Microwave Veggie Curry!! | Jamie Oliver’s £1 Wonders

It's time to celebrate one of the unsung heroesof the kitchen, the microwave – I bet you never thought I'd say that. I can't wait to share mygorgeous spinach, sweet potato & chickpea curry, with perfectly fluffy rice. Cooked from startto finish in the microwave, it's a nutritious and delicious midweek supper for two. Sowith all this talk about the cost of energy, the humble microwave has actually come out on topas one of the cheapest ways to cook food in your kitchen. And I'm gonna cook you the most deliciouscurry, from scratch, with the most perfect fluffy rice. It's a veggie curry it's got five – yes five- of your five fruit and veg a day in one dish. I'm gonna start with the rice. So get yourself abuilder's mug, right. Half fill it – this is for two people by the way – with your basmati rice.That's 150 grams. Then we're gonna go in with.

Our mug which is full of water, so basically it'stwo to one, water to rice. And don't forget a nice pinch of salt. So give that a little stir. Andthis is the same quantities as if you were cooking it in a pan on a hob, but we're gonna put a lid ontop and then this goes in the microwave. Now we're gonna put it in for around 10 minutes on medium.Let's just get this right. Oh no, 92 minutes. Right, just over 10 minutes… I'm still notas fluent as I'd like to be. So while the rice is cooking let's put together a beautiful freshcurry, this is with sweet potatoes, chickpeas, spinach, it's gonna be beautifully spiced. Soit's really fun to make and super super simple. We're gonna use the humble box grater so first, onthe coarse side, we're gonna take one onion that I've peeled and we're just gonna grate that. It isdifferent than cutting it, you're kind of bruising.

It a little bit and getting those juices out.We're gonna add to that. Fresh ginger it's such an amazing spice, it's got heat it's got freshness.So just use a knife to very simply scrape off that outer skin. I'm gonna get that andgrate it on the course side as well. Now on our box grater we're gonna gofrom the coarse side to the fine side, and this is particularly good for garlic, Idon't want big chunks of garlic just little ones. I'm gonna go in now with one heaped teaspoonof curry powder. Then two tablespoons of tomato purée goes in. A pinch of salt and pepper.And about a tablespoon of vegetable oil. So this is like my curry base right, thinkof it as the foundations of this curry. Then, kind of the king of the curry is the sweet potato.If there's any little gnarly bits just simply nick.

It off. Give it a little poke with a knife, andwe'll place that in here. I know it looks bonkers but go with it, there's sense and logic. Then onewhole chilli, I'm just gonna prick that as well. And then this is gonna go into the microwave forten minutes to develop the flavour and cook the sweet potato. So in this curry you're gonna getfive, yes five, of your five fruit and veg a day in one dinner. Okay you heard the bleep. It'shot – I forget, it's the microwave it's hot! So out comes our rice, let's have a quick look.You can see it's absorbed beautifully and I'm just gonna leave this lid on top and it'sgonna carry on steaming and it might be the lightest rice you've ever done. So, the veggiebase is gonna go in, lid on top again. Come with me on this journey, we're gonna go in themicrowave for another ten minutes, on full whack..

Ok. Alright, alright. Smells amazing!Right. We can take the sweet potato out and just pop it on the board. It's about threequarters cooked, but by sort of splitting it like that. It's hot, so be careful. Youcan just cut it into nice little chunks, and we can sweep that back into our curry. And at this stage we're gonnago in with one tin of chickpeas, juice and all. Then I'm gonna use frozenspinach. It's economical, it's delicious, it's nutritious, and it's sitting therein the freezer waiting to be used. And this will go back in the microwave for 10more minutes at full whack to let all those flavours develop in the most delicious way. So init goes – ooh with a lid on top – and this will.

Be fantastic, I promise you. This isn't cookingas usual for me, but I do like the challenge. Here it is. Microwave curry, smells amazing. Let'shave a little look… look at that. Hot. Steaming. So give it a nice little mix-up. Let's just takethe chilli out for a second. Beautiful colours. Chickpeas, spinach. It really does smell amazing!Let's have a little try, see what's going on. Really fresh. Adjust with salt and pepper.We're gonna take two tablespoons of yoghurt and put it through and marble it, and that yoghurtwill just do the most brilliant job of lightening that curry, look at that. And then, with thespice, now we've tasted it, is it hot enough? Yes, no? So with this little chilli here we can justslice it up and you get to control that chilli hit to your liking, but for me it's all going in! So,curry, rice, still hot and steamy. Let's serve up..

Let's take some of this delicious curry andjust spoon that on top. So there you go, homemade fresh curry made in a microwave, andI never ever thought I'd be doing that but it's important to react to scenarios happening aroundyou and I think that looks absolutely gorgeous, come on let's get in there. It's got loads of flavours, y'know the chickpeasare so creamy the spinach is really like vivid green, the spice is on-point. Really, reallydelicious, that little base that we made has really created the most incredible abundance offlavours and I really didn't think you could get that amount of flavour from a microwave. And youknow what if you don't cook much or at all but you love a curry, please give it a go, it's fresh,it's delicious. You gotta have a go at that..

This cheeky curry generously serves two people anduses tins and spices that have a long shelf life. Served with rice, it's 93p a portion.