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Vegan Japanese Curry

Do you know that Japanese cuisine is not all about Sushi? We have many comfort food that are served at family meal time. Japanese curry is one of them that everyone including me likes. (I have never met anyone who doesn’t!) When I was a child every Saturday was a curry day so smell of curry always reminds me of my childhood. 

Vegan Japanese Curry

Japanese curry sauce is thicker and it tastes milder with a brown saucy kind of flavour. Usually people make Japanese curry with block of pre-made curry sauce so it is really easy to cook. However, the block often has meat extract in it that makes it difficult for vegans to try its delicious national dish. I found some vegan version blocks here in the UK but they are not cheap I have to tell you that. When I cooked this vegan curry I was very surprised. It does really taste like Japanese curry!! It’s easy to cook and so much healthier compared to the block ones. With this curry I sometimes imitate Japanese Katsu Curry (Japanese curry with pork cutlet) with vegetable cutlet and it is super tasty! I could not resist showing the photo of Katsu Curry here.

Vegan Japanese Curry

Prep Time 10 mins
Cook Time 35 mins
Total Time 45 mins
Servings 4 people

Ingredients
  

  • 1 tbsp Oil for frying
  • 5 cloves garlic chopped
  • 2 Onion chopped
  • 2 big Carrots finely chopped
  • 6 Mushrooms sliced
  • 200 g Tofu cut in small cubes
  • 1 small Apple sliced
  • 2 tbsp Plain flour
  • 1+1/2 tbsp Mild curry powder
  • 1/2 tsp Garam masala
  • 600 ml Vegetable Stock
  • 2 tsp Sugar
  • 1 tbsp Soy sauce
  • 1 tsp Vinegar
  • 1 big Bay leaf use 2 leaves if you have small ones
  • 200-250 g brown or white rice if you use brown rice start cooking earlier as it takes longer
  • 4 Vegetable cutlets optional

Instructions
 

  • In a cooking pot or a wok, fry the vegetables with the bay leaf until they are soft and caramelised on a low heat for about 10 minutes. Add the tofu and continue frying for 5 more minutes, this time on a medium heat.
  • Take the frying pot or a wok off the cooker to take half of the fried vegetables and all of the tofu (if you can't remove all that's OK as long as you get the most out of it) onto a plate and set aside (for adding in the sauce later).
  • Put the frying pot or a wok back on the cooker and add in the apple. Stir with the vegetable for 2 minutes on a medium heat. Add the flour and curry powder, stir to coat everything and fry for a minute.
  • Add the stock a bit at a time. Add in the rest of the ingredients and bring to boil.
  • Reduce the heat and simmer down to a thick sauce. it takes about 20 minutes. You can start cooking rice now if you are cooking white.
  • Blend the sauce with a hand blender until smooth. Add in the other half of the fried vegetables and cook for 5 minutes.
  • Serve with rice and cutlets (optional).

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