Seafood Karahi

Was in the mood for something spicy and nothing captures that better than Indo-Paki food.  Our food is so unique because of our spice palette and nothing beats food from your home country, ever!

One of the easiest dishes I know how to whip up is Karahi Chicken.  One of my favorite Pakistani dishes. My dad makes the absolute best Karahi Gosht (beef).  It's a dish made in a karahi, the South Asian version of a wok, with lots of tomatoes, chilies, cilantro, garlic, ginger, spices, and meat.  I make mine with chicken because I don't have the patience to wait for beef to get tender, unless I have a couple hours to wait.  It's 6:30pm, I'm exhausted, and I want dinner NOW.

I decided to get a little creative and use salmon and shrimp in my karahi, and it was a darn good decision. We love seafood in our house, so this was a total win.  Salmon is a nice meaty fish that holds it shape in cooking, and shrimp, well it's shrimp...perfect for a curry...yum.  Both soaked up the curry sauce and its spices so well and cooked up quicker than chicken or beef.

 Seafood Karahi:

Vegetable oil
1 medium onion, halved, sliced thinly
1 tsp ground red pepper
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp garam masala (found in the indian store, or make your own; my MIL does)
1/2 tsp turmeric
1 tsp sea salt
1 tbs green masala (grounded serrano peppers, cilantro, garlic, and ginger)
1 tbs ginger & garlic paste (LOVE this)
1/2 serrano pepper sliced in half, deseeded and deveined
1-in portion of ginger, sliced thinly
3 roma tomatoes, halved, chunked
1/2 pound salmon, chunked
1/2 pound jumbo shrimp, peeled and deveined
Handful chopped cilantro

Heat 2 tbs vegetable oil in your karahi (wok) over medium heat.  Add onions and fry until a deep brown color.  Add the serrano and ginger, and fry for 2 minutes.

Add the spices, plus green masala and ginger/garlic paste.  Fry this up with the onions for about 2 minutes so the spices toast up and let off their aroma.  Be careful not to let this splatter on you...liquid plus oil is scary.

Throw in the tomatoes, and let simmer with the spices and onions until the tomatoes begin to break down (look at you...making curry...)

Add in the salmon first and cook for about 5 minutes and then add the shrimp, since it takes far less time to cook shrimp.  Throw in some cilantro, reserving some for garnish, and stir.  Let simmer until salmon is flaky and shrimp is opaque.  Eat over basmati rice and garnish with cilantro.

Enjoy!