Suzie Lee Arbuthnot, Winner of BBC’s Best Home Cook 2020

STAY HOME AND GET COOKING WITH LOVE BELFAST

Suzie Lee Arbuthnot, Winner of BBC’s Best Home Cook 2020

A tasty curry that’s family-friendly and easy to make from ingredients you likely already have in your cupboards, fridge and freezer in just 20-25 minutes. Sounds almost too good to be true, right?! Fortunately, Suzie Lee, Winner of BBC’s Best Home Cook 2020, has shared her recipe for Butterbean and Lentil Curry with us, and it delivers on every front.

As someone with ‘keeping busy’ as her motto, it’s not surprising that many of Suzie’s cooking essentials are to be found in the freezer, and that they help save time peeling and chopping, including frozen onions, garlic, ginger and spinach. With many of us now spending more time in the kitchen, it’s refreshing to hear her promote quick solutions to make that time a little easier. So, next time you’re in the freezer-aisles (which seem to be well stocked at the minute) be proud to be stocking up on chopped and sliced essentials.

Whether one of your weekend traditions is tucking into a comforting curry, or you’re looking for something new to spice up lockdown nights in, Suzie’s recipe is easy and full of flavour. It might well become your own show-stopper.

Simple to cook using only one pot, especially as Suzie has provided a video demonstration for us, many of us will have the ingredients for her recipe in our kitchens already. If you don’t, Suzie encourages Love Belfast home cooks to ‘be brave’ and to not be afraid to substitute ingredients in this or other recipes if you either don’t have them or don’t like something.

And if the Butterbean and Lentil Curry has you wanting more inspiration for family dinners to enjoy during lockdown, Suzie’s approach to cooking for her family is a savvy one to try. She cooks up a range of family favourites each week, including stews, casseroles and soups, and has a practical approach to doing so. She not only uses up ingredients that need eating, but reinvents leftovers into new creations, keeping meals different and interesting whilst avoiding waste. From using left-over roasted veg (which she describes as a ‘one tray wonder’) by blitzing into a pasta sauce that the kids will love, to freezing left-over rice and using it to make fried rice, Suzie’s tips are great and timely as many of us are currently having to produce more meals at home.

From them joining her on our call, to making a guest appearance in her video demonstration, it is clear that Suzie’s enthusiasm for cooking great food is as infectious for her family as it was to me talking with her, hopefully it is for you too.

Stay home and get cooking!

Suzie’s Butterbean and Lentil Curry Recipe

This recipe is for a family of four

Ingredients:

1 tbsp oil

1 medium onion diced finely (or 1 cup of frozen diced onions)

2 cloves of garlic chopped (or frozen)

1 tsp of chopped ginger (or frozen)

2 tbsp curry powder (your preference – mild/medium/hot)

1/2 tbsp of garam masala

1 tin of butterbeans drained

1 tin of chopped tomatoes chopped

1 chicken stock cube crumbled

¼ (50g) cup of lentils

200ml of water approx

75g of chopped up spinach or 1 block of frozen spinach

1 tbsp of chutney

Yoghurt or cream to serve

Rice of choice

Method:

• Fry off the onions on a low heat in the oil till very soft.
• Then add the garlic and curry powder and garam masala, wait for the spices start to catch an aroma (will take about 5 minutes).
• Then add all the other ingredients (Apart from the spinach), pour enough water to just cover all the ingredients in the pan. Approx 200ml water.
• Simmer for about 20 min with lid on till lentils have softened, keep stirring throughout just in case the lentils stick to the pot.
• Then once the lentils are cooked through add the spinach for another 5 minutes or if using frozen spinach till unfrozen.
• Finish with the chutney mixed through and then yoghurt/cream on top.
• Serve with rice of choice

Thanks to Suzie for sharing her tips and recipe with Love Belfast to help us all get cooking as we stay at home.

ABOUT SUZIE

Suzie is the Winner of BBC One’s Best Home Cook 2020! She also happens to be an accountant.

She is a mother-of-two and juggles looking after her young children, with running her accountancy business from home and exercising in her spare time.

Suzie does everything at 100 miles an hour and packs as much as possible into every day, and was nicknamed the “Tasmanian Devil” by her friends as a result.

She’s been cooking since she was a child when she used to help out in her family’s Chinese takeaway. and now Suzie is at her happiest when cooking up big feasts for her extended family. Her cooking style is hearty family food served in very generous portions.

www.suziearbuthnot.com