A Much Needed Dose Of Comfort

Keema Pie with Curry Leaf Smashed Potatoes

If there was a week where I think we could all do with some serious comfort food, it’s this week!

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It's probably not that surprising to find out I’m a classic comfort eater; food is how I celebrate, how I commiserate, and how I successfully (?) smother all of my feelings until they no longer exist. You know, really healthy coping methods! Okay, maybe not, but that has always been my reality.

The question for today is, what exactly is comfort food? Comfort food has been a very popular topic of cookbooks over the last few years, and if the recipes in those pages tell us anything, it's that comfort food is incredibly personal and has no global definition.

For me personally, comfort food has two sides: the process and the dish itself. Comfort food needs to be delicious, of course, but a lot of the time I also need to enjoy the process. It needs to be a recipe that has me sequestered away in the kitchen for at least an hour or two so that I can get out of my head and enjoy a little bubble of time where the world doesn’t exist and instead I’m just stirring something slowly whilst having a little dance in the kitchen or I’m lost listening to a podcast. I dont have a clear idea of what makes a dish itself specifically comforting, but there are certain things that definitely add to that sense of comfort. That could be the use of cheese, spices, carbs, and fat. Did I say carbs already? Definitely carbs. If it's a dish I crave when it's cold and grey outside, it's a fair bet that it is something I would define as comforting.

Today's comfort is my dictionary definition of comfort, a pie. Not just any old pie, but a spiced keema pie made with homemade puff pastry served with curry leaf smashed potatoes. Just the absolute best. I can't tell you how delicious this pie was or how much restraint I needed to not have a second slice the second I had finished the first. I am very far from being an expert in Indian cooking, but it is often a food I turn to when going in search of comfort. It could be the spicing, but I think it's likely also nostalgia. I grew up in Bradford, a city with a very large Pakistani and Indian population. It’s probably no surprise then that the food of these regions is something I love.

When it comes to the pastry, you have a choice: homemade or shop-bought. I will never criticise anyone for using shop bought puff pastry because, let's be honest, it's on the more complicated and time-consuming side of things. But if you’re like me, you may actually enjoy this process. I find making puff pastry kind of meditative, and it’s a process I can easily get lost in; it's a project to occupy my racing thoughts, a labour of love that can calm me down. If you want to give homemade puff pastry a go, you can find my recipe here. You’ll need half of this recipe for the pie, but it's worth making the whole batch and freezing half for another recipe.

Keema is a mince-based dish; keema literally means mince. Most often it is made with lamb or mutton, but it can also be made with beef or even chicken. My favourite will however always be lamb, especially when you use mince with a decent amount of fat. Delicious! What I love about a keema is that it's incredibly easy to make, but there are so many different ways you can make it and so many regional versions to try. I really want to give Maunika Gowardhan’s version made with coconut milk and vinegar a go, as well as Nik Sharma’s Goan version made with potato, vinegar, and cloves. For my version, I wanted something slightly saucy so I would make for a great pie filling, so I added tinned tomatoes.