Recipes / Potjie
Vegetable and bean potjie
A meat-free potjie of potatoes, butternut, carrots and three kinds of beans in a mild curry and tomato sauce, layered and left to simmer over a few coals.
- Prep
- 25 min
- On the fire
- 1 hr 30 min
- Serves
- 6
Ingredients
Vegetables and beans, in the order they go in
To finish
Method
Cooking on gas?
- A potjie works well on gas, and the heat is easier to hold steady than coals.
- Use a gas ring, your grill's side burner, or stand the pot on the grates over one burner with the grill lid open. Check that it can take the weight of a full pot.
- Where the recipe says hot or medium coals for browning, use a medium-high flame. Where it says low coals or a few coals under the pot, turn it down to the lowest flame that keeps a gentle bubble. You will not need to add fresh coals.
- Set a No. 3 potjie or an 8 litre (8 quart) Dutch oven over medium coals. Heat the oil and cook the onions for 8 minutes until soft and starting to colour.
- Add the garlic, ginger, chilli, curry powder, cumin and paprika. Stir for 1 minute.
- Add the tomatoes, chutney and stock and bring it to a simmer.
- Layer without stirring: potatoes and butternut first, then carrots, then the three kinds of beans. Sprinkle half the salt and the pepper over them.
- Add the red pepper, mushrooms and baby marrows on top, and sprinkle the rest of the salt over them.
- Put the lid on. Rake the coals away so only a handful remain under the pot. Simmer gently for 75 to 90 minutes, adding 2 or 3 fresh coals every 30 minutes.
- After 45 minutes, lift the lid once. If the bottom looks dry, pour a little hot stock down the side of the pot.
- When the potatoes are soft, put the spinach on top, close the lid and leave it for 3 minutes to wilt. Stir gently once, taste for salt and scatter the coriander over.
Done when: a knife slides easily into the potatoes and butternut, and the sauce has thickened around the beans.
Tips
- Tinned beans are already cooked. They go in above the potatoes so they heat through without turning to mush.
- Keep the coals under the pot only. Vegetables catch on the bottom faster than meat does.
- Serve with pap, rice or potbrood. A spoon of plain yoghurt on top is good if you are not keeping it vegan.
Potjiekos was built around meat, but a vegetable potjie has long been the dish for the one vegetarian at a braai, and many people now cook it as the main event. Beans give it the body that meat would. The method is the same as any potjie: build the flavour at the bottom, layer the hard vegetables first and leave the lid on. See potjie basics for pot sizes and heat.