Hump Day Curry

It's was another crazy week up here.

I've been running meetings all week with spillover onto Sunday and Monday.Blah!  By Wednesday I was already losing steam. A week stuck in meetings means a week of work and emails piling up only desk. Double Blah!

On top of that I'm supposed to make a dessert buffet for 60 for our office X'mas party this Saturday. No, of course I hadn't started baking anything. Heck, by the time I get home, walk the pups, make dinner and clean up, it's 9pm by the time I get a chance to put my tired feet up and I don't feel like pulling a Martha Stewart outta my butt!

I'd figured I'd at least cut out having to cook for the rest of the week and make big pot of curry. Not just any curry, Ptarmigan Curry.

A recipe? As far as I'm concerned, the best curry is basically a stir-fry with curry powder instead of soy sauce. And no, I don't have a recipe for stir-fry. The best stir-fry, like the best curry, is a quick, ruthless discussion between you and your fridge.

  "Psst, what you got on your shelves, Mr. Fridge."
"A bunch of spinach handful of baby carrots, half an onion, half decapitated crown of broccoli and 2 sad mushrooms."
"I'll take everything but the mushrooms."
"That'll make them even sadder."
"Too bad. No room for sad veggies."

I'll admit that the of the veggies used in tonight's curry came off the veggie tray from my meeting today. A handful of carrots, tomatoes, broccoli, cauliflower and celery. What do you want from me? I hate watching food, especially perfectly fine veggies go to waste.
When broccoli is $6 a bunch and potato is going for $20 a bag of potatoes, I'm shameless.
And anyways, it also already cut up and ready to go.

I also had a bunch of kale and cilantro in the fridge. I added a can of chickpeas foraged from the backwoods of my pantry.

  I seasoned the ptarmigan breasts with salt, pepper and curry powder and seared them for 2 minutes on each side over med-high heat. I cut them into bite-sized pieces and added them to the curry. You want the breasts on the bloody side of rare because it'll cook a bit more when you add it to the curry.
Here's the end result:

Throughout the week, I'll just keep tweaking it to make variations. One night I'll 'souped' it up with some coconut milk. Another night, I'll added a more tomatoes. It's great with a range of starches from quinoa to rice noodles to being stuffed into a wrap for lunch.

Hurray for Hump Day Ptarmigan Curry!