Saag paneer with okra and chickpeas

This dish starts as a classic Indian saag paneer — spinach with cheese cubes.

We bulked it out by adding home-canned chickpeas and home-canned okra. You can omit those though if you want to make a pure saag paneer, or don’t have them.

To be clear: this is a cooking with canning recipe, not a recipe for canning.

This recipe uses:

• Home-canned spinach
• Home-canned chickpeas
• Home-canned okra

Yield: 8 x 1 cup (250 g / 8 oz) servings

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Contents hide

• 1 Saag paneer with okra and chickpeas
  • 1.1 Ingredients
  • 1.2 Instructions
  • 1.3 Nutrition
• 2 Recipe notes
• 3 Nutrition

Saag paneer with okra and chickpeas

A take on saag paneer, made with home-canned chickpeas and home-canned okra

Course Side Dish

Cuisine Indian

Keyword Chickpeas, Okra

Prep Time 20 minutes minutes

Cook Time 30 minutes minutes

Total Time 50 minutes minutes

Servings 8 1 cup (250 g / 8 oz)

Calories 528kcal

Metric - US Customary

Ingredients

• 1 half-litre jar home-canned chickpeas (1 pint jar)
• 2 half-litre jars home-canned okra (2 pint jars)
• 1 litre jar home-canned spinach (Or kale. 1 quart)
• 500 g paneer cheese (1 lb)
• 1 tablespoon oil
• 1 tablespoon oil
• 2 teaspoons garam masala
• 1 teaspoon cumin seed
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• ½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
• ½ teaspoon turmeric
• 1 teaspoon gingerroot (fresh, grated)
• 1 teaspoon garlic (minced)
• 1 tomato (chopped)
• 4 tablespoons coconut milk powder
• 1 tablespoon cornstarch
• 250 ml water (1 cup / 8 oz)

Metric - US Customary

Instructions

• Drain and rinse the chickpeas. Place into a bowl.
• Drain the okra; add to bowl.
• Drain the spinach, pressing it a bit to get excess water out. Chop up on chopping board; add to the bowl.
• Set the bowl aside.
• Cube the paneer cheese; brown in the heated 1 tablespoon of oil in a frying pan. About 5 minutes. Remove from pan and add to bowl.
• Add the second tablespoon of oil to the pan.
• Add the spices from the garam masala down to and including the garlic. Add as well the chopped tomato. Cook for 4 to 5 minutes.
• Mix the coconut milk powder, the corn starch and the water.
• Add to frying pan. Cook for 3 to 4 minutes.
• Add the contents of the bowl.
• Cover, and let cook for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Nutrition

Serving: 1g | Calories: 528kcal | Carbohydrates: 46g | Protein: 29g | Fat: 29g | Saturated Fat: 15g | Cholesterol: 67mg | Sodium: 99mg | Fiber: 15g | Sugar: 10g

Recipe notes

• For the garlic and ginger, you can just use from a jar.
• If you don’t have coconut milk powder, you can use coconut milk from a jar. Or you can use heavy cream, or yoghurt.
• Indian paneer cheese is a cheese that does not melt during cooking, but rather, holds its shape. Instead of paneer, you could try halloumi cheese, or firm tofu, or just omit.
• Instead of spinach, you could try kale or another green of your choice.

Nutrition

Serving size: 1 cup (250 g / 8 oz)

A lot of the calories come from the chickpeas, but those are good calories.

Per serving:

• 528 calories, 99 mg sodium

* Nutrition info provided by MyFitnessPal