Curry puffs are one of those things that there seem to be as many recipes for them as there are people who make them.

Cooks use puff pastry to shortcrust pastry and many things in between, and that’s just the outside. The filling can be curried anything from plain potatoes to vegetables, chicken or sardines.

Making curry puffs from scratch can be a fulfilling project for an empty afternoon, but cheating is allowed with frozen pastry for those none too confident of their skills as a pastry chef. Just handle with care so they do not explode.

Ingredients

Filling

• 5 tablespoons oil
• 1 medium red onion finely chopped
• 1/2 teaspoon kurma or chicken curry powder
• 2 teaspoons meat or chicken curry powder
• 1 teaspoon chilli powder
• 1/2 teaspoon turmeric powder
• 1/2 cup finely diced chicken breast meat
• 2 large potatoes boiled and finely diced
• 1 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Pastry

• 450 g plain flour
• 140 g margarine or shortening
• 177 ml water
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Directions

• Make the filling first. Heat oil and fry onions gently until golden brown. Add the kurma and curry powder, chilli, turmeric and fry gently.
• Add the chicken, potatoes, sugar, pepper and salt and cook for five minutes. Mix well and leave aside to cool.
• To make pastry, mix flour with margarine, water and salt and knead well.
• Let it rest for 1/2 hour.
• Cut the dough into circles (7.5 cm) in diameter and place a tablespoon or so of filling on one side.
• Fold pastry over to make a half circle and crimp at edges.
• Deep fry in hot oil until golden.

This recipe first appeared in Rasa Malaysia. Low Bee Yinn is a food blogger and cookbook author.