Name: Vindaloo (Goan Pork in Vinegar and Garlic)
Prep time: 30 min
Cook time: 1 h 40 min
Total time: 2 h 10 min
Yield: 4 servings
Cuisine: Indian
Ingredients: 1 kg pork; 1.5 tsp salt; 12 pcs dried Kashmiri chillies; 15 cloves garlic; 30 g ginger; 2 tsp cumin seeds; 1 tsp black peppercorns; 1 piece cassia bark; 6 pcs cloves; 4 pods green cardamom; 1 tsp ground turmeric; 150 ml vinegar; 4 tbsp neutral oil; 2 pcs onions; 4 pcs green chillies; 1.5 tbsp jaggery; 2 tbsp vinegar; 1 tsp salt

Ingredients

4servings

Meat
pork · belly or shoulder; it needs the fat to carry the acid1 kg
salt1.5 tsp
Vindaloo paste
dried Kashmiri chillies · deseeded; use 8 if yours are hotter12 pcs
garlic · the alhos of the name. Do not economise15 cloves
ginger30 g
cumin seeds2 tsp
black peppercorns1 tsp
cassia bark · 5cm1 piece
cloves6 pcs
green cardamom4 pods
ground turmeric1 tsp
vinegar · cane or malt vinegar, used instead of water for grinding. Rice vinegar is too mild150 ml
To cook
neutral oil4 tbsp
onions · thinly sliced2 pcs
green chillies · slit lengthways, added at the end4 pcs
jaggery · or dark brown sugar; it rounds off the vinegar1.5 tbsp
vinegar · to finish, replacing the sharpness lost to the cooking2 tbsp
salt · to taste1 tsp

Steps

Cut the pork into 3cm pieces, pat dry and salt with 1.5 tsp.
⏲ 10 min
Deseed the dried chillies and soak them in hot water for 15 minutes. Throw the soaking water away — it does not go into the paste.
⏲ 15 min
Toast the cumin, peppercorns, cassia, cloves and cardamom in a dry pan over medium-low heat for 2 minutes. Stop at aroma, well before smoke.
⏲ 3 min
Blend the soaked chillies, garlic, ginger, toasted spices and turmeric to a fine paste using the 150ml of vinegar as the only liquid. Not a drop of water. This is the difference between vindaloo and a curry with vinegar splashed in: the acid has to be inside the paste to travel into the meat while it marinates.
⏲ 10 min
Coat the pork with all of the paste, seal it in a container and refrigerate 12-24 hours. That time is not there to flavour the meat but to cure it — the same principle by which Portuguese ships carried pork without it spoiling.
Fry the onions in the oil over medium heat for 8-10 minutes until browned. Their sweetness is the other side of the balance against the acid.
⏲ 10 min
Add the marinated pork with every bit of the paste and fry over high heat for 5 minutes, scraping the bowl out into the pan.
⏲ 5 min
Cover and cook over low heat for 60-80 minutes. Add no water: the pork's own moisture and the vinegar are enough, and water dilutes the acid this dish is built on. Stir every 20 minutes to check the base.
⏲ 80 min
Uncover and reduce for 10-15 minutes. It is ready when the sauce clings to the meat and red oil rises to the surface.
⏲ 15 min
Season with jaggery and salt, then add the final 2 tbsp of vinegar. Long cooking drives the sharpness off, and returning it here is what stands the dish up on its three axes of sour, sweet and hot. Add the green chillies and give it 2 more minutes.
⏲ 3 min
Take it off the heat, cool, and refrigerate overnight. Vindaloo peaks on the second day: the vinegar works further into the pork and the spices even out. Reheat and serve with rice or bread.

Tips & Variations

Variations

Chicken or lamb both work: 40 minutes for chicken, 100 for lamb. Cut the marinade

to 4 hours for chicken — the acid is strong enough to turn the flesh chalky over a night.

The British curry-house vindaloo is a different dish, invented to fill the hottest

slot on a menu, with Goa's sourness and sweetness dropped and only the heat kept. This recipe is not that one.

Sorpotel belongs to the same Goan-Portuguese family, made with pork liver and heart

and matured in vinegar for longer. Richer and sourer than vindaloo.

Add potatoes if you like — because they taste good, not because they are

traditional (see the etymology below). Quarter two of them and add them for the last 25 minutes.

Rogan josh is the other long-braised Indian meat dish on this site

and its acid comes from somewhere else — yoghurt there, vinegar here. Cooking them near each other is a good way to see what acid does in a braise.

Serve with rice, naan, or Goan sannas.

Tips

Grind in vinegar, not water. The name says so: vindaloo comes from the Portuguese

carne de vinha d'alhos, meat in wine or vinegar and garlic, where the acid and garlic acted as the preservative that let ships carry pork. Vinegar poured in later only seasons the surface; vinegar in the paste travels inward as it marinates.

The "aloo" is a mishearing. Alhos is Portuguese for garlic, not potato. Restaurants

in India and Britain began adding potatoes because of the name, so a vindaloo without them is the original, not a version with something missing.

Add no water while it cooks. Diluting the acid slackens the meat and collapses the

balance. If the base looks like catching, lower the heat rather than adding liquid.

Vinegar in two goes. The first 150ml is for curing; the final 2 tbsp is for aroma

and edge. Acid is volatile, so all of it at the start leaves nothing sharp by the time the dish is done (balancing flavour).

Use a fatty cut. Made with loin, only the sourness survives. Belly or shoulder fat

supports the vinegar, and the collagen turning to gelatin gives the sauce its body (braising: collagen and time).

Toast the whole spices first. Two minutes in a dry pan before grinding makes a

bigger difference here than you would expect (blooming spices).

Do not skip the jaggery. Without sweetness, 150ml of vinegar simply stands there

sharp. A tablespoon and a half of sugar does the same job.

The second day, and the day after. Because the acid works as a preservative it

keeps a week refrigerated and three months frozen. This is a dish to make ahead on purpose (salt and seasoning).

The basics behind this dish

Cooking basics →

More of the same kind

Main course →

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