Indian Lamb Curry made in an hour with and easy homemade curry spice mix and creamy tomato sauce, simmered on low heat until fall apart tender.
Indian Recipes have been a HUGE hit on the site including the fan favorites Slow Cooker Butter Chicken, Chicken Biryani, Easy Tandoori Chicken and Chicken Korma.
Indian Lamb Curry
Anytime we order in Indian food we stick to our classic options like Chicken Tikka Masala, Vegetable Biryani, naan, Saag Paneer and Indian Raita but when we go an Indian restaurant with a lunch buffet my husband makes a bee line for the lamb curry.
Lamb is an interesting protein here in the US. Outside the United States people enjoy lamb dishes far more often, but here it gets the reputation for being really gamey.
What is the gamey taste in meat?
For wild meat, like venison or lamb, you may notice a stronger meat taste. This is due to the difference in diet most wild animals have. Just as cows are fed a mostly corn diet, many wild animals eat different plants and foods which allow for the meat to have a much stronger flavor.
If you find you want the meat to be less flavorful, I recommend trimming as much of the fat as possible as most of the gamey flavor is concentrated in the fat.
Like This
Like this recipe? Then Like us on Facebook!
If you’d prefer to make your Indian lamb curry with coconut milk, you can swap out the greek yogurt at the end of the recipe for 1/2 cup of coconut milk. Then allow it to simmer for an additional five minutes so the sauce can thicken again as the coconut milk is runnier than the greek yogurt.
This Easy Lamb Curry isn’t going to take you all day to prepare or all day to find the ingredients. I avoid some of the more traditional hard to find ingredients like black cardamom or even cinnamon sticks because in testing I found we maintained great flavor with the easier swaps.
If you have these ingredients you’re welcome to use them:
- swap ground cardamom for one black cardamom pod
- swap cinnamon for one cinnamon stick
Just be sure you remove these ingredients before serving as they are not palatable to eat. I don’t worry too much about the cloves or the black peppercorns as they sort of melt away into the lamb curry during cooking.
Create a free account to Save Recipes
Indian Lamb Curry in the Slow Cooker
You can easily make this recipe in the slow cooker by adding all the ingredients except the greek yogurt into the slow cooker. Cook on low for 6 hours. Then add in the greek yogurt, stir and cook on high, for 30 more minutes before serving.
The house will smell delicious!
Indian Lamb Curry
Ingredients
- 1/4 cup vegetable oil
- 2 bay leaves
- 4 whole cloves
- 10 black peppercorns
- 2 yellow onions chopped
- 2 pounds boneless lamb cut into 1 pieces
- 1 tablespoon ginger minced
- 1 tablespoon garlic minced
- 1 teaspoon cardamom
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 teaspoon turmeric
- 2 teaspoons coriander
- 2 teaspoons garam masala
- 2 cups water
- 1/2 cup tomato puree
- 1/2 cup greek yogurt
- cilantro for garnish (optional)
Instructions
To a large skillet or dutch oven add the oil on medium heat with the bay leaves, cloves, peppercorns and onions and cook, stirring, for 8-10 minutes.
Add in the lamb, ginger, garlic, cardamom, cinnamon, salt, turmeric, coriander and garam masala cooking and stirring for an additional 8-10 minutes.
Add in the water and tomato puree and let simmer on medium-low heat for 45 minutes, adding in the yogurt just before serving.
This is really good! I was a little worried when it wasn’t very thick, after the medium-low 45 minute simmer. However, letting it go another half hour while making the rice, made it just fine. Also, we used coconut milk instead of greek yogurt, as it’s what we had. And I mistakenly grabbed tomato paste instead of puree, but again, still delicious. Thanks for a yummy recipe!
I’m glad to know you enjoyed it, Kristin.
Not tasty enough. Added far more of the herbs and spices than the recipe called for. Disappointed
Delicious and best of all it was husband and kids approved! Definitely adding this dish to my regular lunches! Thank you!
This did not taste like an Indian curry to me. It was flavorful and tender but it is a lamb stew that covers up the wonderful flavor of lamb. It is missing acid and another flavor-perhaps peppers? It was tasty but not the Indian flavor I was looking for. If you added potatoes and carrots, it would be a really wonderful stew.
Absolutely delicious – what more can I say!
Thanks, Alison.
This is an EXCELLENT recipe! The first time I used regular diced lamb and a block coconut cream from a brand I don’t usually buy. It was ok and worth making again, but tonight I tried with lean diced lamb and a good coconut cream and it was HEAVENLY!!! Just absolutely DELISH and I will definitely make again! Thanks for sharing and don’t hesitate to try this! My only major sub this time was mild curry powder for Garson masala and cumin for coriander just cuz it’s what I had handy. All the other spices I already had because I love to cook Indian food, so that was a bonus as well! Thanks again for this! Cheers!
Yay!! Thanks for coming back to let me know how much you enjoyed it.
I have made this curry many times and shared the recipe with several friends. It is easy to follow, and if you can find the ingredients in the bulk section of your local store you can minimize the cost of the spices you may not use frequently. I have tried this with yogurt, coconut milk, or neither we love it either way.
So glad you have found this recipe to be such a good go-to! Thank you for leaving a review!
This recipe sounds very good, but for the life of me I can’t understand why you refer to lamb as a “wild animal”
Absolutely amazing recipe! Although the spices are a little difficult to come by and also a little pricey. I did add a little curry powder, increased the garam masala by a teaspoon, and a little more salt. Made Bombay potatoes on the side! My kids who are picky, loved it. Great recipe, looking forward to making it again!!
Sorry Sabrina this is not a curry, a curry without any chilli is not a curry its a soup. You have not recreated an authentic curry you have invented a lamb soup im afraid. Incorrect describing it as a curry, and if people like this then they are liking soup not curry. Anyone expecting an authentic curry will be disappointed with this recipe i think.
Too watery. Maybe toss the lame in flour first?
Was your lamb frozen at one time? I’m thinking maybe it wasn’t completely thawed??
Flavorful and versatile sauce. Made it with lamb and chicken but works well as a separately cooked satisfying vegan sauce with chickpeas in a bowl with pickled veggies and a grain.
Followed exact recipe and it had no flavor at all and too much onion
Great base recipe. Increased the salt and pepper, added 2 t curry powder, extra garlic and 2 squirts of sriracha. We loved it!
Unfortunately this meal was not a hit with my family. We followed the recipe but overall it was found to be very bland and tasted more like a very mild tagine. Disappointing
Great curry. Changed it a little, added a extra onion and increased the garam masala to 3 tsp. Household food critics (kids) loved it. Would add a little chilli powder if you like a little warmer as it is very mild. Also might try it with Cream rather than the coconut cream we used.
I made this today. Wow. It tasted exactly like at the local Indian restaurant I used to frequent before the lockdown.
Thank you Sabrina.
Love the lamb curry. We had grilled lamb for Easter and I made the curry sauce to go with the leftovers. It’s one of the first curries I’ve made that really tastes like what I would get from our local takeout restaurants. Thank you!
You’re welcome, Jeremy.
This was just delicious and so easy to do! Will definitely cook it again!
An enthusiastic 5 stars! I was nervous because this was my first time making curry. I’ve now made it twice and I am really pleased with the experiments. The sauce is delicious and flavorful and so comforting. The first time we followed the recipe as written and it was perfect. So tender and perfect with rice and cilantro. This latest time I didn’t have everything quite in order but I wanted to make another batch. I used 26oz of mixed cauliflower and potato instead of meat, slightly watered down sour cream instead of yogurt, and I only had a quarter of an onion. It turned out equally if not more delicious than the first time! I’m so glad to have found this recipe I will be trying with many different base ingredients in the future. The spice mix is perfect and sauce so scrumptious with rice. The recipe is so versatile, don’t be nervous to try something else (less expensive) than lamb. I do recommend tempering the yogurt with a bit of the hot curry before adding it. This would also work great with a non-dairy yogurt or sour cream substitute. Yum! Can’t wait to make more.
Thank you for taking the time to come back and let me know how much you enjoy this recipe.
Just finished making it, just waiting for the lamb to be done. I did taste the curry and I loved it. The recipe says to use cardamom, but I wasn’t sure it I should use green or black, so I used black cardamom. I took the seeds out of their shells and used my coffee grinder to turn the cardamom seeds into a powder. I hoped that wouldn’t make the curry too pungent and so far it seemed not to. Would you advise otherwise to just use the seeds as they are, or did I make a mistake by doing this? Also, was I supposed to use green or black cardamom seeds? When we go to an Indian restaurant and I have lamb curry, the color and flavor is very different from this one. The color of the lamb curry is more of a dark brick red color and the flavor of the lamb curry is more savory than this one. How can I make a lamb curry that is similar to that, let me know if you have a different recipe for lamb curry that might mimic the one from the restaurant that I go to. The restaurant is Indian Oven and it’s located in Mesa Arizona. Otherwise, thanks for your lamb recipe. It looks like its going to be a winner for tonight’s dinner!
The cardamom should be green for this recipe. It wouldn’t be too much to grind your own either. It’s such a great idea! Glad you love the recipe so much.