Grandma’s Curry Ghackets with Rice

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My grandma's take on Ghackets mit Hörnli: a minced meat sauce with a heaped spoon of curry, served over jasmine rice with buttered carrots.

• Serves 4
• 40 minutes

Her recipe, her rules

My grandma passed away this year at 97, and this is the dish that takes me straight back to lunch at her place. She stirred curry powder into her Ghackets back when most Swiss people still thought Italian food was exotic.

Her one rule: brown the meat properly. That's where the flavour comes from.

The recipe

Ingredients

• Ghackets

• 500 g mixed minced meat
• 2 onions
• 3 garlic cloves
• 1 tbsp butter for frying
• 1 heaped tbsp curry powder, mild or hot
• 2 tbsp flour
• 600 ml stock
• 100 ml half cream
• A handful of parsley
• Salt and pepper

• Sides

• 350 to 400 g jasmine rice
• 6 large carrots
• Butter
• Parsley

How to make it

1. Wash the rice two or three times until the water runs clear, then cook it according to the packet.
2. Sear the minced meat in butter over high heat until it is deeply browned. Take your time, this is where most of the flavour comes from. Turn it, then lower the heat to medium so it doesn't burn. A splash of water helps if it starts catching.
3. Add the finely chopped onions and cook until glassy. Add the grated or pressed garlic and cook for another minute.
4. Stir in the flour briefly, then deglaze with the stock. Add the curry powder and let the sauce reduce until it coats the meat.
5. Finish with the cream and the finely chopped parsley. Season with salt and pepper.
6. Cut the carrots on the diagonal, turning them a quarter after each cut so you get angled wedges. Steam or boil them for 10 to 15 minutes, they should keep some bite. Toss with butter and a little parsley.
7. Serve the sauce over the rice with the carrots on the side.

Don't rush the browning. Grey mince makes a flat sauce. Deep brown mince makes grandma's sauce.

Hörnli instead of rice is the classic version. Both work.