Thai Sweet Potato and Spinach One-Pot Curry Recipe
This creamy sweet potato and spinach curry is Thai-style vegetarian comfort food. You cook it in one pot, and the aroma of curry paste and coconut milk will quickly bring everyone to the table. Similar to Indian curry, it’s warming and filling, but has the characteristic Thai freshness of lime and herbs.
This is a home-style, simplified take on Thai curry, inspired by street food stalls but based on ingredients that are easy to find in Western supermarkets. Instead of meat it uses chickpeas, fitting into the growing trend of plant-based cooking.
This curry combines a thick, coconut sauce with soft sweet potatoes and springy chickpeas in a single pot, without complicated techniques. The flavor is as bold as in Thai street stalls, but you can buy all the ingredients in a regular supermarket. The recipe is very forgiving with vegetable swaps, so it’s easy to use up leftovers from the fridge.
Why this version works
- The sweet potatoes cook in a mixture of stock and coconut milk, so they soften evenly without turning into puree.
- Chickpeas and spinach go into the pot at the end, so they don’t turn mushy and keep their color.
- One‑pot cooking makes it easy to control the thickness of the sauce by adding more stock or coconut milk as you go.
- Lime added after taking the pot off the heat boosts freshness and balances the sweetness of the sweet potatoes and the richness of the coconut.
Chef's tips
Choose firm sweet potatoes without soft spots – overripe ones fall apart quickly and turn the sauce into an unappealing mush. Don’t pour in all the coconut milk at once; reserve some for adjusting the final thickness when you see how much the sweet potatoes have thickened the sauce. Look for the moment when the cubes are tender, the sauce is creamy, and you can see delicate red streaks of curry paste on the surface.
How to serve
Serve with jasmine or basmati rice, or in a more homely way – with bulgur or pearl barley, which soak up the sauce beautifully. Put lime wedges, fresh cilantro, and chili flakes on the table so everyone can season their own portion. The curry reheats well, so it’s perfect for a work or college lunchbox.
Watch out for
- Don’t cut the sweet potatoes smaller than 1.5–2 cm cubes, or they’ll fall apart quickly and thicken the sauce into a cream soup.
- Fry the curry paste only until it becomes very fragrant; if it browns, it will give a bitter, heavy aftertaste.
- Before salting, always taste after adding soy sauce – it’s easy to oversalt because the stock can be salty too.
- Don’t cook the spinach for long; once the leaves wilt and turn a deep green, the curry is ready.
Substitutions
- You can swap spinach for kale cut into thin strips, added 5–7 minutes earlier.
- Replace canned chickpeas with cooked red or green lentils.
- You can substitute vegetable stock with water plus a teaspoon of miso paste for deeper flavor.
- Choose the curry paste by heat level: yellow is milder, red is distinctly hotter.
Ingredients
- sweet potatoes - 600 g
- fresh spinach - 100 g
- canned chickpeas - 240 g
- coconut milk kokosowe z puszki - 400 ml
- vegetable stock - 300 ml
- red or yellow curry paste - 2 tablespoon
- onion - 1 piece
- garlic - 2 clove
- fresh ginger - 15 g
- soy sauce sojowy - 1.5 tablespoon
- lime juice - 2 tablespoon
- oil roślinny - 2 tablespoon
- fresh coriander or parsley - 2 tablespoon
- rice jaśminowy (do podania) - 240 g
Preparation
- Peel the onion and cut into thin slices. Finely chop the garlic and grate the ginger on a fine grater. Peel the sweet potatoes and cut into approx. 2 cm cubes.
- Heat the oil in a large pot over medium heat. Add the onion and fry for 4–5 minutes, stirring, until it softens and becomes slightly translucent but does not brown.
- Add the garlic, ginger and curry paste. Fry for 1–2 minutes, stirring constantly, until the spices become very fragrant.
- Add the diced sweet potatoes and stir so they are coated in the curry paste. Pour in the stock and half of the coconut milk. Stir, bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low.
- Cook covered for 15–20 minutes, until the sweet potatoes are tender – check with a fork; it should slide easily into the centre of a cube.
- Add the drained chickpeas and the remaining coconut milk. Cook for another 5 minutes on low heat so the flavours meld.
- Add the spinach (if using fresh, add it in batches). Stir for 1–2 minutes, until the leaves wilt and reduce in volume. If using frozen spinach, cook for 3–4 minutes, until thawed and well combined with the sauce.
- Season the curry with soy sauce and lime juice. Start with half the lime juice, taste, and add the rest if needed until the flavour is slightly tangy and fresh.
- Serve the hot curry with cooked jasmine rice, sprinkled with fresh coriander or parsley.
Storage
No storage information available for this dish.
This is my go‑to dish for wet autumn evenings after getting off the tram, when all I want is one very warming bowl. I often throw in leftover bits of vegetables from the fridge – a few florets of cauliflower or half a can of chickpeas – and the curry always saves the day.
