Every Sunday night, I plan the weekly evening meal menu to suit my family of four, which is no easy task due to various activities and taste buds.
So when I was approached by The Spice Pioneer to give their five new Power Pod spice mixes a go, I thought why not!
The Spice Pioneer launched these five new Power Pod spice mix meal kits earlier this month and the full range includes Chicken Lollipops, Chilli con Carne, Fajita, Katsu Curry and Peri-Peri Chicken.
The spices are sourced using worldwide ingredients and are selected due to the authentic and powerful quality of their flavours.
An added bonus is that all the spice mixes are gluten free, vegetarian and made with only natural ingredients, they’re a great culinary adventure waiting for you to start cooking with.
The fact that all of the packaging used for the product is recyclable, was an added bonus.
I decided to cook the Katsu Curry spice power pod first as I thought this was the least spicy flavour to start with.
As a family we all love chicken thighs and a curry, so I varied the recipe a little by using them instead of breaded chicken, which is the easy recipe given on the back of the packet.
My 15 year old son wanted to help me cook, so he became my junior chef for that nights preparations and he was in charge of the sauce with a little help from me, whilst I prepared the chicken and wild rice.
The recipe, which is on the reverse of the packet and shown above, is simple to follow and such a revolutionary way to cook an easy and quick midweek meal.
The preparations took us about half an hour with a further 15 mins for the chicken to marinade in the wok over a heated hob ring.
My husband and daughter both commented on the lovely aromas coming out of the kitchen whilst we were cooking the Katsu curry and I must say that they weren’t wrong, you could smell the cumin, coriander, clove and turmeric spices.
Once the chicken had cooked through, we blended the sauce mix into a thick creamy sauce and added it to our chicken before serving it with the wild rice and garlic poppadums.
The sauce had a lovely colour to it and it really did taste like a gourmet curry sauce.
However, next time I make it, I would pour it over breaded chicken as stated in the recipe as it was a bit overpowering as purely a curry sauce.
Personally for us, we found the clove aspect of the sauce tended to overtake the taste of the chicken. But that was probably my fault for adapting the recipe to suit us… rather than sticking to the instructions and using breaded chicken with a little sauce drizzled over it!
Each of the 5 power pods I received have their spice grades listed on the front of the packaging, thus making it easy to know what to expect in the spice stakes.
For example the Katsu curry was a one, and that was quite spicy for us. The others we will be trying will be the Chilli con Carne (spice graded 2), the Fajitia (spice graded 2) and Chicken Lollipops (spice graded 0.5).
As a family we’re not really into very hot spicy food, so the Peri Peri which is a high spice 3 rating, may be a little beyond out taste buds.
It’s easy to see why these Power Pods provide an inspiring means of making healthy and uncomplicated home-made meals.
As people’s lives are so much busier these days, these power pods offer you great gourmet flavoured spices to add to your everyday meals and at just £1.99 per pod, they offer great value for money also.
You can see the full range of recipe boxes and power pods that are available on the Spice Pioneer website.
With leading food writers like Delia Smith and Rick Stein having endorsed the use of the Seasoned Pioneers spice blends, it is high praise indeed and little wonder that these pods will prove to be hugely popular.
The flavour of this Katsu curry was worth that extra bit of preparation time, even if we did go a bit off kilter with the recipe. Another big plus for me was the simplicity of the recipe, even my 15 year old son could follow without any confusion.
Therefore, if you are looking to spice up your ordinary midweek meals, I can recommend this Katsu curry recipe. Although, it is probably best to stick to the breaded chicken and pour some of the sauce over it, so as not to overpower your meal like we did!
We’re already looking forward to trying out some of the other power pods over Christmas, especially to spruce up some of the leftover turkey.
Thank you to The Spice Pioneer for gifting us the Power Pods for review.