CHARITY CURRY NIGHT 2
Last Saturday night was the second of mine and my friend Juliet’s ‘Charity Curry Nights’. The format is simple; people book in advance, I cook up a load of curry, people turn up on the night, pay, eat said curry, and we donate the proceeds to charity. I’m loving it, although cooking curry for 25 people might sound like some of your worst nightmares, for me it’s extremely therapeutic, a chance to ignore my bleeping mobile phone with its Twitter notifications and emails and reminders and events and everything else, and just roll my sleeves up and cook.
This month’s curry night was in aid of both my former food bank in Southend, and refugees in Syria. 25 people turned up, and tucked in, and along with Jim and Juliet’s in-house bar selling quite lethal cocktails, we raised a whopping £315.
I cooked the following dishes (those not written on my blog yet will be added later this week and the links added in, so keep your eyes peeled. There seriously aren’t enough hours in my day at the moment!):
‘Sainsburys advert curry’ with added mushrooms – recipe here: http://inspiration.sainsburys-live-well-for-less.co.uk/recipes/jack-monroes-thai-chicken-curry/
Chickpea and peach curry with chicken – adapted from my Jardaloo Ma Murghi recipe here: http://agirlcalledjack.com/2013/04/09/jardaloo-ma-murghi-curry-with-apricots-22p/
Fish korma – recipe here: http://agirlcalledjack.com/2013/12/05/fish-korma-72p-recipes-from-charity-curry-night/
Fish tagine, based on my chicken and mandarin tagine – recipe here: http://agirlcalledjack.com/2013/08/19/spiced-chicken-and-mandarin-tagine-64p/
Spinach and lentil daal – recipe here: http://agirlcalledjack.com/2013/10/03/lentil-and-spinach-daal-66p/
Red lentil and pepper jalfrezi – recipe coming soon!
Cauliflower, green bean and pea passanda – recipe coming soon!
Slow cooker baba ghanoush – recipe coming soon!
Pilau rice – recipe coming soon!
The next one is in March, so if you’re local to Southend, keep your eyes peeled on the Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/agirlcalledjack or ping me an email on jackmonroe@live.co.uk for details.
If you want to organise your own charity curry night, please drop me a line and tell me about it! I know a few people did after the first one in December, and it’s seriously exciting to think that in little pockets of the world people are cooking up a storm and sharing great grub with their mates, to raise money for good causes. So I want to know about it!
Best wishes,
Jack. Twitter: @MsJackMonroe
Categories: Fundraising, Campaigns & Charity
COOKING ON A BOOTSTRAP 
Sorry with floods at moment charity begins at home x
Sent from my iPhone
>
Hey! It’s true, the floods are awful, but at least Jack gave money to both Syria (where the situation is also awful) and her own local food bank too (where they are also doing vital work). Of course if she had divided up the money any further, it wouldn’t have been much of a donation, so I think Jack and Juliet are both doing their best. Maybe if we all hold a curry night, we can help Syria, food banks and the flood victims too!
Nothing stopping you from cooking curry for your local flood victims! 🙂
Then do your own curry night to raise money for the flood victims. There is more than one cause to raise money for you know, and no one has the right to shame others for their choice of charity.
Pleaseeeeee come and of knee in Manchester!! I will happily pay v good money to eat your curry! )especially the chickpea & peach one, and the Dahl!
Seriously looking forward to the Baba Ghanoush recipe!! x
This is such a great idea. An organisation that I was connected with – and still am – used to have “host a roast”; an amazing opportunity to have fun and raise funds.
This does promote an idea or two, about doing something to ease the plight of those poor folk in the West Country who really are enduring a never ending ordeal of watery misery.
This is such a great idea. Some years ago, an organisation I was with held “Host a Roast”. It was convivial, fun and raised, not only funds, but awareness of great food – as this does. Maybe we should do something similar to aid those people that are enduring utter misery in the West Country, through the near permanent flooding. Maybe a national West Country dish, evening…
Hi Jack I love your curry night idea! I volunteer for my local food bank and am going to try and start a chilli night if I may steal your idea?
I’m a single mum, I work full time in healthcare on night shifts and struggle to get by which is why I find your recipes so useful.
I’m a keen cook, and would love to write my own budget Italian cookbook – any suggestions about where/how to get started?
thanks jenny in yorkshire
This is such a great idea. My friend is doing a cake day for charity (sadly a friend who lives too far away for me to attend) but I’d rather have the curry. These ones look delicious.
Would you mind giving a ball park figure on the overall cost of your curry night. I would like to do something similar to raise funds for my local hospice.
Definitely going to explore this idea with my local pub in support of our local foodbank (as my place is far too small to host more than 4 people), What sort of cost are you looking at and what do you charge in order to cover costs and still make money?
Love this idea and the curries look great!
Why not try looking at the costings of the recipes then adding a mark-up that you deem reasonable for the people you are going to invite. The mark-up x the number of portions sold (or estimated to be sold) = the profit that you can donate to charity.
If you’re going to host an event then you’re going to have to do a lot of work, may as well start with some research and planning!
Looking forward to the cauliflower, green bean and pea passanda. Mmm