Cooking with Mark: Curry with fruits?

Should fruit ever be used as an ingredient in savoury cooking? Try this chicken apricot curry, then join the debate

We discuss food a lot in the office. We’re not all great cooks but we have a mutual love for good food. Our latest discussion had the office split: Should fruit ever be used as an ingredient in savoury cooking?

I pore over food images daily online, and a specific pizza topping seems to have caused quite a controversy of late — the “food of the Hawaiians”, pizza with pineapple toppings. I am not a fan, but folks have taken to social media to express their utter disgust that this combo is even a thing.

Outspoken celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay defiantly isn’t a fan, and he’s previously vowed online to consume one of the “monstrosities” live on Facebook if his fans made 500 charitable donations. Ramsay’s not alone. Obscurely, the Icelandic president has suggested a total ban on such toppings, and this would be quite a national disaster for the Nordic island — Icelanders’ love a pizza! I was astonished on a visit there at the number of pizza outlets there were.

A lot of Middle Eastern dishes, as we know, have fruit as an ingredient, and it works. The hype of the pineapple pizza travesty may have gone a little too far. Although, I still believe certain fruits should never be included in a savoury combination.

My sister Emma and I still laugh about the days she used to cook for me. I used to visit her regularly and she always prepared food. One weekend, I was served a simple chicken curry. She knows I love spicy food, but a mildspiced, slimy chicken curry, dotted with raisins, should be a thing that never happens.

In the early 90s, the UK saw a huge sway of timesaving tinned or jarred ‘cook-in/ pour over’ sauces in stores. They were sweet, salty and not at all tasty, advertised with catchy jingles such as ‘I feel like chicken tonight’. The nation embraced the TV ads, complete with a clucking chicken dance. And they loved the time-saving convenience, my sister included. So, not to offend, I agreed to eat the ‘cook-in curry’ on the condition she removed the raisins!

As the discussions continue, I still have never eaten a pineapple-topped pizza, but I have made prawn and pineapple Thai curry, and it was delicious. Another favourite I made recently was a chicken and apricot curry. It’s a dish I have been preparing for over 20 years, a tried-and-tested winner. Slow cooked, spicy and sweet, topped with potato straws, it’s been a classic dinner party dish many times over — simple to make, and free of a catchy jingle and crazy clucky chicken dances. — Recipes, food styling and photography by Mark Setchfield, follow him on Instagram @gasmarksix.