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Forum Thread - What makes a good curry

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Kath Gannaway, on 19/5/2015 07:33am

I am writing an article for a tourist magazine based on enjoying a great curry while visitors are in the Yarra Ranges region of Victoria, Australia.

We have some great restaurants - mainly Indian and Thai - that make fabulous curries.

I am wanting an independent view that touches on what makes a great curry, but also why people love curries so much.

Can anyone help?

Kath Gannaway

Mail News Group, Healesville. Australia.

Helen Bach, on 19/5/2015 01:17pm

I do hope I'm not treading on anyone's toes, here, but this board is a little quiet, these days.

If I may:

this appears to be a very simple question, but I don't think it is easy to answer. I was watching a programme with Madhur Jaffrey CBE, called Curry Nation, how Indian food and people have become included into 'British' culture. She contrasted 'home cooking' with restaurant food. And this is where I think the answer lay. She was most impressed by a Kashmiri young mother who was preparing food using her mother's and grandmother's ways, (isn't it always the way?). Twenty minutes to get just right colour of fried onion, and an hour and a half into the prep, still the meat had not been added! Contrast that with the 'restaurant' dish, where all the ingredients (but the chicken) were thrown into a cold karahi, then the contents boiled to death, then, 7 minutes later, the chicken was added. MJ could not conceal the horror of the prep, or how it tasted.

The difference between a good (lets say superb) dish and a poor one is preparation. Adding ingredients at the perfect time, and using perfected techniques to develop flavours, not just adding them.

I hope that helps a little. My opinion, of course.

Mamta, on 19/5/2015 02:17pm

Hello kath

Hope this helps;

A great curry should have fresh and good quality ingredients and be cooked with patience. It doesn't mean you spend hours which you don't have making it, but learn to make short cuts that work. A busy woman in modern day can not spend as much time in the kitchen as her mother or grandmothers did, but can still make very good curries.

The spices should of course be fresh and the best you can afford. Best doesn't always mean most expensive. You sometimes get tiny jars of Indian spices from Western supermarkets, which may have been packed a few years previously.

If you have space, keep your main spice bags/containers in freezer or at least fridge, keeping only small amounts on your everyday kitchen shelf.

Don't try to copy restaurant food. Just like western restaurant food, it has enormous amounts of butter/ghee/cream etc. not usually eaten by Indians at home.

And, don't forget that the 'curries' are only a small part of Indian cuisine. Don't call everything Indian a curry, it isn't!

Kath Gannaway, on 19/5/2015 10:31pm

Thank you both for the responses.

I'm not sure they will help with my task, however.

It seems unlikely that any restaurant will have hours for preparation - however, people do seem to still enjoy a restaurant curry dish?

Do you think it's possible for a restaurant to serve up a curry that would rate as very good to exceptional?

Mamta, on 20/5/2015 05:34am

You don't need hours to make good 'curries' or Indian food these days, unlike our grandmothers. We do have a lot of modern kitchen gadgets which save time in chopping, grinding, steaming, microwaving and loads of other modern techniques that are adopted by Indian chefs in good restaurant settings, some also used by many modern housewives. If you ever watch a good restaurant kitchen, they have ingredients pre-prepared, like chopped vegetables, onions, ginger, garlic, tomatoes, coriander, meats, chicken, fish or whatever else is on their menu. Meats are often pre-marinated. When the orders come, they cook fast on their modern, restaurant grade cookers/tandoors etc. They are professional, do this day in day out, all day and have speed. That is how they cook fast. At home, I have only a home kitchen, but I can cook a meal for 6-8-10 people pretty fast from scratch, 2-3 hours, including starters.

It is said that eating spicy food, especially chillies, releases endorphins in your brain and gives you a feeling of happiness, contentment. Perhaps you get addicted to spices to an extent, as you do to endorphin release with exercise, eating carbohydrate rich foods, pasta, chocolate etc. :)?

Your point that people enjoy only restaurant style curry is not entirely correct. They enjoy a good home cooked Indian meal as well, perhaps more. You will notice that really good Indian restaurants do not generally make very hot food, curry houses in UK do. The good restaurants just have good chefs who cook good food with balanced spicing, good ingredients and great expertise. South Indians and certain other sections of Indian community on the other hand, do eat hotter food generally.

Then there is street food of India, which is meant to be hot and spicy; a short, sharp, intense stimulation of the senses.

The food served in some curry houses of UK, popular with beer drinkers or after a football match crowd, is not something most Indians will appreciate.

“Do you think it's possible for a restaurant to serve up a curry that would rate as very good to exceptional?”

Absolutely. These days, we have Michelin starred Indian chefs in London, running very, very good restaurant. They are of course quite expensive, even the ones without Michelin star!Try them sometimes. Perhaps my daughter Kavey will see this thread and answer you on that, she is a food critic, based in London.

Helen Bach, on 20/5/2015 01:58pm

I think that one of the reasons why people enjoy a 'good curry' is ignorance. In the 1950's and 60's where I grew up (a city of 80,000 people) there was one family from the Indian sub-continent. Fortunately, Dala Singh and his family started an Indian grocers, selling spices, and other things. That was the start of preparing Indian food for me. The city had at least three 'Indian restaurants', which I, with my peers, frequented on a regular basis. We liked the alien flavours, the whole thing, really (except the decor, which we thought was not really Indian!)

It was only when I bought my first Indian cookbook (by another Singh) that I started to realize what the restaurants were offering was not Indian at all. Why did it take me so long to make a dish, but the restaurant could knock them out in so little time. The answer soon became apparent, as the matrix menu was explained. Choose a meat, then a sauce. Easy. Madras sir? (that's two tsp of chilli powder, vindaloo, that's three, you get the idea. More than half of the dishes on an Indian restaurant matrix menu don't exist in India, certainly not made with the variety of meat. So for a menu containing 100 'different' dishes, 4 or 5 may be Indian in idea, the rest are made up.

For example, Rogan Josh is a dish from Kashmir. It is a type of korma or braising dish. Now, ever tried to braise a prawn? No? the though is laughable, but available in nearly all 8,000 UK so-called 'Indian restaurants'.

Why do people love curry? because it is different, and usually shared with friends. The food doesn't have to be very good, unfortunately, because most people don't know what a good Indian dish should taste like.

And why would somebody go to Australia and eat Indian food? Makes no sense. Why would you go to France and eat Moroccan food? I suppose the answer lies in the words 'bush tucker'!

Mamta, on 20/5/2015 02:12pm

"More than half of the dishes on an Indian restaurant matrix menu don't exist in India, certainly not made with the variety of meat".

It is interesting; one day I was watching Indian Master Chef on TV. The contestants were asked to make a British dish called Chicken Tikka Masala lol! None of the contestants had heard of this.

Kev, on 24/5/2015 11:42am

Since making my own indian food at home with the help of this site and others I find indian takeaway/restaurant curries all have the same basic flavour. Obviously you get different dishes, sweet, hot, sour, and they can be quite good. Very unhealthy though. Homemade always tastes better and the difference in flavours are more pronounced, plus you can make healthier homemade copies of the restaurant curries.

Mamta, on 24/5/2015 07:08pm

Thank you keV, and yes, home ccooked is generally nicer and healthier.

Guest, on 2/12/2015 07:39pm

Dear Mamta Ji,

I fortunately came across your site while researching 'what makes great tasting curry' (or something to that effect. I have been working hard on my cooking for the last 3 months and still not getting it. I was clear that there has to be a grammar to cooking, just like a grammar for languages or grammar for music. The seven notes of Sa-Ni, makes up thousands of raags and so too it should be to cooking. Can you please explain to us that grammar:

Henry Dimbeby in his article states that what he learnt form you was that that there are only 3 main rules to a great curry:

1. Use spices generously

2. Decide how to cook your onion, ginger and garlic

3. Decide what is going to give your curry sauce the body

This was so exhilarating to me! This is the kind of grammar I was searching for. Please, can you enlighten me on the below:

1. What proportion of spices to use? Is it based on weight of vegetables used (I am a vegetarian btw)

2. Does a food need to have all the five tastes (it is actually six in south indian literature)

3. How to get the understanding of the combination of spices?

4. How to bring about this great balance between the taste forms?

5. A summary of good techniques - I realise that recipes only take so far. It is technique that really brings the taste out.

Thank you,

Ganesh Bala

Mamta, on 3/12/2015 11:37am

I like like your description of cooking as grammer :)! I agree that good food sings/should sing like Sa..rae..gaa..maa.

I think Henry got me very slightly wrong. What I said was to use fresh spices, not the ones bought from supermarkets in tiny jars that may have been sitting on shelves for a couple of years. And, I said not be stingy with them, meaning use them appropriately, depending on the dish you are making. Some dishes, like rich meats/chicken type of ‘curries’ may need more spices (in numbers as well as amount) than the gentler flavours required for fish, vegetables, dals etc. Every Indian dish should not be covered in a thick curry sauce. So, my rules are these;

1. Use the best, freshest ingredients for your dish. It is a myth that curry covers bad ingredients.

2. Use spices appropriately to suit the main ingredients.

3. Decide how to cook your onion, ginger and garlic, or even to cook without onion, garlic, tomatoes style of sauce. Most of my vegetable Bhajies, or stir-fries for want of a better word, do not have onion, tomatoes etc. (onion and garlic are considered tamsic) They are cooked on low heat, in their own water, with not too many spices. See individual vegetable ‘Bhaji’ on the website.

4. Decide what is going to give your curry sauce the body. Look for 3 Basic Curry Sauces on the website. There are of course 100 other variations, but I don’t claim to know them all.

5. Use of different oils in cooking varies in different regions. I will mostly use Mustard oil, if I am making a vegetable bhaji, especially in pickling style. This gives a totally different aroma.

6. Seeds in ‘tarka’; for dishes; Cumin, the most commonly used seed can be replaced with nigella or black mustard seeds or carom or fennel or fenugreek seeds, all giving different ‘groud’ flabvour to the dish. Or you can mix them to get a more ‘fuller’ flavour, like in pickle style bhajies.

7. What proportion of spices to use? It is based on the vegetables, your taste, whether you are cooking something with a sauce or a dry bhaji, cooking for children, your mood on that day and so on. It also depends upon on the actual dish you are making. Indian cooking is very regional, mine is mostly north Indian. All regions cook differently. So follow the recipe you have selected and be guided by your taste. I don’t eat very hot food, so add more chillies if you like yours hot. In everyday cooking, I, like many others, use things by guess work. However, I have measured them carefully whenever I have written a recipe.

8. Does a food need to have all the five tastes (it is actually six in south Indian literature)? I haven’t actually thought about it consciously or analysed it, but I guess it does. Umami is a word I was not familiar with, until recently. Most traditional Indian dishes have a way of cooking them, a mix of spices traditionally used with them, though not many people follow them now.

9. How to get the understanding of the combination of spices? By following recipes from people whose food you like and by trail and error. No easy way to do this.

10. How to bring about this great balance between the taste forms? I am not sure I follow this question!

I should write a book about Indian cooking, shouldn’t I ;) lol!

Guest, on 3/12/2015 04:51pm

Thank you Mamta Ji for taking the time to respond. Yes, indeed you should write a book!!

Sticking to a recipe in itself a hard task for me :-) As you know musicians in India don't play by the note. They play spontaneously. But then they have gone through the rigour in their early stages. So too, I shall try and follow your recipes to the letter and see whether I hit the Tah Dah moment, when the real chef in me wakes up :-). Thank you for your efforts and others in your family to keep this blog up and running.

Mamta, on 3/12/2015 05:57pm

You are most welcome. You don't have to be a chef to cook well, I am not!

Good luck and God bless!

Helen Bach, on 13/12/2015 11:46pm

interesting discussion, Ganesh, here are some of my thoughts:

1) use spices sparingly: it is as important, maybe more important, to add spices at the correct moment, rather than exact amounts. Spices contain flavour chemicals which give each spice its characteristic flavour, but to be able to use those flavours, one has to have the correct cooking environment, either oil/fat or water, or somewhere between the two.

In amount of spices added, less is often more with the correct techniques.

2) Most fresh ingredients contain water, and cooking them reduces the water content. This is especially so with onions, and to a lesser degree with garlic, ginger and fresh chillies. To cook these properly means heating (in oil) to get rid of most of the water present inside the veg. This means cooking the onions (cut into fine dice) first, then adding the garlic after about 10 - 15 minutes, then the ginger, and finally the chillies. The idea is to get all four vegetables cooked to the same level, without burning. Then the spices can be added, mostly singly, but sometimes masalas can be used.

3) Don't understand 3.

To answer the rest, I can only say I follow the recipes given, unless it doesn't sound right, then I abandon it and look for a more suitable one. Learn about spicing by following a very good recipe, if you are lucky, the cook will explain why certain spices are used, when to add them, and in what form.

If you follow really good recipes, the tastes should be as the originator intended. If you don't like the end result, pass on that recipe, and find another. Messing with poor recipes is very hard work, best to start a fresh, IMHO.

Finally, a range of good ingredients is only going to produce a good result if the proper techniques are followed.

Finally, to use another musical analogy, the finest classical music is only produced by following the music exactly, there are no bonus points for 'doing your own thing', although one might argue that that is exactly what is happening in cadenzas!

Hope that helps.

Mamta, on 14/12/2015 11:22am

Hello Helen

Thank you for this.

"3) Don't understand 3. "

What I mean is whether you will need to cook onions, ginger and garlic lightly, medium brown, dark brown or add them all in one, uncooked, with meat, as in Khada Masala type of dishes, where everything is added all together, perhaps marinated for a while if you have time. They are all then slowly cooked ‘dum’ or on a hob with a good lid, or in an oven or in a slow cooker. Another thing about onions is how you would cut them. Some things need finely chopped, some taste better with thinly sliced/thickly sliced and some are good with ground to paste, as old traditional 'curry' sauces had; onions ground on a stone "Sil Batta"

While it is generally correct to say that onions should be cooked first then garlic and ginger added halfway, I use an electric chopper these days, chopping all three together. If you cook it on medium heat, stirring frequently, they do not burn and release their aromas well.

Agree with you totally about quality of ingredients and recipe. The saying that a ‘curry’ covers bad ingredients is a myth :)

I will follow some recipes exactly, especially the old, traditional, tried and tested ones, where I wouldn’t change a thing. However, I think that half the fun of cooking, at least for me, is chopping, changing and evolving to suit your own taste. But then I am not a professional cook :)

Merry Christmas!

Helen Bach, on 15/12/2015 05:56pm

ah, thank you Mamta, I was a little confused, age I suppose! BUT, is the decision with how to cook onions etc. down to the cook, or the person who originated the recipe. If the originator knew what they were doing, surely changing the method (and/or ingredients) produces a different product, and not the one the originator intended.

If I share my recipes, which isn't often :?( I always include the proviso that although anyone is free to use it, the ingredients and method should be left alone. This is for a very good reason. I hope I know what I am doing, and to change the ingredients and/or method may result in an inferior product, and I could get the blame, or a bad name. I once gave a recipe for vindaloo to a person, who didn't follow the recipe exactly, and ended up with a rather different version, which wasn't as good. My recipe had 24 foot notes which may have been too many for the person, but, in my opinion, were essential.

The problem with onions is to do with the water content and the enzymes which produce the acidic volatile fumes. If those fumes dissolve in water, they produce something akin to sulphuric acid, and can taste very tart, if not bitter. If the onions are not cooked properly, the gravy will be acidic, and this may be the reason so many iffy recipes call for a spoonful of sugar! IMHO, the onions need to be cut quickly, into 3mm dice, by hand, or a blender, BUT must per thrown into hot fat immediately, so as to reduce the formation of the acidic volatiles. Then they must be cooked (on medium heat) to drive off most of the water, which comprises around 80% of ordinary onions or Indian ones (those pinky ones) BUT not the very large Spanish ones, or the American Vadalia sweet ones. The thing to aim for is to get rid of the water before the acidic volatiles can form, then add the garlic, ginger and chillies, as these have progressively less water. Once the water has been driven off, then spices can be added. If the spices are added too soon, there will be far too much water present, and the full flavour will not be available. Which is why I suggest adding less spice, but at the correct moment.

Hope this helps, and suggests where I am coming from.

Happy winter holiday to you, your family and all your readers, and listers, whatever they are?

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