Hello,

I love this site and can't wait to try some of thease fantatic recipies.

I have a couple of questions, that you may be able to help we with.

1.When making curries, after all ingredients have been added, I follow recipies to the letter, but i find even on a low heat, and stiring regular that my sauce often dry's out after about 15 - 20 mins, and i end up adding about 1/2 pint of water, to get the sauce to my desired liking. this results in the curry not tasting as nice/strong. Any ideas to what i am doing wrong?.

2. Making Ghee, from unsalted butter.

I tried to make Ghee yesterday, and did everything correctly. (i think),

my end result ended up tasting a little like butter scotch, is this right?,

any tips on making ghee, and is it an important part of recreating take-away/resturant style curries.

Many thanks in advance,

Phil.

Hello Phil

I am glad that this site is useful to you.

1. I don.t understand why your sauce dries out. Which particular curry are you having this problem with? If you let me know, I can look at it again and see if any instruction is not clear and rectify it.

2. For making ghee, see http://www.mamtaskitchen.com/recipe_display.php?id=10271 From what you are saying, it seems that you cook the butter on too high and for too long. You only have to cook the butter until solids settle down at the bottom and clear ghee separates on the top.

Mamta

Here's my guess at what is going on..

I know (for fact) that depending on which pan I use (and even if I take my pans to other peoples houses.. yes I do..) it makes a great difference to how long things cook..

I know for instance, my hob heat pretty quickly compared to my mothers electric rings, but not as fast as my brothers gas (all which I've use the same pans on)

I also know that on my hob I have to turn the heat down some time ahead of when my brother would on his gas (as gas is instantly down or up)

So basically, the recipes you see are a guide and sometimes things need to be adjusted to suit your own pans and oven.

I have a thick heavy bottomed pan that I do my curries in which I know like the back of my hand.. but sometimes I use a smaller thinner pan to do a drop of curry sauce and it burns easily in there if I don't watch it and stir it a lot more...

Steve

I don't make ghee on the stove top. I put about 1 lb of butter in a baking dish (something like a souffle dish but make sure that the bottom of it is not too broad or the butter will cook too quickly and then it won't have a nice roasted flavor). Put the dish into a 300 degree oven for at least one hour. Check to make sure that it has a nice color and roasted flavor, if not, do a another 15-30 minutes. That is it, the ghee will be made, and you then just need to separate the white part from the golden part.

Hi Phil,

Two different questions, but I think both are down to the same cause. You're cooking far too fast. It's a very common mistake to confuse "boil" and "simmer". It doesn't help at all when you read recipes which say "Cover pan, turn the heat down and simmer till the sauce is well reduced and thick." Simmering is carried out at a temperature quite well below that of boiling water (90-95C, 190-195F). If you cover a pan with its contents simmering, you'll get virtually no reduction of volume.

In modern cooking parlance, therefore, simnmering is often taken to mean "slow boil" and boil is understood as "boil flat out".

Many modern cookers - you don't say whether you're using gas or electric - are adjusted in such a way as to make it very hard to hold a true simmer. I guess that's the case for yours. So, cook slower. When simmering, you really oughtn't to get many bubbles rising to the surface, though the liquid should be moving.

Ghee. I don't do it correctly, I know, but try this, which is a sort cut to making fairly decent European clarified butter. Take a slab of butter, stick it over low heat in a pan and let it first melt and then start to foam. KEEP HEAT LOW. Give it a shake from time to time and when the colour is just beginning to change, and the butterfat turns transparent, remove from heat, skim off any residual foam, and let it sit - pan tilted - for a couple of minutes to let the milk solids settle. Pour off gently. For your information, continental unsalted butters clarify rather more easily and quickly, as they have less milk residues.

BTW Unless you particularly want to make your own ghee you might find it easier to just buy it ready-made. All Indian food stores carry at least one brand and I know there are lots of mail order options too.

Dar all,

Just to let you know that the Philip who posted the message about drying out and ghee isn't the same Phil (me) who asked about Ian's coq au vin. In future, I'll call myself Phil from France, assuming that the other Philip isn't in France.

Thanks for all the info, Ian

Cheers

Phil

Don't worry Phil from France - we guessed it wasn't you as we know you've been successfully cooking Indian food for a long time!

In between our paid work we're working on lots of new features for the site, one of which will allow users to register with unique user names so this kind of confusion will no longer be an issue.

Can't give an ETA I'm afraid as it's all being done in snatched hours here and there.

Kavey

Dear Kavita,

Glad to hear that the two Phils aren't being confused.

Thanks for all the work you put into this in your spare time.

Re coq au vin: I'm defying popular reluctance (as reported on French tv) to buy chicken(s) here in France (in the wake of the bird flu worry), given that there are no attested cases of it here, to the best of my knowledge, and even if there were, that's not to say that the thing has mutated yet. Or that the meat of infected birds isn't edible once cooked.

But I'm aware that the little old lady over the hill, who lives on her own with her vast numbers of pigeons, free-range ducks, chickens and geese, might not be vulnerable once a pandemic begins. (I say 'once', since I gather that it's not WHETHER we get a mutation, but WHAT FORM it takes, and what the scale of infection and mortality might be).

In the meantime, I still remain a free-range chicken eater (it's the chickens, not me, who are free-range), but it strikes me that, in times of transmissable flu, chickens would be better off indoors.

Phil

about the ghee, don't buy shop bought ghee. there is nothing quite like home made ghee and it is so simple to make (already described correctly above) The results are really worth the few minutes it takes.

Hi Mamta!

I have recently shifted to U.S and have discovered that I enjoy cooking. I still have loads to learn and have developed 'jhatpat cooking' styles to save me time & effort.

I have some questions and would like to share my jhatpat tips. Please do let me know if there is an unhealthy factor involved so i can make changes..

Q1. Milk

a.The Milk at grocery stores come by a 'sell by' date. Is that the expiration date?

b. The milk smells sour but it did not curdle when I made Tea. I tried to make paneer and it curdled on its own post boiling point. Is that paneer safe to eat. And how long can I store paneer water?

I was redaing some forums and wanted to share some ideas. I am Hotel Management Graduate and picked up some tips from chefs.

1. If u mix a spoon of ghee with oil and put tadka in dals it will add to the flavor and prevent the tadka from getting scorched, specifically tadkas with onions.

2.CHICKEN CURRY-How to fake a 'rich look'

Chicken curry looks great if it has a rich look to it. To fake a 'rich look' you use minimum oil in beginning and add half the tomatoes. Reduce it by half

As soon the chicken is cooked , reduce heat.

In a small pan heat a spoon of oil with teaspoon of ghee , add some finely chopped tomatoes.

When the oil separates from tomatoes add some garam masala mixing it quickly with the tomatoes to avoid scorching and add it to the curry.

Drop some chopped coriander leaves on top of the chicken curry, don't mix it with the curry and close lid quickly and leave on sim.

When ready to serve open lid it 'looks rich' and appears its been simmering on the stove for ages.. Do let me know what u think:)

a. Legally it is the expiry date, but I sometimes use it for a day or two after. I always buy extra milk and keep a few liters in the freezer. Milk freezes quite well and it covers the days when I don?t have time to go shopping. You do have to remember to defrost it though, start when fresh milk is running low.

b. If milk smells, I won?t drink it or make paneer from it. I am sot sure about the paneer safety, but it will be smelly.

Thank you for the tips. It is interesting, we were just talking about having a ?tips? section only two days ago! I will save them for when we start a tips page. If you will let me know your real name via the contact link, they will go under your name.

Mamta

This method should work for other curries too. Many traditional Moghul dishes actually add deep fried onions or onions fried in a pan until dark brown (caramalized) after the cooking is finished. The oil is drained off, just onions and garam masala are added on top and lid is closed. They do give curries a nice and rich flavour, as well as colour.

Mamta