Curry Recipes Online
Curry Chat => Lets Talk Curry => Topic started by: Cory Ander on December 11, 2012, 02:00 PM
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Some thoughts on why home BIR curries might be different from the real McCoy (Please feel free to elaborate on anything I've missed):
- Small scale (rather than large scale) curry base
- Short cooking times (rather than extended cooking times) for the curry base
- Small volumes (rather than large volumes) of dish preparation
- Low power heat sources (rather than high power)
- Use of frozen curry base (rather than unfrozen)
- Use of frozen garlic, ginger and tomato paste (rather than unfrozen)
- Use of frozen coriander (rather than unfrozen)
- Slow usage of spices (rather than high usage)
- Availability of nicely impregnated spice infused oil
But, to be honest, I have never noticed much of a difference when I have used fresh/unfrozen of all of the above (apart from using old, duff, spices).
The only thing I haven't really tried is a "full scale" curry base (60 litres plus?) and prolonged cooking times (3 hours plus?). Has anyone tried this and what difference did they find please?
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Hi CA,
On the assumption that you're looking for an exhaustive list of all possible explanations, I'll add a few more for consideration
- the "missing taste/aroma" are in fact present but the home cook loses the ability to discern it due to overloaded / dulled senses
- food hygiene practices at home are not as slack as restaurants (maybe a function of the scale of the cooking which is undertaken, meaning ingredients hang around at room temp for longer than when home cooking and containers get refilled without being properly washed out, etc)
- cooking technique is not correct
To expand On the last point, if you include the cooking of the base, there are many individual stages to cooking a curry and under or overcooking any one stage could have a significant effect on the outcome. It's not unreasonable to assume that a full time BIR chef repeating the same recipes each day becomes aware of exactly how far to boil the onions, fry the G&G, etc and the cumulative effect of getting all these stages right makes the difference between something special and something "not quite right"
Lastly, just for a laugh....
- there's a secret ingredient "they" are not telling us about ;)
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Hi guys I did a curry night 2 weeks ago for 6 adults and 6 kids pops chutneys onion bhaji sheek kebab 3 currys pilau rice and nan ,when my guests arived they said that it smelt just like the curry house ,we all ate and everybody said how nice it was.i couldnt smell a thing of course .the next day I smelt the left over jalfrezi and it smelt good but not that bir smell.I said to my wife il have the rest for my supper tonite whitch i did(this is sunday).On the wednesday 4 days after making it Iwent in to my beer fridge in the garage and saw a container with some more of the left over jalfrezi in it, I didnt know it was there,Iopened it and wow it smelt just like the bir, it smelt superb.I then thought about the maturity thing but how do they get it mature straight away?.I went in to my usual very good ta and watched my meal being cooked, all the usual high heat & flames, one interesting thing i did notice was that one pan of base sauce was simmering but the one that he was using was on a rolling boil from when i walked in to when i left he also kept dipping the ladel in and scraping the bottom , i wondered if he was caramalizing some of the base and pulling it through the sauce to get some of the flavour in for that early maturity?or was he just warming it up?.
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Interesting list there CA, as the poster above said it does make a lot of difference to the taste/smell of a curry if left for a couple of days and I have noticed exactly the same.
My Wife never eats all her Saturday night Madras I make and likes to save some for a Sunday evening snack,this sometimes is left until the Monday and I take it to work for lunch :)
When reheated in the canteen at work the place smells like a t/a and my mates don't believe I made the curry 8)
and the flavour is much better than when made on the Saturday,whether this is because my senses have cleared or as I believe the spices are given time to infuse and the curry ' matures ' .
How a BIR achieve this maturity I don't know but as you have listed they don't use frozen base and if a home base is frozen perhaps the freezing stops the 'maturing' in it's tracks.
A BIR due to the high turnover would be using mostly fresh Spices all the time so that's another bonus.
I don't go with the idea that you need high heat to produce BIR curry's as I have seen first hand enough curry's cooked 'slowboat' style full of BIR flavour :P
Just my thoughts ;)
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- there's a secret ingredient "they" are not telling us about ;)
Natterjak, Az said NOT to tell anybody about it ;D ;D
Joking aside, this topic has been discussed many times in previous threads. However, i think it's probably a good idea to discuss it again, since we didn't arrive at an answer on the previous occasions and recent experiences of members may just move this whole thing forward a bit more ::). If we all add our two penneth and experiences we may just be able to classify some of the content as pure myth and disregard it and leave ourselves a few things we can actually work on. I'll post a few thoughts of my own tomorrow.
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CA, my thoughts...
Small scale (rather than large scale) curry base
Agree with this. I don't recall any home experiments with a 60L pot. I'd be personally surprised though if this made a noticeable difference over a typical "large" base posted on cr0.
Short cooking times (rather than extended cooking times) for the curry base
Also interesting to understand is what they do with the base at the end of day... is it left to sit overnight? Do they ever just "top it up"?
Small volumes (rather than large volumes) of dish preparation
Low power heat sources (rather than high power)
I and others that I recall have used high heat sources to cook curries in similar times to those observed in a BIR. I am curious though the BTU's of a typical BIR gas range compared to high powered home ranges, and those standalone outdoor gas rings.
Use of frozen curry base (rather than unfrozen)
Use of frozen garlic, ginger and tomato paste (rather than unfrozen)
I've rarely used frozen g/g so couldn't comment on the difference. However I can say for sure that when I went from freshly grating/mincing ginger and garlic to pureeing a mix with oil, that my curries improved dramatically. I'd never go with fresh mince again.
Use of frozen coriander (rather than unfrozen)
Slow usage of spices (rather than high usage)
Availability of nicely impregnated spice infused oil
Ahhh - the old/spiced oil argument. I honestly can't say one way or the other which is closer to BIR - with spiced or unspiced oil, having tried both over the years. I think though that there is enough video evidence to say its not a standard practice, and I've not seen reports that say those curries cooked with fresh oil are any less "BIR".
-- Josh
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I'm sure we all make a great curry ;) and as good and sometimes better than some restaurants
But I will compare them with my favorate Curry House and this is where you want to be :'(
A curry does change flavour through maturity and the base I would say
when to stir and not to stir :-\ In my opinion a CTM will come out spot on its just balancing the sugar and powders(coconut and almond) and red sauce the base seems fine in that dish It doesnt need a lot of reduction (or roasting)
sorry no answers >:( Just throwing afew things in
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Hey joshallen2k, read your comment regarding a better result using ginger garlic puree - I use pre-made jar stuff. Do you think your homemade puree would improve my curries? If so, can you please link/post your recipe? Thanks!
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Hey joshallen2k, read your comment regarding a better result using ginger garlic puree - I use pre-made jar stuff. Do you think your homemade puree would improve my curries? If so, can you please link/post your recipe? Thanks!
Im sure J2K wont mind - yes most definitely, please see link
http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=3915.0 (http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=3915.0)
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and prolonged cooking times (3 hours plus?)
my 3 hrs is 2 hrs before blending and then 1 hr after blending (thinning water added). i've tried extending the after blending upto i think 6 hrs. there is no change.
ps for me getting the aroma "smell" is key to BIR taste
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Ive been thinking about the hypothesis of a large cooking pot making a difference, and although I dismissed it initially, maybe it bears closer scrutiny. They do say "cooking is chemistry" and in chemistry you obtain different reactions under different conditions of temperature and pressure.
Now the pressure in a liquid is equal to the density X the acceleration due to gravity X the depth of the liquid (thanks Wikipedia!) and so in a pot full of base sauce the pressure is proportional to the height of the pot. In other words restaurants cooking in a big 40 litre pot 70cms tall could be boiling their base at double the pressure of you and I with our puny 6 or 8 litre stockpots at home.
From schoolboy physics: Higher pressure -----> higher boiling point. So the base sauce at the bottom of the restaurant chef's big pot could be making different chemical reactions to those which we achieve at home.
I'm not saying it's necessarily true, just that it's feasible. Worth a thought anyway, should anyone be interested in this forum's primary purpose this fine Yuletide night. But the latest argument thread has more page views and three times the replies in one day than this one has achieved in nearly two weeks. Shame.
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Right. But BIRs don't (AFAWK) use pressure cookers. So could we not replicate the effects of a larger vessel simply by using a pressure cooker (as I already do) ?
** Phil.
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Possibly Phil. Perhaps someone good with maths can put some numbers to the problem, to compare the pressure in a domestic pressure cooker to that at the bottom of a large (restaurant sized) cooking pot and report back?
It's a bit beyond me at this time of night. It's slightly different in any case because in a pressure cooker there's equal pressure throughout, whereas in a large pot only the bottom reaches max pressure. Mind you, that's where the heat is directly applied and so presumably is the source of any interesting chemistry which is going on. I'm off to bed now :)
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Lastly, just for a laugh....
- there's a secret ingredient "they" are not telling us about ;)
I don't think this point should be dismissed as 'just a laugh'.
My best suggestion is that nobody, so far, has presented a decent recipe which, if followed carefully, will produce results equal to the best BIRs. Why should the best BIRs give away their precious recipes, whether it be in written form or via a youtube video? It could be secret ingredients but my hunch is that it's more likely to be techniques which are simplified or dumbed-down a bit for presentation to us lot. I'm still working on my recent breakthrough. It produced flavours as good, or almost as good, as any BIR, and I've managed to repeat it now with very few ingredients. But when I added a few extra ingredients like fresh coriander and a bit of lemon juice, the flavour went downhill. "How can this be???" I'm asking myself. I need to do more work to understand what's going on.
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It's a bit beyond me at this time of night. It's slightly different in any case because in a pressure cooker there's equal pressure throughout
But is there ? Atmospheric pressure is experienced equally (modulo epsilon, for vanishingly small epsilon) throughout the liquid in a container; the extra pressure experienced by the lowest part is the sum of atmospheric pressure and the (effect of) the weight of the the liquid above. In a pressure cooker, exactly the same situation obtains, except that it is not atmospheric pressure that is experienced equally throughout but an artificially raised pressure. There is still (the effect of) the weight of the liquid above the lowest layer, which will make the lowest layer experience once again a higher pressure, will it not ?
** Phil.
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From schoolboy physics: Higher pressure -----> higher boiling point. So the base sauce at the bottom of the restaurant chef's big pot could be making different chemical reactions to those which we achieve at home.
Perhaps someone good with maths can put some numbers to the problem, to compare the pressure in a domestic pressure cooker to that at the bottom of a large (restaurant sized) cooking pot and report back?
Interesting and innovative thinking NJ! Something I've not considered as a possible rationale before.
If my physics and maths don't desert me, I deduce the following:
- Standard atmospheric pressure is about 100,000 Newtons per meter squared
- A pot of water, of 1 meter cubed (pretty big, for a pot of curry base, I know!), weighs about 1000kg
- The pressure, at the bottom of the 1 meter cubed pot of water, would be about 1000kg x 10 meters per second squared (i.e. acceleration due to gravity) = 10,000 Newtons per meter squared
- Therefore, the additional pressure, at the bottom of the pot, would be about 10% of the standard atmospheric pressure
- Therefore, if a typical pot, in a BIR, is filled to a depth of 50cm (assuming it is water), the pressure, at the bottom of the pot, would increase by about 5%
- Alternatively, the pressure, at the bottom of the pot, would increase by about 1% for each 10cm of depth of water....so by about 1% for a small batch of curry base with a depth of around 10cm
As I understand it, pressure cookers operate at a pressure of around 2 standard atmospheres of pressure? Which is about 10 times the additional pressure at the bottom of a 1 meter cubed pot of water. And around 20 times the pressure at the bottom of a typical BIR pot (assuming it is 50cm deep).
Is my maths correct?
Either way, as it stands, a pressure cooker is pressurising far more than a big pot of curry base. But who can say whether this is significant or not?
Three things for me to do, then:
- Cooker a large pot of curry base (60 litres or so) for long times (3 hours or more)
- Make a curry base using a pressure cooker (time to buy a new one!)
- Compare the results with my normal, small scale (2 litres or so) curry base cooked for relatively short (1 hour or so) times
Thanks for the insight NJ! 8)
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This graph (http://docs.engineeringtoolbox.com/documents/926/water-pressure-boiling-temperature.png) shews clearly how boling point (of pure water; mixtures of water, oil and spices will clearly differ) varies with pressure.
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Thanks CA & Phil for helping develop this thought. You are of course correct the pressure is the sum of atmospheric pressure and the pressure due to the head of water. CA I agree with your figures although my derivation was slightly different. I just googled "pressure in water per metre in atmospheres". Plenty of sources confirming that per metre depth the pressure goes up by 10% of an atmosphere.
I've also cross checked on pressure cookers and at a typical 15psi they are indeed at 2 atmospheres, which from Phil's graph is a boiling point of just over 120 deg C.
So the marginal increase in boiling point due to the height of a restaurant cooking pot looks to be rather modest in fact, so maybe it's not all that significant. Worth thinking about though.
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I'm sure one of our members has recently tried a full size base, and commented that the flavours were still missing! Can't remember who though. I think it might have been Haldi??
W
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I think the BIR aroma is most likely down to high temperature and the consequent molecular changes in oil composition. Chris posted recently and nailed it using high powered heat with his outside burner. The CT madras sauce I made not long ago also had the aroma in abundance; lid on, high temp, and under pressure (albeit minimal). The pressure cooker could be the way forward (remember what Julian said re: that smell). Perhaps a curry could be finalized in one? Whilst its unlikely that BIRs, TAs, etc. use pressure cookers much, they don?t use domestic hobs with limited heat output either.
Rob :)
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Could the BIR aroma just be down to the fact that they are cooking far more dishes at once or in a short space of time than we do at home.or do you mean in an individual dish.
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So the marginal increase in boiling point due to the height of a restaurant cooking pot looks to be rather modest in fact, so maybe it's not all that significant. Worth thinking about though.
I suppose it depends on how much chemical reaction is going on in the process, opposed to physical. I assume that chemical reactions are minimal compared to physical.
However, if chemical reactions are actually significant, then a 10 degree rise in temperature will generally double the rate of reaction (i.e. Arrhenius equation). So temperature (and, therefore, pressure) is definitely significant. I suppose the same may also be true for physical reactions (hence the effect of a pressure cooker!)?
So, yes, definitely worth thinking about (even if on Christmas Eve!) :P
Perhaps whoever has made a large volume (i.e. greater than 60l) and cooked it for long periods (i.e. greater than 3 hours) would care to comment on any difference observed (e.g. Haldi?)?
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"More Analysis Paralysis" and google blither.
Just turn your home kitchen into a BIR kitchen as close as you can, with ingredients and methodology
and you can't fail to stink out the neighbours.
"On Aroma"
I remember when my local restaurants started getting refurbished into modern contemporary style,
with huge air conditioning units in the ceilings, looked fantastic and modern when finished.
But there was a BIG something missing.
The wonderful aroma was being sucked out by the air conditioning and its still the same today.
When you walk into a contemporary Restaurant now, your usually greeted with the aroma of cleaning products e.g. Zoflora Summer Berries.
I remember Haldi's big base experiment, being a total disaster. :(
He used a rubbish recipe with an insane amount of tomato as I recall.
my two pennies
Merry Crippa everyone, Chewytikka ;D
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More Analysis Paralysis" and google blither
And, typical of you, CT, you pretend to know it all (and divulge little) and rubbish everything that anyone else dares to suggest (because, of course, you know best)! Total bollocks, my man, total bollocks! ::)
and you can't fail to stink out the neighbours
As I'm sure you do! Pretentious git! ::)
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I hope santa brings me an 8 kW gas burner (and a tandoor).
Rob (http://i40.tinypic.com/qqza8g.gif)
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i still use a ~4L pan for base - despite going past the large vessels in the asian stores on a regular basis.
i often even end up having to split the base when i make ifindforu's (produces ~ 19 off portions c/w norm of 9 to 12 portions). so a bigger pan would help in that respect.
from tasting real BIR base and c/w with site bases i can't identify any difference other than the oil.
the only advantage for me would be the ability to get the spec more consistently right - little changes in spoonfulls have a bigger effect on smaller volumes.
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from tasting real BIR base and c/w with site bases i can't identify any difference other than the oil.
I think that's the real killer for this idea. Several people have tasted bases from BIRs and said that they are no different to the one's from this (and other) sites. It's also why I don't think the 'secret' is in the base.
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I think that's the real killer for this idea. Several people have tasted bases from BIRs and said that they are no different to the one's from this (and other) sites. It's also why I don't think the 'secret' is in the base.
I'd agree somewhat ss, in that there is something still to be learned in creating bir at home. For me it's consistency in producing one after the other. I find it very odd, that some of my efforts are bir & some are well wide of the mark, using the same batch of base etc. Personally I think the oil used commercially, which hardly anyone has ever used at home, plays it's part, along with a slightly higher cooking temperature than domestic. Im pretty sure its created in the pan. Bit odd why so many people are having trouble following very simple recipe's & reporting poor results. (Apart from newcomers to base gravy, who almost always have glowing reports. On the issue of bulking, at how many litres does a gravy become "bir". The c2g ebook seemed skirt this issue choosing instead to muse about mystical onion "smells". Your right there is a real discrepancy there
Regards
ELW
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I remember Haldi's big base experiment, being a total disaster. :(
He used a rubbish recipe with an insane amount of tomato as I recall.
my two pennies
Merry Crippa everyone, Chewytikka ;D
Here's the post
http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php/topic,8533.msg75436.html#msg75436 (http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php/topic,8533.msg75436.html#msg75436)
It wasn't a rubbish recipe, it was the recipe from a place I had been visiting
If you follow the thread, you see that maturity of the base, was what was missing
The quantity of tomato has been pretty consistant at most places I have been in
i.e.
2 cans per base
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I remember Haldi's big base experiment, being a total disaster. :(
He used a rubbish recipe with an insane amount of tomato as I recall.
Perhaps your recall isn't what it was, you are getting on in years?
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For anyone interested, an observation I made when when boiling onions /carrot/'bit of gg'/ & frying the tomato/mix powder/gg in oil separately(baghar...whatever), was that it is like starting a basic tarka or starting a curry. The aroma from the baghar ingredients on their own, has been & is described as toffee like. I've smelled this at home,but I do'nt recognise it as bir
What I have smelled is the aroma produced when the baghar ingredients are diluted with onion gravy, in the restaurant & at home. It's completely different & not toffee like. It smells more like a spicy tomato soup if i'm near the kitchen. It is It's not the smell of the actual served food at all. A useful tip, which has helped me'
1. Have a sniff of the mix powder in it's dry form- This should be gone completely in the finished dish. There should be no trace of this smell whatsoever in a finished dish
2. Have a sniff of the baghar ingredients on their own(oil/gg/MP/tomato) fried in a pan seperately(very toffee like smell, a bit like Ashoka Banjarra paste,which on its own,tastes nothing remotely like anything i've had in a bir). There should be no trace of this smell whatsoever in a finished dish either
3. After adding a ladle of gravy to the hot pan, while cooking a dish, an odd like, imo a spicy tomato aroma will appear. I'll recognise it immediately along with anyone who comes into the house
* The above must not overpower the onion gravy/base gravy/garabi. I've found it's the other way round. The harsh spices are diluted by the higher quantity base gavy. I've managed it so far by frying everything on a high domestic heat,big hiss when the tomato paste & gravy hits the pan(as yet I can't explain why high fast cooking is different than longer lower temp cooking :-\).
There will be completely new flavours created from these mixtures & adding them to others,when done correctly,will give you the bir flavour & aroma.
IMHO, a huge amount of published material on this subject has failed to address this little issue
I hope this makes some kind of sense & helps someone
Regards
ELW
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ELW,
it may or not be of help but the "toffee" smell was never an actual toffee smell - it was the best way of describing what was happening during the dry oil fry and the time to quench. i now always add free liquid to fry the spice and never get a "toffee" smell (even at the high heat that i use). in short i rely on sight and a bit of movement with the spoon.
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Just picking back up on this
Hi Jimmy Nomates, ;D;D LOL typical response from you too, CA. I try not to bite, but your such a tool.
Exiled in Oz for years and as far away as possible from tasting an actual BIR curry, probably
fuels your feeling of frustration / inadequacy and constant lack of understanding of the subject.
you probably have Inadequate personality disorder? Therapy maybe ;)
My recall is fine SS
Thanks for the link Haldi, as you state 2 x 400g cans of tomatoes, but also + 400g of tomato puree as part of your Bhagar.
To a home cook that's 2 full tubes of tomato puree.
A pot of base is easily flavoured, hence you finished up with a tomato tasting base, which you comment about in your post.
Even your photo shows your crimson Tomato base to full effect, which is not what you would really expect to see in any BIR kitchen.
Just my observation
cheers Chewy
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Just picking back up on this
Thanks for the link Haldi, as you state 2 x 400g cans of tomatoes, but also + 400g of tomato puree as part of your Bhagar.
To a home cook that's 2 full tubes of tomato puree.
A pot of base is easily flavoured, hence you finished up with a tomato tasting base, which you comment about in your post.
Even your photo shows your crimson Tomato base to full effect, which is not what you would really expect to see in any BIR kitchen.
Just my observation
cheers Chewy
I realise you have been in many kitchens, but this amount of tomato is correct at three of the places I have been
Mind you they dont use tubes of tomato puree, it comes from a large can of White Tower
I didn't fancy buying a huge tin for the experiment, so I used tubes
Their curry gravy cooking oil is red
Having said all that, I have seen curry gravy made with no tomato puree at all
I guess we just have to accept that different places have different recipes
That's probably why we never all agree to have cracked the perfect curry
We are chasing different flavours
I note that one of your recipe calls for Worcestershire sauce
I've tried the recipe and it's very good, but ceratainly not like any of my local BIR's
I promise you, that NONE of them use Worcestershire sauce in any curry
That sort of consolidates what I am saying
There is no "right" way to do it
Please don't take offence, I love reading your recipes and watching your videos
One of the main reasons I waited to make a full sized base, was because I wanted a recipe I had seen for myself several times
And that was what I did
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Having seen videos, read info and talked to the chef, 2 tins of tomato seems excessive, since its an onion soup and seems to involve non at all to a spoon full of paste for an extremely large pot. Haldi mentions 8kg of onions but a large pot will take 20-40kg.
No offence but 8kg of onions, then peeled is what I can get in my 11.5 litre pot so I wouldn't call this a definitive large scale test by any means, no offence. Even more so when you use 2 tins of tomato for 7-8kg of onion. This is home scale and lasts me a short time. A TA wouldn't last 5 mins.
I'm struggling to see how 8kg of onion has been touted as the large scale test and used as an example or the sense to suggest its large scale. It reads like a fuddled small scale base.
We have those crappy dial a curry type places here with tomatoey taste and also the good TA and BIR that don't have tomato taste and they insist to me the crapness of your broad TA is not your authentic curry house. They informed me of difference when I first started going 15-20 years ago, I pointed how some are more like tomato and disappointing as these were popping up and not the real deal.
As said, if these are what you have then you'll be chasing that taste but I can't stand tomato taste in curry.
The Worcestershire sauce point is a bit of a cheap shot to chewy, its not like some instant BIR must have or a dish transformer.
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Just picking back up on this
Hi Jimmy Nomates, ;D;D LOL typical response from you too, CA. I try not to bite, but your such a tool.
Exiled in Oz for years and as far away as possible from tasting an actual BIR curry, probably
fuels your feeling of frustration / inadequacy and constant lack of understanding of the subject.
you probably have Inadequate personality disorder? Therapy maybe ;)
cheers Chewy
And I'm the tool Chewy? ???
But you're right. To my disadvantage (or probable advantage), I have not experienced BIR curries in recent years. My advantage is that my benchmark is clearly BIR curries of "yesteryear" (which I want to reproduce). The disadvantage is that I don't have a benchmark for BIR curries of "nowadays" (which, by the sounds of it, is no great deal!).
And you're also right. I don't pretend to have all the answers to replicating BIR curries (of yesteryear)....unlike some of us seem to pretend ::)
If you have nothing constructive to contribute to the topic of the thread, then maybe say nothing at all? ;)
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The Worcestershire sauce point is a bit of a cheap shot to chewy, its not like some instant BIR must have or a dish transformer.
In my experience (of Haldi being on this forum for over 8 years!), Haldi is extremely reluctant to have a "cheap shot" at anyone, or anything. He would feel ridden with guilt if he did so!
If it appears so, it's because Haldi believes it to be the case (in my opinion).
I have also never experienced Worcester sauce being added to a curry (maybe it's a Northern thing?)
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Yes, probably a northern thing. Don't know is aniseed is a north west thing but I see it lot here, just adds a bit more to the taste, like a dash of lemon. You can take it or leave really.
Would be interesting if someone could lend a large pot for 30-40kg of onions who has a commercial burner in the garage. I've done 2-8kg and not noticed any difference. Some here have replicated their local base, quite sure jb has but don't know the scale his TA/BIR does though.
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The Worcestershire sauce point is a bit of a cheap shot to chewy, its not like some instant BIR must have or a dish transformer.
I'm glad that you are standing up for Chewy
That's good to see
I think he's great, too
I love his posts and he comes across as a genuinely good and helpful person
But it's not a "cheap shot"
I promise you
I'm just reporting what I've seen, or rather not seen
I am sure that Worcestershire sauce is used at some places
What I am saying, is that it's not used at the places, I have been in
There are differences which should be acknowledged
I for one, happily accept this fact
As for my base not being a big enough scale
Well, that's the size of pot this place used on the occasions I saw it cooked
I know places make bigger bases at different times
It depends on expected demand
(I bet Chewy will have seen that)
But I also knew they achieved a brilliant result working in these quantities
I was just trying to copy what I'd seen, and share it with everyone
I thought it might be of interest, and certainly didn't want to upset anyone
Another difference I've seen, is the old bhajee oil in the base
This does not go on everywhere, I realise
But this is one more case of a different recipe
You can't just dismiss it and say it isn't right
What about ghee in the base?
I've seen that in a London demo but never round here
And that stuff makes a huge difference to flavour
There is no set way to do this
Just imagine if all these BIR chefs got together in one room!!
What an argument that would be
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What about ghee in the base?
I've seen that in a London demo but never round here
And that stuff makes a huge difference to flavour
Hi Haldi, I'm keen to hear your's & anyone else's thoughts on that. It's an ingredient in Glasgow, thats for sure
Regards
ELW
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No offence but 8kg of onions, then peeled is what I can get in my 11.5 litre pot so I wouldn't call this a definitive large scale test by any means, no offence. Even more so when you use 2 tins of tomato for 7-8kg of onion. This is home scale and lasts me a short time. A TA wouldn't last 5 mins.
I'm struggling to see how 8kg of onion has been touted as the large scale test and used as an example or the sense to suggest its large scale. It reads like a fuddled small scale base.
Hi harley, this was just an obvious attempt at scaling up at home by an experienced home cook. At how many ltrs do you reckon the test becomes accurate? ??? 12, 30 or 60 litre as in the restaurant vids. Does Bir gravy become bir gravy at 60 litres? or can it be done in say 44?
As for the tomato content, check abdulmohed's version on cr0, whichs uses 400gm tomatoes with 4 large onions. Some recipe's i've seen don't even use garlic in the base.
Regards
ELW
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i put a small amount of veg ghee in all base (30g in 800g onion). you could use more depends on your own needs.
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Hi harley, this was just an obvious attempt at scaling up at home by an experienced home cook. At how many ltrs do you reckon the test becomes accurate? ??? 12, 30 or 60 litre as in the restaurant vids. Does Bir gravy become bir gravy at 60 litres? or can it be done in say 44?
As for the tomato content, check abdulmohed's version on cr0, whichs uses 400gm tomatoes with 4 large onions. Some recipe's i've seen don't even use garlic in the base.
Regards
ELW
The discussion here was full scale, ie what restaurants do that we don't. Does it make a difference to our scaled down efforts. The distinction is small home vs your typical restaurant/takeaway. People cited haldi experiment as big base, full size, the thread title was making a full size base at home. If you want to say that the haldi thread was a scaled down version then its just like any scaled down version done here and doesn't need mentioning in reference to full size base and is just another scaled down base. Others, not me, have said perhaps from memory or poor reading how haldi did a full size base etc.
At how many ltrs do you reckon the test becomes accurate? ??? 12, 30 or 60 litre as in the restaurant vids. Does Bir gravy become bir gravy at 60 litres? or can it be done in say 44?
Thanks for being silly.
Can you not grasp the notion of small home scale to what we understand to be full size? No-one is drawing a line. The question was asked does the large restaurant pot make a difference to our smaller pots. Can you not acknowledge that this means a large gap between the two without going into silly notions of exactly what litre it is?
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I always thought that smell was from the set up in BIR kitchens, most seem to have onion bhaji oil on top of the cooker as well as base gravy and uncovered spices not to mention the currys that are cooking at the time and that smell leaves the kitchen through the fan extractor.
Try watching more youtube BIR videos and see where they leave all that stuff right under the fan extractor!
I would not want to do that in my kitchen
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Wow, this was a really interesting discussion. Thanks to all for sharing your thoughts and for making BIR look more like a science!
I would like to throw another thought into the mixture, but I'll make it in the form of a question. At what temperature do BIRs keep their base throughout the day and how frequently do they re-heat it?
I've seen videos of stockpots of base on top of BIRs and I've never noticed them having any flame going underneath, which sort of suggests they probably only turn the heat up every now and then - if at all. Thoughts?
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I've seen videos of stockpots of base on top of BIRs and I've never noticed them having any flame going underneath, which sort of suggests they probably only turn the heat up every now and then - if at all. Thoughts?
The base sauce pot is kept on a low heat at all times. You can't see the flame because the pots are so large they cover the burner. The debate has often arisen as to how much difference to the taste it makes if you get a curry made from the first ladle from the pot or one a few hours later from the last ladle. Many people claim that a curry bought later in the evening, and so presumably made when the pot's nearly empty, has greater depth of flavour. But, of course, that might also be influenced by the amount of beer imbibed proir to the tasting! ;D
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I'm certain the taste comes from the oil and garlic contained within the base and not its content, the longer the cooking time the more that taste develops and releases the flavour back into the base.
Also the oil used at the intial stages of cooking the dish, interesting over the last 4 months ive used filtered bhajee oil - not spiced oil or fresh veg oil and my curries have had the taste.
However the only explainations I can draw is in my base/cooking method/ingredients over the past 12 months are:-
Mooli instead of cabbage or potato in base - not conclusive
More oil in base - conclusive
More garlic in base - conclusive
Seasoned bhajee oil - not conclusive
Garlic paste over garlic/ginger paste in dish - conculsive
Rajah gold madras curry powder in mix powder - not conclusive
No jemon dressing in hotter dishes - conculsive
Although I'm not convienced on some of the variables above put them all together then is this where the last 5% is??
Your thoughts!!!!!!!!
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No jemon dressing in hotter dishes - conculsive
This is something that I have been using a lot lately and I need to experiment without again! Glad you pointed it out, because it does give me something to try in my next curry.
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Cant quite put my finger on the lemon dressing thing in the hotter dishes, seems to reduce the intensitivey of the heat of the final dish.
However I'm now using Mr Naga's pickle in hotter dishes so it might be something to do with that.
Lemon dressing seems to work better in the less spiced dishes where you are using say methi leaf and mix powder and garam massala only
Back to the base thread by SS the base I now use takes two days to finish and uses high heat to boil then low heat/duration to extract the oil back out of the base
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Many people claim that a curry bought later in the evening, and so presumably made when the pot's nearly empty, has greater depth of flavour.
It could come from 'extras' which some BIRs chuck into the base sauce quite frequently or, at least, used to, as they are cooking final curries. I recently watched a bit of the Balti cooking video (old VHS tape, late 80s or early 90s). I'm sure the chef skims off stuff (surplus oil most likely) and puts it in the big pot of base sauce. I think I've seen it done in other videos (youtube etc) too. Why would they do that, unless it improves the flavour.
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Many people claim that a curry bought later in the evening, and so presumably made when the pot's nearly empty, has greater depth of flavour.
It could come from 'extras' which some BIRs chuck into the base sauce quite frequently or, at least, used to, as they are cooking final curries. I recently watched a bit of the Balti cooking video (old VHS tape, late 80s or early 90s). I'm sure the chef skims off stuff (surplus oil most likely) and puts it in the big pot of base sauce. I think I've seen it done in other videos (youtube etc) too. Why would they do that, unless it improves the flavour.
Hi George,
Could you share a link to a video where that is seen?
Also, what is this vhs tape you are talking about?
Thanks
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Another thought that occurred to me. I read in some posts that the practice of curry cooking in the 80s, included the use of a whole-chicken in the gravy pot.
How unlikely would it be the use of oxo/knorr stock cube in the base?
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How unlikely would it be the use of oxo/knorr stock cube in the base ?
I think this is one of the perennial straws at which all of us have grasped at some time; as far as I can tell, it adds not one iota of authenticity to the finished dish.
** Phil.
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Could you share a link to a video where that is seen?
Also, what is this vhs tape you are talking about?
I can't recall where I saw it on youtube videos, but I did, in one or two of the genuine BIR kitchens.
The Balti video is like this one:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BALTI-KITCHEN-VOLUME-1-VIDEO-VHS-INGREDIENTS-GUIDE-/181059205785 (http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BALTI-KITCHEN-VOLUME-1-VIDEO-VHS-INGREDIENTS-GUIDE-/181059205785)
It's not staged or anything - well not the sequence I refer to anyway - they just take a general shot of a busy kitchen and the chef scooped something out of a final curry and threw it in the big pot of base gravy.
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How unlikely would it be the use of oxo/knorr stock cube in the base ?
I think this is one of the perennial straws at which all of us have grasped at some time; as far as I can tell, it adds not one iota of authenticity to the finished dish.
** Phil.
I agree. If chicken flavour is part of the magic it's not in the form of a stock cube.
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Another thought that occurred to me. I read in some posts that the practice of curry cooking in the 80s, included the use of a whole-chicken in the gravy pot.
I tried it, scaled down, so I added a portion of chicken to a smaller quantity of base sauce.
The result went against all my understanding of western cuisine, at least, in that meat/poultry adds enormously to the flavour of most sauces. Well, it added to the flavour here and seemed to knock out and dominate the curry flavours. In other words, the chicken made the base sauce and final curry worse. I mean to try again and again to see how I can make good use of fresh chicken stock in BIR type curries, without them going downhill. Perhaps it's as simple as just adding less.
I know it should be possible. Loads of curries start with raw chicken and taste good. For example. Madhur Jaffries recipes. The Dhansak spice mix I thought was so good, used fresh chicken as well - so it must be possible.
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Another thought that occurred to me. I read in some posts that the practice of curry cooking in the 80s, included the use of a whole-chicken in the gravy pot.
I tried it, scaled down, so I added a portion of chicken to a smaller quantity of base sauce.
The result went against all my understanding of western cuisine, at least, in that meat/poultry adds enormously to the flavour of most sauces. Well, it added to the flavour here and seemed to knock out and dominate the curry flavours. In other words, the chicken made the base sauce and final curry worse. I mean to try again and again to see how I can make good use of fresh chicken stock in BIR type curries, without them going downhill. Perhaps it's as simple as just adding less.
I know it should be possible. Loads of curries start with raw chicken and taste good. For example. Madhur Jaffries recipes. The Dhansak spice mix I thought was so good, used fresh chicken as well - so it must be possible.
Makes sense, as one would assume that the use of a whole-chicken would probably be ok for the quantities of base that BIRs make, upwards of 20 litres
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How unlikely would it be the use of oxo/knorr stock cube in the base ?
I think this is one of the perennial straws at which all of us have grasped at some time; as far as I can tell, it adds not one iota of authenticity to the finished dish.
** Phil.
I agree 100%.
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I've just received a bottle of "liquid smoke" via eBay, although I'd bought it as an ingredient for burger sauce (Kenny McGoverns "More Takeaway Secrets" recipe) I wonder if a little drop would be good in curry, or maybe even in naan? Worth a try
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I wonder if a little drop would be good in curry, or maybe even in naan? Worth a try
I've tried liquid smoke in a marinade, base sauce and final dish - didn't do much for me. Be careful of how much you use, too much can very easily overpower a dish and instead of imparting a smokey flavour it makes it bitter.
I've tried smoked garlic and smoked salt and neither gave me the flavour I was after.
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Is this the BIR taste that the old generation is after? ;D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNldeqnDkbs (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oNldeqnDkbs)
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Is this the BIR taste that the old generation is after? ;D
Nah, that doesn't have any sultanas in it ;)
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Findus and Vesta curries - absolutely loved 'em as a kid. :o
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Findus and Vesta curries - absolutely loved 'em as a kid. :o
Didn't we all? I recently bought some Vesta curry mostly for my Dad who has been moaning for ages about he they can't get hold of them. Bought 5 packs and kept 2 back one of which I cooked and ate......, what was I thinking, it was awful! Certainly not how I remembered them.
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I think this may explain our difficulty.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubNF9QNEQLA (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubNF9QNEQLA)