Was there just last night with a friend (we're vacationing in Edinburgh for a week). The waiter was friendly enough and the rice that he recommended to go with my food was a good fit. We only had main courses but, my friend a chicken dopiaza and me a lamb madras with lemon rice. The madras was well-cooked, the taste good but could have been a bit better. The rice was a bit tarty on its own but worked well with the madras; however, I didn't have any naan and I suspect the rice would have overpowered the dish a bit if any madras had been sacrificed on naan-dipping. Overall I was satisfied.

Tasted a bit of my friends dopiaza as well, that seemed really good.

This sounds interesting, but I still haven't been able to get my hands on creamed coconut. Also, I'm lactose intolerant, and while I can find milk and cream free from lactose pretty easily, I'm not to sure about creamy tomato soup. I'd like to try this, but I probably won't be able to.

Margarine is disgusting and quite probably pretty unhealthy, nasty stuff. Here in Sweden it was once promoted as a much healthier alternative to butter, poppycock.

I myself live in a family of LCHF:ers and do myself try to not eat too many carbs, but I'm not going to go preaching about it and I sure don't want to debate about it, but living by that philosophy the problem is usually that I can't have my rice or nan's with them, so I guess a really good BIR dish with all the good stuff included isn't really healthy by anyone's diet.

About oil though, I always use canola oil for my curries, which according to many is one of the healthier alternatives of oil, and wiki says this,

Canola oil has been claimed to promote good health due to its very low saturated fat and high monounsaturated fat content, and beneficial omega-3 fatty acid profile. The Canola Council of Canada states that it is completely safe and is the "healthiest" of all commonly used cooking oils.[18] It has well established heart health benefits[19] and is recognized by many health professional organizations including the American Dietetic Association, and American Heart Association, among others

Still, it's oil so if you're concerned about eating too much fat use less.

As for ghee, I think butter along with the canola oil and the olive oil are actually among the better fats you can eat so as long as it's actually real butter ghee I won't stay away from it, but other kinds I would. But to each his own.

So, now to the dish, I find the technique with the onion and the blender very interesting, because I have too been a bit concerned with getting some fried onion taste into the dish without it being visible, both for madras and for the vindaloo (I've never got any pieces of onion in that either, but I still feel it would benefit from the taste). JerryM's technique sounds good but difficult so I might start out trying your idea for my vindaloo to see how it works out, and maybe also your madras some time next week. It looks surprisingly brown but definitely good!

Indeed, they vary. When I was new here, which I still kind of am, I tried to emulate my favourite CTM. As I am lactose intolerant I wanted to be able to make it at home with cream and milk free from lactose, since I couldn't eat it there any more. Then recently I decided to have one from them to see if I had in any way come close, and guess what, they had changed it! It was still delicious, but suddenly it tasted carroty and more coconuty and with less cardamom than before. When you can't even have the same CTM in the same place I guess that says alot about how varied the curries are in different places. And CTM being so mild is extra hard to get right, no heat to cover your cock-ups.

Could a moderator please update the OP to contain what follows here instead of what's there now, and also add, "Revised + Pictures" to the title? Thanks in advance!

If you just want to see the recipe just skip the following paragraph. Here comes a lot of blabber about what kind if vindaloo this is and why:

I love hot food, I really do. But generally I'm disappointed in the Swedish Indian Restaurant vindaloos, even at my favourite place. They don't seem to taste much unlike so many good and flavoursome curries, so I settle for something milder unless I need that kick. Therefore I've tried to make a vindaloo that give me that desired heat but without being flavourless. Dried chilies, which are used in this recipe, give more flavour and add a bit of smokiness to go with the heat. I also use red wine in addition to vinegar, because to me in cooking that's always better, and I can get more of that winy taste without making it too acidly harsh. I think that I've finally made a good one that actually resembles many vindaloos I've had here in Sweden (though the cooking is probably off), but with a richer taste that I find delicious. It doesn't feel 100% SIR to me, because it's too good.

I must add straightaway, though, that I think a good vindaloo should have a spicily dry flavour, not sweet or sour (that's never happened to me anyway) and I've never had one with potatoes so if you're into that kind of stuff you're on your own, sorry.

The recipe (serves 2 hungry, or possibly 3):

Spice Mix
3 tsp Standard chili powder
2 tsp Extra hot chili powder, eg. dried piri piri)
2 tsp Coarsely ground black pepper
1 tsp Curry powder (I used a medium Madras powder)
1 tsp Cumin
2 tsp Turmeric
2 tsp Paprika
1 tsp Garlic powder
1/2 tsp Coriander powder
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp salt

Ingredients
1 Red chili
1 Jalapeno
1 Chipotle pepper
2 Dried ancho peppers
150 ml oil (or less if you don't like it too oily, I for one love oil)
A few cloves.
5 Big garlic cloves, minced.
1 tbsp Minced ginger
3 tbsp Heinz Chili Sauce/Ketchup
3 tbsp Tomato puree
150 ml Red wine, not too sweet tasting (I used an Italian one called Briccotondo, it's pretty cheap and worked fine)
50 ml vinegar
500 ml Base sauce (I used the SnS gravy)
Precooked meat for 2 big portions.
1/2 - 1 dl Chopped fresh coriander, including stalks.

What to do
1. Put a sauce pan with about 400 ml of water on the stove and set to boil.
2. Get started on the chilies. De-seed and chop up finely and throw them into the boiling water and let it boil without a lid, at least 20 minutes.
3. While the chilies boil, make all other arrangements, mincing garlic and ginger, preparing the spice mix, defrosting base sauce etc.
4. You can test to see if the chilies are done just by chewing a piece of one of the dried ones (chipotle or ancho) to see if it's gone soft. When they are done get the chilies out of the water but save the water.
5. Gently fry the ginger and the garlic in the oil until brown.
6. Add spices, cloves, chili sauce/ketchup, tomato puree and the chili peppers and continue stirring for a minute or two.
7. Raise the heat and add red wine and vinegar little by little, stirring as you keep it cooking. Be careful not to burn.
8. When all the wine is added pour in half of the chili water and cook to a thick sauce.
9. Start adding the base and the remaining chili water a little at the time, it should sizzle. Recommended time for this procedure is 15 minutes (thanks SnS)
10. Add the precooked meat and fresh coriander and keep cooking until it's vindaloo thick.
11. Serve hot with a good pilau rice, naan, tomatoes and most importantly, a good beer.

Note: If you don't want red wine in it for whatever reason you could add more vinegar instead. If so, a total of 100 ml vinegar for the dish seems sensible.

Please do give this one a try, I know it's a bit more complicated than the usual BIR fair, but really it's not much so.

Pictures in next post.