Quote from: chrism on July 13, 2011, 12:15 AM
hi, my name is chris and i joined this site as i like indian food. over the years ive tried and failed trying to make a few of these dishes, i hope by joining this site i can get some spot on advice to make the perfect curry and learn from my mistakes.
Welcome Chris - yeah me too :

What I've learnt from this site (very quickly) is that there is not one single reciepe that ticks everyones box for taste, texture and spice.
So my best advise from spending months chasing the holly grail and trying everything is pick a base + spice mix and focus on that - I found myself chasing my tail every week thinking there was a better base and changing base/spice mix and never really finding a benchmark - find that benchmark and build on it with that recipe tweeking different componets and methods of cooking.
TBH the base needs to be simple, I cant see your local TA spending hours preparing some of the more complex bases - one thing I learnt two weekends ago and a massive leap forward - I prepared a curry (50+ servings) for our loacl village fair - started base Friday and let it bubble away on the corner of the Rayburn overnight - by 9.00am Sat there was a pool and I mean a pool of spiced oil ontop of the gravy that I'd not achieved before - the smell was pure TA - so perhaps the quest for BIR style curries is not so much in the ingredients but the method as we dont tend to cook large volumes of base for long periods of time - however for me thats a turning point - oil seems the key
Don't think you will go far wrong with the Taz base and Mick's (CBM) method using that base and CA's spice mix (not Taz spice mix) - its working for me
Happy cooking