Blending chillies in cold water

[Bobby Bhuna]

After following the Bruce Edwards technique of blending garlic and ginger in cold water when making the base, I was stunned at how much stronger the flavour became.

I've been trying for quite some time to replicate the strong fresh chilli taste present in the Madras from my local. Do you think that blending fresh chillies in cold water then adding it to the base will make the chilli taste much stronger, or is this effect confined to garlic / ginger?

[joshallen2k]

Personally I never noticed that the BE g/g puree method was particularly stronger. I know Bruce said there was a chemical reason, but never elaborated.

I've tried a few things with fresh chillies (cold water puree, hot pre-fry...) and the most I've achieved is an added "bite", but not a "last 5%" sort of achievement.

As an experiment, why not a add a new fresh (or dried) chillies to the curry and remove at the end? (or don't eat). This was something I stumbled on with Admin's Jalfrezi.

-- Josh

[Bobby Bhuna]

Weird, makes a huge difference for me. If I recall correctly though, you finely chop, even for the base, whereas I used to coarsely chop. This does suggest that size makes a difference ;D