Topic: Just had a demonstration by the chef at my local restaurant

[stephen west]

Thanks. The recipe above was spot on!

Just made a batch of Kris Dhillon's sauce with 10kg of onions, 500g of garlic, and 500g of ginger, for 25 people.
I made about 8 kg of korma using Ghanna's recipe with the whole spices added, and two portions of the above recipe and was told they were both as good as restaurant meals, so am very pleased.

Making a largish batch of sauce didn't appear to affect the flavour of the curry sauce. I used Kris Dhillon's method of pre-cooking the chicken in the base sauce with turmeric added, but instead of straining out the chicken and throwing away the chicken cooking sauce, I added it to the korma, and I do think it added an extra taste.

[Mark J]

Excellent, glad it worked. How did you end up cooking for 25 people!

[stephen west]

I made the mistake of offering to. I reckon, overall, it must have taken about 12 hours -including a minor incident where the liquidiser nearly went up in flames! I'd do it again, though. It's only by cooking in largish proportions that I learn.

Thanks again,

Stephen

[pete]

Well if Stephen made a base in that quantity ,without it changing it's general taste, that ends the "needing to cook in large quantities to get the taste" theory.
And congratulations too!
That was a lot of curries!!

[stephen west]

Thanks. I did the same bulk cook last year, but last year I didn't add sauce the chicken was cooked in to the final kormas. I half-precooked them in boiling water.  Now, it might be my imagination, but, this time it did taste much better (in my opinion). It might be because I changed the recipe slightly, but I've noticed before that by adding the sauce that the chicken breasts are pre-cooked in to the final dish, the taste does seem to improve. I would agree with the assertion that adding chicken stock/jelly to the base sauce improves the flavour.

[Mark J]

Ive started adding this liquid to my base also, it smells our of this world

[pete]

Ive started adding this liquid to my base also, it smells our of this world

That sounds like a much more practical thing to do.
Do you have any whole spices in the water as well?
Making jelly by boiling for FOUR hours is just not something most people have time for.
 

[George]

I made about 8 kg of korma using Ghanna's recipe with the whole spices added, and two portions of the above recipe and was told they were both as good as restaurant meals, so am very pleased.

Stephen - do you mean your korma had the same type of flavour as a BIR korma, or was it just as good as, or better in a different sort of way? I have made good kormas in the past. My friends would say they are "as good as restaurant meals" (or better). But they are not the same!

Regards
George

[Mark J]

That sounds like a much more practical thing to do.
Do you have any whole spices in the water as well?
Making jelly by boiling for FOUR hours is just not something most people have time for.

I just use the bruce edwards method of precooking meat and then use the juice and oil that is left over in the next batch of base sauce, this obviously isnt too vegetarian either and I presume you have no need to precook meat. If you pre cook vegetables using this method though that would be worth a shot

Have you tried adding chicken stock cubes? Im currently using knorr chicken stock cubes just to get a bit of chicken stock and msg into my base without the hassle of boiling bones for hours  ;D

Ive got a base on the go at the moment actually, its your base Pete minus one onion, plus a carrot, green pepper, coranider stalks and half a can of chick peas. Ive also added 5 stock cubes and about 200ml of pre cooked meat base sauce

[joe2]

Well done Stephen, this is good work, but might I also add:

>> was told they were both as good as restaurant meals>>
Comments like this from friends are nice, but absolutely meaningless - I've been told that for 20 years, and it's not true.