Chef Sam's Live Interview

[natterjak]

I agree jb. Both Chris and Sam strike me as being primarily interested in helping people understand the subject more fully and in doing a thorough job of documenting things. Rather than a "get rich quick" approach.

[Secret Santa]

So Sam...what do you eat during your long shifts at the takeaway?

Well...last night we all had shepherd's pie.

LOL!  ;D ;D

[Secret Santa]

So it's precooked spices in oil. Maybe similar technique to the kasmiri masala video Chris posted, but with a different blend of spices?

This is what I said in this thread: https://curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php/topic,12073.msg96847.html#msg96847

"Forget the terminology it's just confuddling the issue. What your magic addition is Chris is some mix of tomato/onion/garlic/ginger and spices, ground and whole, all fried down nicely together. There's nothing new about that and it's no magic secret. Kris dhillon, for instance, cooks down tinned tomatoes, turmeric and paprika and adds it just like you do. Many other bases add similar fried "mixes" and so do I."

The look of that paste is exactly as I would expect if it's just a pre-fried spice mix or a pre-fried spice and garlic/ginger mix and I'll be very surprised if it's anything else. On the video Sam says "It's how we do it to bring out more flavour in the spices...a lot of people just throw the spices into the gravy, we don't do that" so it's just old hat pre-fried stuff not the magic secret Chris thinks it is. So no Chris, contrary to you shouting in the background that we'll have to buy the book to find out, we already know.

[loveitspicy]

And to throw a truthful spanner in the works i messaged Chris a while ago and I suggested to him that his spiced oil was Garam masala, garlic and onions - amazingly the way we now do it - I got no reply so wont be far away with my suggestion.

Also to not on a thread which i cant find someone suggested there was a medicinal taste and all sorts of suggestions were made - my reply - green cardamons and Sam admitted in the interview that he cooks with green cardamons

best, Rich

[Secret Santa]

I was pleased to hear Sam say that the use of Patak's pastes started about 20-25 years ago because that puts it right around 1990 which is exactly when I started to notice the slide toward today's evil concoctions that everybody seems to love.

I feel vindicated in my assertion that Patak's ruined the BIR curry and feel sorry for those that never have and probably now never will taste a true BIR curry.

[goncalo]

I was pleased to hear Sam say that the use of Patak's pastes started about 20-25 years ago because that puts it right around 1990 which is exactly when I started to notice the slide toward today's evil concoctions that everybody seems to love.

I feel vindicated in my assertion that Patak's ruined the BIR curry and feel sorry for those that never have and probably now never will taste a true BIR curry.

Good question for the chefs of yore that may have changed to pataks since. If they use patak these days they may not feel there is a huge risk in disclosing the recipes to the actual pastes

EDIT: reached a 1000 posts, join me later in celebration, the curry is on me!    ;D ;D

[Secret Santa]

I was pleased to hear Sam say that the use of Patak's pastes started about 20-25 years ago because that puts it right around 1990 which is exactly when I started to notice the slide toward today's evil concoctions that everybody seems to love.

I feel vindicated in my assertion that Patak's ruined the BIR curry and feel sorry for those that never have and probably now never will taste a true BIR curry.

Good question for the chefs of yore that may have changed to pataks since. If they use patak these days they may not feel there is a huge risk in disclosing the recipes to the actual pastes

I think they'd be less likely to share if they're still using those home made mixes and pastes because it will set them apart from the Patak's brigade.

Interestingly Sam was asked if he prefers the curries of 30 years ago or the ones now and he said definitely the ones now and added that he'd tried the ones of old and they "weren't all that". That, for me doesn't bode well because anyone who has had curries from 20 or 30 years ago knows that they knock the socks off the current crop of curries.

[Secret Santa]

Sam doesn't know what hing is, even by its alternative name - asafoetida! Oh, and he's self taught. :

And Chris, asafoetida is not for preventing wind! It's to give a garlicky/onion flavour to the dish for those who don't eat anything that has touched the earth (Jains for instance) but is used more widely now (except by Sam apparently!  ). The anti-flatulent properties of it are dubious at best.

[Kashmiri Bob]

Does look like the base "magic" is at least in part the bagar.  00.30.00. To be covered in the e-book.  This is probably also how the "magic oil" is made, and all the pre-cooks.  We'll see. Be nice to have it explained properly.  Does seem a knack to it.  Get it wrong and the spice aromatics wont release properly or, worse case scenario, the spices burn; and end of, for example, entire batch of base gravy. Get it right. Mmm.

Rob     

[Les]

From Wikipedia

Antiflatulent. Asafoetida reduces the growth of indigenous microflora in the gut, reducing flatulence.[7] In the Jammu region of India, asafoetida is used as a medicine for flatulence and constipation by 60% of locals

Les

Chef Sam also said (if I'm not mistaken) that a balti is no more than a Bhuna, Of which I total disagree, that may be true now, but the old style Balti was nothing like a Bhuna at all