Topic: Curryhell's Samosa recipe

[Micky Tikka]

These are a must do at Christmas time for me where I have a bit more time along with those cornbeef puff things  ;D

[Naga]

So...after my abortive attempt to complete the job yesterday, I retrieved the filling and pastries from the fridge and started to form some cones ready for the lamb.



Unfortunately for me, yesterday's setbacks continued into today - the pastry just wasn't right! Overnight in the fridge, it had transformed from an icky-sticky monster into a pile of half-formed frisbees! They were just too brittle to bend into shape and, after trying 4 different pieces, I realised that it just wasn't going to happen with this batch. I had two choices - make a nice lamb keema for dinner, or start again with the pastry and try to get it right this time. I opted for the pastry and, this time, I must have done something right because I ended up with a nice, dry dough.



I decided to avoid the problems of yesterday and sprayed some sunflower oil onto my work surface instead of the flour dusting I used yesterday. It was Fry Light oil and I should have just stuck to pure oil, as the water content in the Fry Light made the decent dough a bit slippy and wet. In consequence, the samosa cases rather took on a bit of a life of their own between formation and filling, so although I definitely ended up with samosa-shaped snacks, they weren't exactly classics! Still, another lesson learned and I'll do better next time.



After 10 minutes in 160C sunflower oil for each of the 3 batches of four samosas, they were ready for testing.






My good lady wife declared that hers was entirely fit for purpose, and, after scoffing my own, I reached the same conclusion! Delicious!

Thanks, CH, that's another treat for the curry menu!

PS: My kitchen lighting isn't exactly conducive for taking decent photos - that's my excuse anyway! The grub looked much better in real life!

[curryhell]

I'll be giving this a go later on today, with a special filling for my girls - leftover bombay potato and pre-cooked chicken bits (just not enough for a curry) to save wastage!  ;D
..............................so much better and authentic than bl@@dy filo squares.

Hope all goes well Pete. The beauty of samosas is the vesatility of the filling you can use.  Don't mention the filo things - imposters 

[curryhell]

Today I enjoyed, for my lunch at work, the samosas cooked at the weekend which had been frozen a few days as an experiment. Having defrosted overnight in the fridge they were indistinguishable from freshly cooked. In short, delicious.

Great news Chris, that now means i can do the whole thing in advance and simply defrost , with no adverse affects 

Next test will be to fry from frozen some of the uncooked ones which are in the freezer. Hopefully this will settle for me the question of whether freezing before or after cooking is best. I suspect the answer is before, but we will see.

Will be interested to hear this result to, although i am more likely to fry then freeze unless there is a definite gain frying uncooked from frozen.  Thanks for helping with the jigsaw Chris.

[curryhell]

Nothing wrong with those little beauties Naga.  Manjula's samosas look very similar.  Great that the good lady gave them the thumbs up and that you enjoyed them.  Shame about your cases from yesterday though    They look fit for purpose in the pic.  I think all would have been well if you had used them immediately.  The thing about dry frying, whilst it makes contstruction easier, you have to be very careful not to dry out the pastry too much or it does become brittle and breaks as you are trying to fold into the cone shape.  I too have experienced this.  It was exactly this issue that prompted my experiment post, as i wanted to see what sort of impact the time delay had on the dough provided i kept it as near as i could to the original condition when it came off the tawa.  I wonder if your cases could have been reconstituted if wrapped in a damp cloth ?  Hmm, may have to explore if i have any that turn out brittle 
Thanks for trying the recipe and providing your detailed result mate.

[natterjak]

Results are in... The samosas which were frozen uncooked, then fried from frozen were a bit drier and not as well flavoured as those which were cooked before freezing, then simply defrosted without further cooking. There was a kind of sweetness to the pastry of the precooked ones which was less prevalent in the cook from frozen ones.

[Naga]

Nice one, NJ! Good to know. These samosas are definitely great straight from the fridge as you've mentioned previously - I've had 3 today lol! But I'm not sure I'll get through a full batch in good order. so freezing them down is a top option.

[curryhell]

Many thanks for completing the jigsaw Natterjak and thanks to all those that have tried the recipe and and added to the thread.  Cooked and frozen it will be if i have to make a shed load of the little blighters, quite possible with Xmas coming up   I hope i've given some of you the bug to continue on the perfect samosa trail  ;D  Would be good see comments on your successes in future attempts as well 

[Waterdiddy]

Well, I gave it a go and I was impressed! My first time  making samosas and they were edible, even moreish!

The dough I got was a bit on the wet side, but thats down to the measures I think.

Curryhell, you give dessertspoon measures - how many ml is this, please? I actually used my dessert spoons and I think that was my problem.

May I presume that you are meaning 10ml, being as a tsp = 5ml, a tablespoon = 15ml, then a dessertspoon = 10ml?

Sorry to be picky, but the taste on these are just right and I want to dial this recipe right in now we have tried it.

Thanks for the recipe and any help you can give CH

Bests,

Pete

[natterjak]

Well today I made my third batch of these samosas, using up the final third of the filling made last weekend. Quite a turnaround from my initial "never again" position,  which was a bit silly with hindsight.

I'm trying to dial in on exact measurements for the pastry as I like to eliminate variations between batches. Today I used these ratios which worked well:

250g plain flour
Half level tsp salt
One third level tsp Kalonji seeds
3 tbsp oil
130ml (130g) water
Yield was 7 x 7" pastry discs for 14 samosas

I initially added 125g water which didn't quite come together as a dough, hence the extra tsp full.

I love the end result of these samosas and have got the technique a bit more nailed but it still took me over 2 hours to make, even using pre-made filling. If there's a way to streamline the process and speed them up, I'm all ears.