Hi meggeth, how you fry/singe your spices is entirely up to you, all I am saying is that by adding a little water (from boiled kettle) to the spices it singes the spices and you can tell they are cooking, I tried it without adding the water and you cannot tell how hot the spices are because of the onion,chilli,garlic, ginger toms in the pan that have soaked up the oil, and many times the spices were undercooked or overcooked, this has produced my best results , give it a go see what you think