Topic: KD-base/PT

[Peripatetic Phil]

Just to clarify.  There is no spiced oil in my base, nor do I believe that there should be

[livo]

But it

[livo]

Hi would you confirm 120ml of oil is used, I make this eight times 15ml.
Thanks

Not necessarily.

US 8 Tbsp = 118.3 ml
UK 8 Tbsp =  142.1 ml
AUS 8 Tbsp = 160 ml

This question is why I, for a reason, made the comment I did about the process of removing "Excess oil", if and when required. I'm in Australia and could have excess while a US reader, and yourself, could have insufficient or the correct amount depending on KD's original recipe conversion factors.

[Peripatetic Phil]

US 8 Tbsp = 118.3 ml
UK 8 Tbsp =  142.1 ml
AUS 8 Tbsp = 160 ml

I would (very respectfully) disagree with the first two.  When measuring one tablespoon of oil, even if using a calibrated measure, the degree of uncertainty makes a precision of 0.1 ml impossible to achieve.  I would very much doubt whether a precision of even 1ml is achievable.  Therefore I would express the first two as "about 120 ml" and "about 140 ml" respectively

[CarpCarp]

A good correction Phil. 120ml give or take is the average.

[Peripatetic Phil]

Incidentally, intrigued to learn that a UK tablespoon is not 15 ml as I had previously (and wrongly) assumed. I measured my "Vogue" tablespoon measuring spoon using a Volac B.S. 604 measuring cylinder, (standardised at 20C, the temperature of my kitchen) with units of 0.5 ml at a 2 mm vertical separation.  Being careful not to disturb the meniscus, I transferred the contents (which were cold tap water) of my measuring spoon into the measuring cylinder using a pipette, To the best of my judgement, the cylinder indicated 16

[CarpCarp]

Ok let

[Peripatetic Phil]

I rarely measure or time things (microwave rice being an exception to the latter) and think in terms of teaspoons, tablespoons and so on rather than these modern metric thingies, but on cooking a lamb karahi today, using MDH Karahi Gosht masala, I confess that I weighed the lamb, the onions and the masala.  The reason was that this was the first time for some time that I had used MDH KGM, and I wanted to be sure that I knew my starting point if I wanted to repeat (or modify) the dish in the future.  For the record, the pack recipe is in terms of 500 gm lamb; I had 800, so rounded everything up by a factor of 8/5 (approx); they recommended 10

[livo]

I agree with all of this. Some aspects of Indian cookery are as far removed from precision as any style can be.

It would be difficult to remove the full contents of any measure of oil and I'm in no way suggesting you should, or even can, use 118.3 ml.  Completely unnecessary and ridiculous. By its own physical property of coating surfaces you will obviously end up with less. My point was to illustrate a 25 - 30% variation either way depending on locally available utensils. This is not insignificant and the reasoning behind my earlier post about excess oil removal, following the questioning of the already correctly provided amount.  This questioning appeared to me to be about the level of oil more so than the actual measured volume and so my post was not "random".  Either that or someone wanted a sticker for getting the multiplication of 8 X 15 correct.  ;D.

Levels of base oil has been widely discussed. So too has spiced oil. Different subjects.

To again bring it back to topic, I would go so far as to say that with only 2 spices in such low quantities, the KD base is very open to and tolerant of considerable inexact measurement.  At completion, and subject to individual preference, some excess (but not spiced) oil could be removed.  This alone is essentially all I said in the first place. :

Off topic comment. While irrelevant in BIR,  the variation in regional cup and spoon measures is critical to consider in fine bakery and pastries.

[Peripatetic Phil]

I would go so far as to say that with only 2 spices in such low quantities, the KD base is very open to and tolerant of considerable inexact measurement.  At completion, and subject to individual preference, some excess (but not spiced) oil could be removed.

I'm not certain that it (the removal of excess oil, that is) would be possible, at least not using my revised methodology, since the end-point of day 1 is the blitzing, after which the base will be homogenised if not emulsified.  On day 2 I bring it back to the boil (gently !) "until the oil comes out", but if I were to remove the oil at this stage there would be no oil layer to stop the base from festering ...

** Phil.