Topic: Instant pot base and paneer vindaloo

[Robbo141]

First time I

[Peripatetic Phil]

Well documented, well illustrated

[livo]

I came to this thread as it was started by Robbo141 and I wanted to ask about his search for the (his) Vindaloo.  I'm finding big chunks of posts missing all over the forum these days.

Pushing on though, Robbo, what is it about the Vindaloo you remember that eludes you?  I've been looking into quite a few recipes and videos over the last few days and while there are differences, there are also a lot of similarities.  It isn't a dish I cook, but I have done traditional Pork Vindaloo in the past as it was my late father-in-law's favourite dish.

Clearly the BIR (base gravy) method is different to the traditional, but the idea is to achieve the same dish in a different way.  It appears to me that the key will be in getting the Vindaloo paste down.  You can either adopt the BIR notion that Vindaloo is just Madras with extra chilli powder, or you can look into the more traditional paste made from base ingredients for the express purpose of making "Vindaloo".

Sorting the myth from fact. Portuguese in origin is probable. Vindaloo for wine or wine vinegar, maybe. Aloo for potato, probably not and this appears to be a BIR thing as it isn't in the traditional dishes I've seen.

How far off Vindaloo nirvana have you reached?  What was the closest you've come?  I'm going to give a few recipes a crack to see if I can find the fascination this dish attracts. Apparently, it is meant to be deliciously tasty, tangy and spicy and not simply ridiculously blisteringly hot.  I can live with the former but have no interest in painful food.

[Robbo141]

Hey Livo
There’s just that certain something about any BIR dish really. I’ve cooked curries that I’ve described as delicious and 9/10 but none have tasted like the dish you get at a British Indian restaurant. I don’t subscribe to the notion that there’s a secret ingredient and a vindaloo is most certainly not a madras with more chilli powder. My dad’s go-to is madras so I’ve had many and it’s a very different curry.
Maybe it’s just a nostalgia thing but any excuse to keep trying.

I had the traditional dish many times in India and it’s great, but it’s not BIR.  The Aloo meaning potato is a common misconception (I held that view for donkeys years) but apparently the name does come from Portuguese Vin D’Alho that I think is meat with wine and garlic.  The potato thing I’m pretty sure is a British invention.

The search continues…

Robbo

[livo]

There is only one thing about Indian dishes that is consistent and that is the inconsistency.  I found several instances yesterday of the production of a Vindaloo sauce which can then be used to make either Vindaloo or Madras by simply adjusting the amount used as well as using more or less other chilli addition. Other than that, the dishes are the same.

I have often seen reference to the use of the words Madras and Vindaloo to describe the heat level rather than to define a different dish, but I have no doubt you have a basis for describing them in that way.  Yet, it would seem that it is a BIR thing to simply say Madras is 2 measures of chilli and Vindaloo is 3.

I reviewed the ingredient lists for Vindaloo in 3 recipe books yesterday and they are nothing alike. Another  book called it Portuguese Pork and it is a boiled dish, which is perhaps not Vindaloo at all.  As for restaurant  Vindaloo sauce, I found Imran's Kitchen method and the subsequent Madras using it very likely to be a reliable possibility.