Topic: Who believes there is a secret ingredient to the curry base?

[Mark J]

Here's some text from a job advert at caterer.com:

Tandoori Chef ?7.51ph
Rajinda Pradesh is our modern contemporary Indian restaurant located in the unique surroundings of Sherwood Forest. We require an experienced Head Chef and Tandoori Chef to enhance our already highly qualified team. The restaurant has high volume turnover and also provides a busy take away service.
 
Salary: ?7.51ph ?? Location: Nottinghamshire ?? Date: 16 Mar 2005 16:01:32 ?? Employer type:? ?

For the head chef, they are offering ?21K plus bonus.

A chef on ?7.51ph might well be interested in earning some pocket money for a private demo!

Thats centreparcs for anyone thats interested, I have eaten at the Indian restaurant and it is very nice indeed, extremely limited menu but good

[adamski]

I don't believe its all in the base sauce.

I did an a test the other day, one curry cooked with hardly any oil as a starter the second
was cooked with loads of oil as a starter and the second one tasted very different, infact the second one tasted nearly like the real thing.

Too many base sauce recipes and too many are similar give or take the carrot.

Hell, it can't be one simple ingredient, I think alto of people would be happy if that was the answer.

For one ingredient to make that much difference to the taste of a sauce is nigh on impossible, we are not talking about a subtle taste that would be missed by most people, but something that we all agree on with out question is definate.

Everyone on this forum KNOWS that what they cook at home still has something not the same.

Whats different,

A) you cooked it and it's not in a sliver foil container or served on a sizzling platter
B) you've not done it day in and day out for 10 years (well most of us have not)
C) you really don't realise that what you've cooked IS the real deal.

Someone tell me that they have cooked a curry using these recipes for someone else, and told them it was a take-away and they
said "no way man this tastes like you cooked it".

I cooked Pete's one for the wife and she said and I quote "you could sell this and no one would know".
 
Still, is it worth going to the Bengal Cuisine again, my Dads birthday is comming up soon and he's keen on going, maybe I'll push for using the sauce that he cooks and not the "special" already done sauce.

[ghanna]

hi , Adamski
very good idea ,could you please come back and report .
thanks
ghanna

[Mark J]

I don't believe its all in the base sauce.

I think it probably is or the oil, the actual recipe's the chefs use are very simple.

I did an a test the other day, one curry cooked with hardly any oil as a starter the second
was cooked with loads of oil as a starter and the second one tasted very different, infact the second one tasted nearly like the real thing.

This is a very good point, the restaurants use a shedload of oil, for a portion for one I saw about 3 TBSP of oil floating just on top of my curry the other night.

Hell, it can't be one simple ingredient, I think alto of people would be happy if that was the answer.

The only single ingredient I think it could be is MSG

A) you cooked it and it's not in a sliver foil container or served on a sizzling platter
B) you've not done it day in and day out for 10 years (well most of us have not)
C) you really don't realise that what you've cooked IS the real deal.

I think these points sadly could be the nub of it (although my baltis are served sizzling in a cast iron karahi? ;D )

[Blondie]

Hi all,

as good as all of these posts are, I still am not sure if "that taste" is in the base or only occurs during the preparing of the final dish. Surely we need to know for certain which of these it is before we can progress.  As I have said before we need to get to our locals and buy some base sauce.  Sunday is my takeaway night every week, so I'll be buying my curry from wherever WILL sell me some base sauce.

Cheers,

Blondie

[Mark J]

As I recall Pete said that taste was in the base sauice he bought.

Out of interest last night I cooked a chicken balti for 2, recipe was as per my previous post (restaurant demo), my wife said it has 'that taste', I wasnt sure myself (so difficult to tell when you cook these things yourself I find).

The only things I did different were:

The chicken I used was straight from being pre cooked

I fried only crushed garlic at the start (not ginger, the 2 kitchens I have been in dont use ginger/garlic puree as the first stage) and used 6 big cloves (reason for so much garlic was that recently I cooked an authentic indian dish which was for 3 people, it used 8 cloves of garlic and had something similar to 'that taste').

I also added 2 oxo veggie stock cubes (which have a high amount of MSG in them) disolved in a 3rd pint of water to my base sauce (bruce edwards)

I used pataks balti paste

I used an entire packet of Tesco's fresh corander,  half went in the dish, the other half was used as a garnish

Served in sizzling cast iron karahis


Tasted bloody good I must admit!

[Keith]

Interesting post mark .
I too have been experimenting . I always use the base sauce from Bruce Edwards article as i think it smells better and i go with the recipes from the Curry house cookery ( ?7.95 or something to download ).
I think the extra oil makes a huge difference and also plenty of FRESH corriander .
I have to confess though i stuck a TSP of Pataks Balti Curry paste in last night and it tasted really good .
We had friends round and they said they wouldn't have known the differece from the restruarant !
Could it be as simple as the fact they didn't have to cook it !! I also brought it to the table in foil containers  ;D ;D
I think we all tend to whip ourselves here too much over this . Relax it tastes great . By the way im off to the shops today to buy the next size up in trousers  :-[
Keith

[curryqueen]

Hi Keith,

The Curry House Cookery download you are talking about by Bruce Edwards, does it give more info to that which Pete posted?  If it does, then it's got to be good vallue at ?7.95.  Could you please post the link for me.

[Keith]

Curryqueen
Im not sure it will have much more info than pete as he appears to spend an awfull lot of time trying different things . He probably knows more than this . I bought it because it's info thats all in the one place and easy to read . I think it's good value even if you only get one or two things out of it that you didn't know or haven't tried . It's only the cost of a Curry . Here's the link anyway   http://www.curryhouse.co.uk/index.html   
Keith

[Curry King]

Im of the net for a few days and suddenly the forums as busy as ive ever seen it!!    :

Anyway just my 2$

I don't think theres a secret ingredient as already been said how could it have been kept so secret.  I think its not so much something missing as too much added, keep the base simple, quick and cheap.  I don't belive it makes any differnce for the better cooking it for 4 hours as opposed to 1 hour, the sauce seems to take on a different\better taste after standing for a while.  Im sure the currys themselves need to be cooked quick as well or "that" taste goes, cooking it too much just ruins the flavour.  The gravy needs to be hot before it goes into the curry, this alone I think makes a major differnce to "that" taste.