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

[George]

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!

[ghanna]

hi , yellowfingers
tomato puree is canned tinned tomato with juice ,big tins 400g small tins 230g
tomato paste  is tomato with much of the water been removed  ,you can find it in tubes or even small tins  30p a tin at sainsbury near to the dry pasta.
thanks
ghanna

[Yellow Fingers]

I had another thought about onions. If you've been doing this curry thing for long enough you will inevitably have read about only using this type of onion or that type of onion. Red onions are commonly quoted as being the only ones to use for example and in Bruce Edwards' 'Curry House Cookery' posted by Pete he says medium sized spanish onions are the only ones that will do.

Now I've tried several types of onion and have never been able to tell any significant difference to the base sauce. But if the skins were left on while boiling, well that's another matter all together. I also wonder if they even bother to peel them after boiling, perhaps they just blend them as is.

There is a very good case for doing this:

1. It costs nothing to do.
2. It makes peeling easier and therefore quicker, or if not peeled and just blended in with the sauce even quicker.
3. There is historical use of the method and it has a noted effect on colour and flavour.

I have enough base sauce to last for a century at the moment, but if anyone is making a new batch, perhaps they might try leaving the skins on and post the results.

I would suggest a long simmer if doing this as it will take quite a bit of time to break down the cellular structure of the skins, which will vary with the type of onion used. Certainly this would provide a sensible reason to simmer for many hours as proposed by several contributors here. It would also make sense of using a particular type of onion as there is likely to be more variation in flavouring from the skin than from the flesh of the onion.

More generally, I think the way to approach finding out what the missing ingredients are is to ask yourself, when considering whether to try something new, "would the chef really want me to know about this?". What I mean by that is would it put you off curry for whatever reason if you were told what the ingredient is.

Chicken stock would very definitely fall into this category for vegetarians, and some people would balk at using onion skins so this seems a likely candidate too.

[ghanna]

hi ,all
the reason of not peeling the onion when it is raw is they make you cry and the kitchen staff do not like this specially there is a lot of onions (sacks).
the garlic is small and very difficult to peel as well, when they soak it in boiling water overnight the skin peels easily.
most of the ginger flavor is in the skin and just under the skin   like the potatoes because of that they don't peel the skin,  as well they use huge amounts of it and they don't want to spend the whole day peeling ginger and at the end you will not notice it in the gravy,
i forget to mention that the chef put some fresh herbs in the gravy and he put that with the spices.(he bring these herbs ready chopped from home and mixed together )
the kitchen staff told me the whole place smelled like  mint, dill , coriander and another herb that he thinks is sacred basil.i made some inquires and i find out that this sacred basil is used a lot in Thia cooking.it is stronger than normal basil.
thanks
ghanna

[ghanna]

hi,pete
i made a curry gravy before with Worcester sauce it didnot make any difference i.e not that missing taste.
once i made the proper FRENCH chicken stock with chicken bones and flesh , onions, garlic ,celery,turnips,theme(same flavor as Indian ajwan seeds )black pepper,salt,and all the classic ingredients .boiled slowly for long time .it is out of this world strained the stock used instead of water in the curry gravy it was very nice FRENCH - INDIAN meal  but not really like the gravy we are enjoying in the restaurants, the chiken stock flavor is very strong .
lamb bones got a very very strong flavor ( it smells like live lamb  do you know what i mean?) French chefs never use it to make stock .they use beef ,chicken ,some kinds of fish and vegetables to make stocks.
i made lamb stock before the whole house smelled very bad and
the whole family left the house and only returned after i opened all windows for 6 hours and used a lot of air freshener.
thanks
ghanna

[pete]

Alright then, how about this?
All the meat, chicken and veg is precooked.
That is a definite procedure.
The oil from that and any sauce created goes into the curry gravy.
To duplicate this I would probably use the Bruce Edwards "Curry House Cooking" method.

I have been boiling some curry gravy for a couple of hours.
The oil goes very dark and the sauce seems to almost disintergrate.
I added some home made chicken stock.
Very tasty but missing the flavour still.
I no longer feel that the missing flavour can be made by prolonged boiling.
Sometimes I feel the aroma is there before I puree it.
That kills it dead.

[pete]

Hey.
How come if we have 161 members only 11 have voted?

[Yellow Fingers]

I added some home made chicken stock.
Very tasty but missing the flavour still.

Whoa there Pete, not so fast!

You've only done half the cooking. To decide whether it has made a difference or not you will have to make a full curry with that sauce because the rapid frying during the final cooking or the combination of the sauce with the final added spices or perhaps the flaming of the pan could be the trigger for the missing flavour and aroma.

I'm not covinced that it's possible to tell whether you have cracked it just by making the base alone. I know I'm teaching you to suck eggs here, but you have to be really scientific about this. All tests for new base sauces should be done by making a single curry that you are most familiar with each and every time and there must be no changes to the recipe other than the new base sauce. Ideally it would also be a simply spiced curry to minimise any further ingredient permutations, so ideally something like a madras.

Unfortunately it may be that there are two or three things we are missing and that any two say of the three will just not work on their own. Of course that opens up numerous permutations, which is why you and I and everyone else have such a tough time of it.

As far as using stock goes, I think that it would have to be fairly subtle or at some point some meat eater who also happens to eat the veggie dishes would have sussed it and the restaurant would be up in court pretty quick. I'm not saying it isn't used, just that its effect would have to be subliminal and not in your face.

I think using the chicken pre-cooking stock in the base sauce is a reasonable thing to do, unless you are a veggie, but your friend and mine Mr Pat Chapman says that they just throw it away. Personally I'd say that's a vote for using it! Was it you that saw the chef spoon off the excess oil from a chicken curry and return it to the base sauce pot? Clearly this indicates that they are not too bothered about mixing meat juices into the base sauce.

I no longer feel that the missing flavour can be made by prolonged boiling.
Sometimes I feel the aroma is there before I puree it.
That kills it dead.

The prolonged boiling may still be necessary and if the reports from real chefs are to be believed, definitely is necessary. You can be sure they wouldn't waste time and money boiling for four or more hours if just one or two would do. It may be, however, that it only makes a difference when the missing ingredient(s) are included in the base sauce. It's a bit of a catch 22 situation.

At the risk of repeating myself, the real problem at the moment is that no one has witnessed the making of the base sauce in its entirity and so guess-work rules. Round and round we go!

How come if we have 161 members only 11 have voted?

I was wondering that too, but it just reflects the normal use of forums. There is small a core of regular posters, a few others who dip in and out occasionaly, and then the majority who just lurk until they feel they have something useful to add to the discussion.

[ghanna]

hi ,Pete AND Yellowfingers
i am pretty sure that they re-use the oil from one curry to another and they don't care about meat eaters or not .
every one i asked told me they through out the stock , i believe that, because the kitchen is alaways very hot and they don't refergate the curry gravy it is alaways out side on the cooker day and night,
if they use the chicken stock in the gravy and keep it outside like this it will turn sour and mold will form, any way try some and see..
if the turn out in the restaurant is not full the kitchen staff told me they boil the gravy for at least 10 minutes in order that it will not go bad even if it is covered with oil,it is very hot in there i have been there.
thanks
ghanna

[pete]

I was making two different bases today.
There is a very different aroma from the one made with green peppers.
Neither have the flavour yet.
I made the curryqueen prawn vinadaloo from the cooking demo.
I don't understand, but it still isn't right.
It has got to be the base because the cooking of the meal is so simple.
She's seen it made
I saw it made
Something is definitely odd.
It can't be an unknown spice.
I am running out of ideas and feel we are just going round in circles.