Topic: What is a good recipe for Garam Masala?

[Richard W. Rinn]

From reading many of the posts on the forum, I get the impression that perhaps the majority of the posters use bought garam masala instead of making their own? Just wondering what the most popular types are, or from the people who make their own what recipes they use.

Garam Masala was probably the first Indian spice I bought, before I actually got into cooking curries, just to see what it was like because I knew the name, but when I got into cooking, my first book was a Pat Chapman one which recommended making your own GM, which I duly did, expanding my spice rack about fifteenfold in the process. I'm thinking about chucking what's left of it now and making some fresh stuff, as I've been using it for a good few months and there's still a fair bit left, and I'd like to try something else and make use of some more of the whole spices I bought previously before they get too old.

Something that's interested me when reading GM recipes though is whether or not to leave the cardamom pods in when grinding the ingredients up. Some recipes have said to leave the pods in, but most have said just use the seeds.

I was thinking about trying the GM recipe from the Shish Mahal cook book, which is quite a simple one (only four or five spices I think).

Cheers,


Richard.

[Richard W. Rinn]

Slightly off-topic query concerning this thread having been moved to the Trainee Chefs / Beginners Questions area: I'm not disputing my being a beginner, or my question being a question :-) but just think if it gets some useful replies, surely it would be better in the Spices area where I posted it. I'm just going by the fact that before posting, I looked for a Garam Masala thread in the spices area, but didn't look in the beginner questions area, and of course didn't try a search because I assume it would come up with many, many results. I can see now that there are a couple of other threads about spices in this area, where I wouldn't necessarily have thought to look for them because there is a dedicated Spices area.

Cheers,


Richard.

[Cory Ander]

Hi RWR,

Thankyou for your posts RWR. 

You can find Garam Masala recipes in the "Supplementary Recipes" Section here:  http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?board=28.0

You make a very good point!  I moved a number of threads (including yours) to try to keep the forum as slick and as easy to search as possible (given its current structure and format)  It may be that I've achieved quite the contrary of course! 

I'm certainly not suggesting you are a beginner!  I guess it could be equally well argued that your post belongs in one of three places!:

• "Let's Talk Curry"
• "Trainee Chefs'/Beginners' Questions
• "Hints and Tips - Spices"

I think there is currently a large degee of overlap between sections and I had to make a judgement call on where your (and other) posts most logically belong. 

I decided it did not belong in the "Hints and Tips" section because it was a question rather than a hint or a tip.  I decided it was more specific than general "chit chat" and therefore did not best belong in the "Let's Talk Curry" section, which is a bit of a catch-all.  I concluded, rightly or wrongly, that your post most logically belonged in the "Trainee Chefs'/Beginners' Questions".  It is a very pertinent question, that will greatly assist beginners, afterall!   

I believe that the structure of the forum probably needs to be thoroughly reviewed and revised to accomodate more logical posting searching.  I will talk with Stew about the possibility.  Any suggestions would be most welcome and can be posted here:  http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=1641.0

No offence intended RWR (nor to anyone else whose post I've moved!)!  Keep up the posts!