Topic: My take on CRO2 Base

[JerryM]

CA kicked off a base development a while ago which disappointingly fell away too early. this is my take on it which has got to the stage that i don't feel i can improve it further.

veg oil 500ml (only 100ml if not reclaiming)
marg 30ml
onion 800g
carrot 200g
coriander stalk 20g
garlic 30g (blended in the water as per BE)
salt 5ml
ground coriander 25ml
turmeric 25ml
chilli 5ml
fennel 30ml
muslin bag (4 off cardamon, 4 off bay, 1 anis, 90mm cinnamon)
initial water 300ml
coconut block 25g

method
1) all in pan with lid on and boil/fast simmer 2 hrs
2) reclaim 400ml oil, remove muslin bag & blend
3) add 1000ml water and fast simmer for 1 hr (lid off)
4) add thinning water typ 300ml to give finished vol of ~2250ml

a few notes:
1) u might prefer to use more oil in the base ie 150ml instead of 100ml net
2) 400ml is the target amount of oil to reclaim and may not always be possible. u can also vary the initial amount of oil to suit your needs. if u don't reclaim then just add 100m or 150ml of oil intially
3) the volume at blending should be around 1400ml
4) with no tomato u need more tom puree when cooking

[captain pugwash]

this is my first post so thought i'd use it to say thank you for this base. just made it today and well impressed as my first ever base. thing is that now i have to find what to do with it lol. i'm only an amature so will not post any of my own recipes as i'll poison you all. once again thanks for this one

[JerryM]

captain p,

finding what to cook is not that easy. a lot of recipes yes - but difficult to judge how good they are without trying them. once u get confident get your recipes posted!

the ones i make all the time are here (No particular order):

CTM http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php/topic,539.0.html

Jalfrezi http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php/topic,2664.0.html

Karahi Bhuna http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=3215.0;topicseen

Madras http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=3489.0

Kashmiri http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=3585.0

[dellydel]

Hi Jerry,

So is this the base you use yourself, with the greatest success?

Cheers

Del

[JerryM]

dellydel,

i do now pretty much make this base all the time. mainly down to the fact that i have all the ingredients to hand and the method is pretty easy.

prior to this i had settled on the rajver, safron & ifindforu bases. collectively they make my top 4. i recently revisited the rajver & safron to compare with the adapted CRO2. i'd like to do same for the ifindforu and probably for ivan gough's AIR. the conclusion for me is that whilst they all taste different i can't really pick out that difference in the final dish - they all exceed a "threshold" and make a top notch curry. i am sure there are other top notch bases on the site that i've not tried but i have tried quite a few. i think darth's and admin's are the 2 that stickout that i've not tried.

[dellydel]

Thanks jerry, unfortunatley my curry making has taken a back seat since the hype of the Ashoka recipes, however I am looking at getting back into it, I will try this one next I think 

Where can I find a muslim bag, would they have them at a local Indian grocers?

Cheers

Del

[JerryM]

dellydel,

the muslin bag is just a piece of cloth tied with string (i used a new dish cloth cut into a ~3" square). i now use what's called a "spice ball" and it works a treat (less messing on the washing out front). u may be best trying the cloth 1st to make sure the whole spices work for u although the spice ball was only a few quid (i now also use it for none curry cooking).

http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=3476.0

[currymonster]

I also bought a spice ball after Jerrys suggestion in the previous thread and they're great. Just make sure you get one big enough to fit the cinnamon sticks in easily (3 inches diameter seems  about right).

[dellydel]

Thanks guys!  That spice ball looks fantastic!

Cheers

Del

[Secret Santa]

As I was reading this it struck me that the use of a spice ball or muslin bag should be unnecessary.

I've watched the bases being made from the Malik and east live webcams and they use a few bay leaves, some cinnamon stick, star anise etc., all the usual stuff. Now, do you really think they are going to fish about in one of those bloody great stock pots they make these bases in to remove these whole spices? Course they're not! They just blend them up with the rest of the base.

So by that reasoning all you need to do is pre-grind your whole spices and add those in instead of adding them whole, although you would neeed to add substantially less of the ground stuff.

There you go, no more need of muslin bags and spice balls (I reckon!)