Topic: Which benchmark should we use to measure our curry cooking success?

[peterandjen]

I had a Balti madras and naan bread last night from the local takeaway, it was nice, different to mine, but only slightly, the main differences i noticed were the use of fresh tomatoes, a lot more salt than i use, and the naan bread had a lot more sugar in it than my recipe, also they pre-cook there chicken in a stock containing garlic/ginger/coriander and fenugreek(from what i can tell) and is very nice.
Other than that, i make a better balti than the local takeaway does.
Mine packs more flavour, it tastes more like the authentic bir taste i remember from years back, and is healthier, ie, less salt.
Ive also been trying different base sauce recipes to the one i usually use out of 100 best balti curries. And im switching back, personally i prefer it, its a closer result for me.
I am going to meet the owner of the local takeaway tonight, he's told me he'll come to my home and show me how to cook several different meals. Im seriously looking forward to it.
Although other than pre-cooking the chicken i honestly dont think there's anything in the way of a Balti he can teach me, its been a long road for me and ive learned just about all there is to know about my tastes .
BUT, i am genuinely looking forward to finding out how to make other Curries, i dont know what yet but ill find out , and look forward to the learning experiance.
Time and again on this site ive seen people say, and im one of them, that they are dissapointed with the meals they go out and pay for, and that they/we can do better.
I think personally weve set our sights too high.
The best Balti i have eaten in the last 10 years is one i cooked at home 2 weeks ago.
Again its a personal taste. But its there for me.
Now for the rest of the currie menu:)

[Mikka1]

Cory don't get me wrong. I think its a good idea, I'm not one of those who considers himself to be right up there with restaurant Chefs like some might feel on line these days. (Kudos if you do?) The reason for that is that its just more complicated than cooking up some onions and stashing chicken in them with water and spices.

This for me is what I have been doing for ages. Each time I do it I'm disappointed because I want some spice in there, not necessarily chillies, just spices and good tastes.

In essence I think the Benchmark will only work if you have one rock solid recipe which everyone will make and go from there.

[commis]

Hi

Girls and Boys I think I've got an idea!
How about ordering a Medium Curry Sauce from Malik's then we can all watch, me in the TA and you on the internet and see what they do. That should start some debate!! Also order a Chicken Balti then we will know if they are a Balti House or just a BIR with a jar of Pataks?

Regards

[jimmy2x]

i agree lads, you know i now make curries just on what i know is considered the right way on here. I dont look now at the recipies because they all say the same thing, ive been a total avid curry maker for about 6 months, read and learned thats all its took to learn the basics ie whats needed for each kinda curry, tonight i made a korma and a madras, the madras i had made allready and froze instead of making a base for it. heck the base recipes mainly are just an add on to the curry you wish to make. The korma i just made by understanding what it entails, didint even use a base to make it.

We are i think at a crucial point in this forum, we all understand the basics, we now need a fool proof madras/vindalloo/korma/ jalfrezi recipe, a curry sold nightly for cash in a standard high street up and down the country. The very thing that actually brought us here in the first place.

now there is no way that there is some secret held by every curry chef in the country, heck pakistan got the blueprints for nuclear bomb making for no more than we want to know how its realy done.

quite frankly its time we had answers. even if we drop a bangledeshi chef a 1000 quid between us to show us wtf its about. its surely time we complete the circle.


unless you all fancy being here in 3 years discussing the same old shit and getting no-where, time we found out and had the real recipe that works!.


i for one want to finish my curry education and move onto starters or tikkas whatever.

seems to me the bir method is harder to fathom than any other cooking style, heck i make italian and french and chinese easily because i get the right recipe.

[George]

seems to me the bir method is harder to fathom than any other cooking style, heck i make italian and french and chinese easily because i get the right recipe.

I agree with you if you're saying all that's needed is the right recipes. One example of a superb recipe on here is Blade's Chicken Tikka. IMHO it produces chicken tikka better than the vast majority of BIRs because that recipe must be spot on. I reckon plenty of us can produce several curries as good as the BIR average for each respective dish. I can't see any point of further visits/enquiries involving such mediocre establishments. My main interest is in the relatively few BIRs which produce dishes way above average. If they wrote down and gave their recipes, we'd be able to make them the same, too.

[JerryM]

commis,

it's a nice offer. i know several want to know how good maliks is so on that basis just buying a curry would please (for me it matters not). i'm pretty sure i've got all the information possible out of the web cam. to make any further sense we need to know what the ingredients are that u can't make out and of course what the rest are that we are making an informed guess at.

jimmy2x & george are right until we have an accurate recipe then we are still without paddle. we've had the opportunity to throw cash at it before but amazingly not enough punters.

i'm kind of with DD in a way - happy with where i'm at. trouble is when u get so close u feel gutted if u can't get that BIR result that we pay money for on the high street. there's no way that i would ever stop going for TA - the convenience is too compelling. however to produce equivalent when u got the time is it for me.

for me what CA is offering is a sanity check to nail the red hearings and fine tune what we know already.

we just need to think out the best way of doing it.

i feel we need to return to the CRO2 base as the starting point. we need to iron out frying of onions and making spiced oil as examples - they are both potty to me but i'd be happy to be proved wrong.

[Cory Ander]

I don't really know why people are having so much trouble understanding what I am trying to say?
 
All I am trying to say is that the truest test of how well a person can reproduce BIR curries is how well a person can cook the simplest ones (e.g. plain chicken/meat curry).

If that person can't cook the simplest curries then that person probably can't cook the more complex curries which contain additional ingredients (e.g. madras, jalfrezi, etc).

Guys, simply take whatever curry base and main dish recipe you're most comfortable with, go and make a plain meat or chicken curry and then compare it to a plain meat or chicken curry from your favourite BIR!  Then spot the difference and try and identify the reasons for that difference!

What's all the other nonsense about? 

[chriswg]

I've just read this post all the way through and although I don't want to be counter-productive, I just don't see the point. We know there is an element missing to our curries but it is the same element regardless of whether we are cooking a medium curry or a Vindaloo, or a CTM for that matter.

I don't see the point of experimenting on a 'curry' when I don't think it is anyone's favourite dish. I am far more motivated to try and acquire the missing taste through Madras cooking than I am with something I won't enjoy eating.

I understand your initial point about not making flavours with chilli powder or coconut but I really believe once one us has the Eureka moment it will be very obvious regardless of curry type.

[Cory Ander]

I just don't see the point

I don't want to labour this issue Chris (given most people's apparent confusion with it) but, if you think that complicating the underlying tastes of a plain curry with some suggested ingredients (including, but not limited to, the following) makes things simpler, then good luck to you and others who feel the same:

-  lemon juice
-  chilli powder
-  fresh chillies
-  worcester sauce
-  tarragon
-  cream
-  yoghurt
-  coconut (block, flour, powder or desscicated)
-  fenugreek
-  chilli sauce
-  garlic sauce
-  caramised onions
-  nuts
-  lentils
-  pineapple
-  mango chutney
-  vinegar
-  tamarind
-  peppers
-  onions
-  tomatoes
-  honey
-  syrup
-  etc, etc

It may still be the same needle we seek, but you've just made the haystack so much bigger!

If people want to make the haystack bigger, that's fine by me.  I'd personally prefer to make it smaller  :

[PaulP]

I think CA has a valid point here although I agree that we are all (for now) operating in isolation.

I think it is correct that if you have a good base recipe and a good spice mix you should be able to produce a general medium curry that should stand up on it's own. That would make a good starting point before you start turning it into a more specific dish.

The closest I have come to this is using the Taz recipes. I'm going to grind up some fresh cumin and corriander seeds this weekend and make another Taz base and spice mix after a couple of weeks of CA base and recipes.

I still think the oil is probably the missing link. I'll get a TA tonight from my local Saffron and scrutinise it again.

Paul.