Topic: I may never make base gravy again

[Robbo141]

Since discovering the Butter Chicken recipe, cooked in the Instant Pot electric pressure cooker,
https://twosleevers.com/instant-pot-butter-chicken/
I’ve been experimenting with variations, just winging it basically and I have to say the results have been very satisfactory.  Good enough to just not think about base gravy for the foreseeable future.  Heresy, I know.
If you have a pressure cooker, give it a bash. It’s the simplest of methods and makes for very tasty result.  This was my last one:

Ingredients
1 tin diced tomatoes
5 cloves garlic, finely chopped
2 tsp minced ginger
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp ground cumin
1.5 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp smoked paprika
1 tsp salt
1 tsp kasuri methi, crushed / rubbed
1 black cardamom
1 piece cinnamon
1 tsp extra hot chilli powder
3-4 cloves
2 bay leaves
Chopped fresh coriander stems. About 1” of the bottom of a bunch
1 lb boneless skinless chicken thighs or tenderloins work well too

Put everything in the cooker and mix well.
Put the lid on and Cook on ‘High’ for 10 mins then let pressure release naturally 10 mins then manually release the rest of the pressure.
Remove the chicken and discard the whole spices.
Blend the curry with a stick blender.  It will be quite thin at this stage but that’s OK.
Let it cool a good 30 mins or more. Apparently this helps when adding cream later.

Return the chicken to the pot and add:
5-6 Thai chillies, sliced lengthwise
1 tsp garam masala
Some heavy cream.  As this isn’t Butter Chicken, I didn’t add the whole 4oz cream, just a bit to give it some body.

Turn the cooker on Sauté and bring it to gentle simmer to warm the chicken back up and cook the chillies just enough.  I did try putting the chilies in the first stage but cooking them under pressure just makes them mush and I prefer them a little more solid.

Really simple, and apart from the slight faff of having to blend and then let cool, it’s something I’m going to continue experimenting with this and not do base for a bit.

Give it a go?

Robbo

[Peripatetic Phil]

OK, inspired by your recommendation (and rapidly losing my former interest in labour-intensive food preparation), I invested £59-99 in one of these today.  I will report back when I have tried it, but the first dish is far more likely to be braised sheeps' hearts in Madeira sauce than it is anything from the sub-continent !
--
** Phil.

[Robbo141]

Nice Phil. Useful for so many things and of course you can make base gravy in it in much less time than traditional methods, should you wish.  Enjoy.

Robbo

[livo]

I've had mine for over 10 years and I use it all the time. Stews, curries, base gravy, corned silverside, pressure cooker, rice cooker all in one.  I've used it to make Christmas Pudding. You'll love it.  I'm also going to give this one pot Butter Chicken a crack.  These units are fantastic.

I also have the standard stove top pressure cooker but I rarely use it these days.

[Peripatetic Phil]

I also have the standard stove top pressure cooker but I rarely use it these days.

If the £59-99 Lidl special is all it's cracked up to me, my "standard stove top pressure cooker" will shortly have a new (hopefully temporary) home in the St Austell Hospice charity shop ...

[foureyes1941]

I tried this curry today and really enjoyed the flavours and ease of making, The only difference I did was to add a couple of onions in as prefer curries without too much tomato taste  and thought this would help balance it. Am loving my new Instant pot and look forward to trying lots more dishes cooked in it.

[Robbo141]

Great to hear foureyes
I’ve made a few variations of that recipe. It’s very forgiving.  I put one roughly chopped onion in and it definitely added something to the texture after blending.  The basic butter chicken recipe is a good starting point but hard to mess it up and it’s such a hands-off prep, I love it.

Robbo

[Peripatetic Phil]

Inspired by your recommendation (and rapidly losing my former interest in labour-intensive food preparation), I invested £59-99 in one of these.
--
** Phil.

OK, initial feedback on the Silvercrest SSM 1000 A2.  I used this for the first time today to cook a liver and bacon casserole.  In the past I would have cooked one of these in a cast-iron casserole dish (Chasseur, Le Creuset or similar), so sought guidance from the web on cooking one in a multi-function pressure cooker.  I decided to go with the recipe at Krumpli, substituting my much-loved Bonne Cuisine Madeira wine sauce mix for Brian Jones' gravy ingredients.  I didn't bother weighing the liver, nor did I bother to trim the liver and soak it in milk (why eat liver if you don't like the flavour ?!).  Apart from that, I more-or-less followed the instructions, although I did ignore the "Sandwich the slices of bacon between two baking trays and bake in the oven with the liver for 45 minutes" and just threw four extra rashers in the pot at the appropriate time.

My first problem (apart from failing to realise that the device was not pressurising) was that the SSM <etc> has no manual setting.  Nor does it display the temperature at which it is cooking or even list the temperature for each preset function in the handbook (I have asked the manufacturers for this information, and am awaiting a reply as I write).  The second problem was that I failed to realise that the device does not require the lid to be in place when using the sear/sauté function.  This, of course, made the searing phase rather more difficult than it need be.  In the absence of a manual setting, I chose the "egg" option for the final (5+10 minute pressure-cook) phase, but found that this caused the sauce to stick to the bottom of the pan (it came free easily enough, using a wooden spoon) so I think that for my next Madeira sauce recipe (braised stuffed pigs' hearts) I will opt for the "soup" setting, which will hopefully operate at a lower temperature and therefore be less likely to cause sticking.

Once I had come to terms with the limitations of the SSM <etc>, I have to say that it produced very acceptable results.  I couldn't be bother to cook any potatoes, so just ate it as-is, and it proved a very satisfying meal.  Would I recommend the SSM to others ?  Only if budget is the overriding criterion.  If not, look for one that displays temperatures, allows you to adjust the temperature for the preset functions, and offers a manual mode.  Maybe one of these.

--
** Phil.

[Robbo141]

Phil
My Instant Pot doesn’t show the actual pressure or temp either but I’ve never needed that level of detail. I just use manual no set for a given time.  One thing I did read is that the soup setting is useful when cooking yoghurt based curry, to prevent it separating.  When I do use the sauté function it just has high, normal, low settings.  Works well as long as you keep stirring.

Just have yourself a bash at butter chicken and never look back.

Robbo

[livo]

Mine (Ronson) has no manual control at all.  The only variable control is the timer and this is not applicable to the Saute and Slow Cook functions.  Saute is lid off and one heat where you decide how long to cook for and turn it off when you're done.  Slow cook is for 8 hours with lid on under pressure.  The other modes, for Curry, Rice, etc, have the temperature pre-set, all operate with lid on and under pressure, however each mode is time variable between an upper and lower limit which varies from mode to mode.