Undercover Curry - Anyone heard of it?

[pete]

after maybe 8 years I thought I would revisit this book and recipes
apart from the recipes, the book has an entertaining dialogue
There is no doubt in my mind that the book is written from genuine observations in a takeaway/restaurant

When I made this before, I made the scaled down gravy which is not recommended by the author, although supplied
He understands that probably not many people want to go the whole hog!

My cooking pot wasn't quite large enough to quite make the full amount, but I could go 3/4

I learnt more, this time around,  than when I made it before
Very important to
Cook on extra low gas
Let the vegetables cool right down before blending
Water down blended curry gravy by 50%
Boil until ALL the oil comes out from emulsification
You really need to get the full red oil slick on top of the gravy
Totally covering it
When cooking the curry
Don't overcook the garlic ginger or spices
So NO ROASTING
Don''t overboil the gravy
Add a little pataks tandoori paste
I prepared this and cooked this over a 3 day period
I made a prawn madras
Absolutely brilliant
His onion bhajees are fantastic
I mean as good as shop bought
and even better than a lot I have bought
the peshwari naan I'm not totally sold over
It's rolled just prior to cooking in the oven
It tasted lovely, but didn't rise
No pictures in the book, so maybe that was correct
I believe that Julian's book is very much "influenced" by this book

[pete]

close up of gray

[pete]

large pot of gravy

[pete]

The book says you can freeze. As you might imagine, I have frozen quite a bit!!
There is so much information about cooking curries
All you need is one part of the instructions to be wrong, and you've totally changed the flavour
Obviously, Dave's recipes are just one way of doing it
But exactly following what he says, from start to finish, really has delivered a quality result
Some of the information flies in the face of other recipes
For instance cooking the base on a low heat & no roasting of the spices
But I trusted and did it anyhow
and very glad I did
If nothing else,, the onion bhajees are well worth a try
Recipes for these have always bit a bit vague for the quantity of gram flour required
Dave specifies
weight of onion : weight of gram flour
4:1
and that works perfectly
The salting of the onions makes them keep a good shape
not overspiced, so the flavour of the onion comes through
But for all the curries, the paramount thing is to use his gravy
I was initially very dissapointed with the general flavour of the gravy, but it really worked so well with the curry

[Secret Santa]

Could you post the full bhaji recipe Pete?

[Peripatetic Phil]

If Pete feels unable to do so, I can send a copy via private message.
** Phil.

[pete]

Could you post the full bhaji recipe Pete?

Could you post the full bhaji recipe Pete?

Don't think Dave is watching
are you Dave?
the book recipe  is for a whopping 120 bhajees, but we're not going to do that are we?
this is my scaled down version
I used two huge onions which weighed 600g
I sliced into strips then put in a bowl
I added 1 1/2 desert spoons of salt
Mixed it all in by hand
and left it for two hours
No water is added for this recipe
you use the juice from the onions
then I added

1 egg
1/2 desert spoon madras curry powder
1/2 desert spoon garlic ginger puree
1 teaspoon slightly crushed coriander seeds
1/2 teaspoon slightly crushed cummin seeds
1/2 teaspoon slightly crushed fennel seeds
small handfull of finely chopped coriander leaves
pinch of ajwain seeds
1 desertspoon SR flour
1/2 desert spoon baking powder
150g gram flour

now get your hand in and really mix this up for a minute or two
leave about five minutes

Heat the oil to a low setting
I do this old school, by adjusting the gas
But it was 130 degrees
Cook for ten minutes
The bhajees don't go dark, they stay golden
Definitely watch the heat
Very important to keep low
the mixture is very easy to loosely shape into a ball
this makes about 10 bhajees
and it keeps the shape in the oil but expands a bit (probably the baking powder)

you're meant to let the bhajees cool, then deep fry again at a high temperature for a minute, when required
I have done them like this and they are absolutely fantastic

they get almost a hard shell on the outside, while remaining soft on the inside

but this time I just microwaved them hot
and they were superb

[pete]

got this bag really cheap
5 quid from the asian shop
the onions are huge
hope they are good keepers, going to take a while to get through them

[pete]

two of my bhajees
they smell amazing, even cold
note the amount of gram flour I used was 1/4 the weight of onion

[Ghoulie]

got this bag really cheap
5 quid from the asian shop
the onions are huge
hope they are good keepers, going to take a while to get through them

If they start to sprout - google how to plant out sprouting onions - works a treat - and you got more from each onion.  Involves peeling onion down to indivdual sprouting parts