Topic: spiced oil in base

[jb]

I'm making another base sauce tonight and am considering adding spiced oil to it to see how it affects the taste.I made a batch of onion bhajis last night(very nice) and have kept the oil.I know it's been debated to death but I am wondering how many members use fresh oil in their base or just stick with plain old veg oil.I must admit my oil doesn't have the best smell in the world and I can't see that it will give me a better taste....The Undercover book swears by it although the chef on my recent lessons was aghast when I mentioned it!!

[PaulP]

Hi Jb,

Somebody on the other forum named sced (Pete) has posted his own recipe for spiced oil based on what information he got talking to some BIR workers who were having a fag break!

It is a recipe to produce both the spiced oil and to create a load of onion/pepper mix at the same time. I won't post the recipe here as I don't have permission from the OP.

I made this 2 nights ago and it does smell very BIR so I'll be making a base using this oil and cooking a curry with it very soon. Pete claims that he has achieved 100% BIR with this recipe so I'm hopeful.

Personally I wouldn't put used bhaji oil in my curries. The constant heating of oil does tend to degrade the oil and it just gets more and more unhealthy the more it is heated up.

Cheers,

Paul

[Ramirez]

Do you have a link?

[emin-j]

jb , some weeks ago I made a Base as in the Undercover Curry book and for the Bhaji oil I used the Oil from our deep fryer , whether it was the Oil or the other ingredients I don't normally use in the Base ( Asafoetida or Cabbage ) but the aroma through the House and down the street  was stunning and I have never had a Base produce such a BIR aroma . Unfortunately I believe the Oil which also had been used to fry Chips as well as Bhaji's gave the Base a horrible underlying flavour but I could have been the Starch from the Chips , If I had recent Oil that only Bhaji's had been cooked in I wouldn't hesitate to use it.

[jb]

Wish I had seen the last post earlier,I just finished making my base sauce but I binned the spiced oil;the smell really put me off!!! I was scared of spoiling a good sauce i guess.I did use a bit of asafoetida couldn't really tell me difference in the finish again I was hesitant to use a lot after reading some of the posts about it.Next time I will definitely use the spiced oil thanks guys.I walked past a new local combined Indian takeaway/kebab/chicken place tonight,I have to say the place looks really average but the smell coming from where the Indian place is situated was amazing!!!

[George]

the aroma through the House and down the street  was stunning and I have never had a Base produce such a BIR aroma . Unfortunately I believe the Oil which also had been used to fry Chips as well as Bhaji's gave the Base a horrible underlying flavour

Are you saying that the same base smelled brilliant but tasted awful?

If so, for the best effect, it might pay to have this base simmering away to fill the area with the best aroma, whilst another base is actually used to prepare the curries.

[emin-j]

the aroma through the House and down the street  was stunning and I have never had a Base produce such a BIR aroma . Unfortunately I believe the Oil which also had been used to fry Chips as well as Bhaji's gave the Base a horrible underlying flavour

Are you saying that the same base smelled brilliant but tasted awful?

If so, for the best effect, it might pay to have this base simmering away to fill the area with the best aroma, whilst another base is actually used to prepare the curries.

Hi George , yes that would do the trick  very disappointed with the Curries made with this Base ended up tipping 8 litres down the sink ! Difficult to describe the unwanted flavour a bit sort of acidic I suppose , can only guess it was the Chip tainted Oil.

[parker21]

hi guys  the oil is  used twice! once to cook 150 bhajis in and once in the base or final curry so it would be much less harmful than the oil in your chipfryer/ deepfat fryer that you cook your chips and heat many times.
regards
gary

[Unclefrank]

I use a two handled wok and only cook bhajis, pakoras, onions and peppers in the oil and then use the oil from the wok to cook my curries. If the recipe calls for 2 TBSP of veg oil i only use 1 TBSP of the spiced oil and get very good results, if a dish requires to be oily then i add extra spiced oil to my liking.
I have cooked a curry with oil used from cooking chips in and was quite disgusting very acidic (has somebody mentioned before) so i always keep my oils seperate, have been using the same oil now for about 3 months and the taste gets better and better. I sometimes add half and half ( recipe requires 2 TBSP i then add 1 TBSP of veg oil and 1 TBSP of the spiced oil).

[emin-j]

I use a two handled wok and only cook bhajis, pakoras, onions and peppers in the oil and then use the oil from the wok to cook my curries. If the recipe calls for 2 TBSP of veg oil i only use 1 TBSP of the spiced oil and get very good results, if a dish requires to be oily then i add extra spiced oil to my liking.
I have cooked a curry with oil used from cooking chips in and was quite disgusting very acidic (has somebody mentioned before) so i always keep my oils seperate, have been using the same oil now for about 3 months and the taste gets better and better. I sometimes add half and half ( recipe requires 2 TBSP i then add 1 TBSP of veg oil and 1 TBSP of the spiced oil).

I don't fancy cooking Bhaji's in a Oil filled Wok as if that lot ignited 
So I am going to purchase a second deep fat fryer which will be kept just for Bhaji's etc.