Topic: Just made B Edwards Base - Now which curry?

[chilli chopper]

I did make a curry from the original 'Curry Secret' book by Kris Dhillon but it was disappointing.

Interesting,  I am just re-trying Kris Dhillon's recipes and methodology today.  After slowly but surely moving towards a more individual style,  I now feel the need to go right back to my roots to remind myself where I started.  The stage-1 sauce is just cooling now (one change : I used red onions), and I will try to take some photographs at subsequent stages (when the steam has cleared !).  One thing that I know in advance I will do is to double the quantity of sauce per unit of meat, and double the quantity of spices per unit of sauce : in my early days, these two modifications made a considerable improvement to the quality of the final dish.

** Phil.

Thinking about it, now I've made a curry with the Bruce Edwards base (see my next post) the recipe for the Kris Dhillon base seems OK to me - it's just very plain with no spices. So if, as you say, double the quantity of spices per unit of sauce, it should be tastier results

[chilli chopper]

I had a go at making the curry tonight, so I thought I'd post my results here.

This is a picture of the first one I made:


I was very surprised to find that it did actually taste exactly like a standard BIR curry. Hooray! Not the best curry in the world, but it did have 'that' taste.

I followed pretty much the B Edwards basic madras recipe, with a few changes/additions:

To the heated oil I added onions, let them soften then threw in salt, dried fenugreek, chilli powder, tomato puree, spice mix and chopped garlic. Fried this for 20 - 30 seconds then threw in some base sauce. Let this get hot then I added the pre-cooked chicken. once this was all bubbling, I added green chilli and corriander and let it cook for a minute more.

I decided to make another one after I'd eaten the first one (Ihave 2.5 litres of sauce to use up!) so I made a larger quantity in order to take 2 tubs of it to work tomorrow.

I videoed this as you can see here:

curry

My cam battery died before the end so you can't see me add the meat / corriander etc.

I think I prefer the first one I made to this second one since I don't think I added enough of the spice mix to the second one. I also added some cumin seeds to the second one as you can see in the video. I used my industrial sized wok since making the first curry in a frying pan proved a little messy with the sauce splashing over the edges.

Anyway, I've very happy with the results so far

When I added the garlic/spices etc to the oil, I could smell that distinct curry house style aroma. 

[Ramirez]

Fantastic post chilli chopper!

I've never tried any of the BE recipes, but your final curry looks really good.

[solarsplace]

Fantastic post chilli chopper!

I've never tried any of the BE recipes, but your final curry looks really good.

Hi

Great posts, agreed, the final curry looks delicious.

Watching you cook your dish, It is really helpful and interesting to watch these videos and compare how different people cook. I must confess, I was suffering from a constant urge and literally hoping you would and willing you to turn up the gas to cook faster and hotter.

Also a little surprised at what seemed to be minimal amounts of spice added too, but that has already been discussed in this thread - just did not realise quite how minimal they were.

Great effort though! - more posters should upload videos!

Regards

Russell

[chilli chopper]

I wish I could have turned up the heat too! But I already had the burner set to max. My stove isn't the best so when I eventually get a new one I'll make sure I get one with a big burner.

Regarding spice amounts, I think I should have put in more of the spice since I did put in more sauce than would generally be considered to be 1 portion. In the first curry I cooked there was less sauce and I think I preferred it since the spice to sauce ratio was a little higher.

It's a shame my camcorder battery died before I finished recording.

I agree that it is useful and fun to watch different people cook. But I guess its a bit of a hassle to upload vids to youtube, especially if you have to convert the video format from your camcorder before being able to edit it.

I'm going to make some more curry on Sat since I'm having the family over for a bonfire. I might have a look on here for some different spice combinations to use with the base sauce.

[Peripatetic Phil]

I agree that it is useful and fun to watch different people cook. But I guess its a bit of a hassle to upload vids to youtube, especially if you have to convert the video format from your camcorder before being able to edit it.

It is possible that other video hosting sites are less picky.  I use Vimeo by choice, and they have not yet baulked at anything I have attempted to upload.

** Phil.

[JerryM]

chilli chopper,

picture is immense - well done.

the video is real good learning opportunity for everyone.

the 1st thing that struck me is that i add garlic/ginger paste to the oil (1 tsp, i use ashoka recipe http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=3189.msg28438#msg28438).

the other main thing jumping out is that i add the base a chef spoon (4 tbsp) at a time - this stops the heat dropping.

as for KD1 i had same experience - in terms of improving this site will do it for you - think of BIR as a jigsaw that you need to tackle a piece at a time and often re visit your steps when you feel the need.

[Secret Santa]

Thinking about it, now I've made a curry with the Bruce Edwards base (see my next post) the recipe for the Kris Dhillon base seems OK to me - it's just very plain with no spices.

CC you're quite right about KD's base, the plainness is what I like about it (although it has a little too much tomato for my personal preference). It leaves much more room for spicing variations when you come to make the curries.

Bloody nice looking curry btw for your first go!

Did you keep to the one teaspoon of spices in the first one you made? If so did you feel that it needed more spicing?

[chilli chopper]

chilli chopper,

picture is immense - well done.

the video is real good learning opportunity for everyone.

the 1st thing that struck me is that i add garlic/ginger paste to the oil (1 tsp, i use ashoka recipe http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=3189.msg28438#msg28438).

the other main thing jumping out is that i add the base a chef spoon (4 tbsp) at a time - this stops the heat dropping.

as for KD1 i had same experience - in terms of improving this site will do it for you - think of BIR as a jigsaw that you need to tackle a piece at a time and often re visit your steps when you feel the need.

Thanks for everyones comments.

Regarding adding ginger/garlic to the oil to begin with, the reason I didn't is I personally don't like the taste of overcooked garlic (when it starts to brown) and from past experience cooking 'regular' curries, adding garlic for me normally means it is easier to overcook it. That's why I added the onions first so they would release a little moisture to give a little protection to stop me burning the garlic/spices. I think if i did add the garlic first, it probably only fry it for 30 seconds or so then add onions to get a little water in the mix.

That's a good tip about adding the base sauce in increments to keep the heat more constant. I prefer using a wooden spatula for cooking rather than a metal spoon (but I can see teh advantage of using a spoon in this case for quickly adding the spices) so next time I'll add it bit by bit.

Jason

[chilli chopper]

Thinking about it, now I've made a curry with the Bruce Edwards base (see my next post) the recipe for the Kris Dhillon base seems OK to me - it's just very plain with no spices.

CC you're quite right about KD's base, the plainness is what I like about it (although it has a little too much tomato for my personal preference). It leaves much more room for spicing variations when you come to make the curries.

Bloody nice looking curry btw for your first go!

Did you keep to the one teaspoon of spices in the first one you made? If so did you feel that it needed more spicing?

Yes in the first one I made (the one shown in the photo) I used a teaspoon or so of the spice mix, a bit less than the amount I add in the video, but I didn't add cumin seeds to begin with.

I brought the second curry into work today. Everyone loves it, which is nice It tastes even better today.