Topic: Is curry the next day better?

[Dylan]

I cooked a batch of curries a few days' back - a couple of veggy dishes and a couple of chicken. When I'd finished, the last thing I really wanted to eat was curry! All I fancied was a sandwich. I pushed it around the plate but hardly ate anything. Alright, I had picked a bit (or tested) when I was cooking them but this couldn't account for my lack of appertite. Does anyone else get this?
 I know it's documented that cooks often don't feel like eating thier own food. I think this phenomenom could be exacipated with curry because the flavour is so much stronger than most foods (especially if you cook a lot of dishes in one go). It might explain why we often judge our creations secondary to a genuine restaurant counterpart: it's because we cooked them!
 My answer: dont eat then on the day of creation. Keep them in the fridge for a couple of days then reheat them (finishing with some fresh coriander, of course).

Am I alone in experiencing "all curried out" after just cooking the dishes?

[Mark J]

I think you've hot the nail on the head here, I always prefer food that someone else has cooked. I have also read that cooking with spices dulls your taste buds to them and so when you taste the finished product it isnt quite right.

I think leaving them for a day is a good idea or freezing them

[Curry King]

I get this as well, what I do now is cook a couple of currys and a side dish or two in the afternoon and eat them in the evening, saving whats left for another day.  As im cooking I find im dipping at the them all the time eating and tasting by the end of it I just don't fancy curry.

[Dylan]

Glad I'm not alone. I find if I get a premade curry out of the fridge or freezer I'll completely devour it. More often than not, I'll nuke up a second or third helping too. I could never eat this quantity just after initially cooking the dishes.

I believe curries objectively improve if left for a while also, so it might not all be psychological

[Curry King]

I believe curries objectively improve if left for a while also, so it might not all be psychological

I totaly agree with you here but how come this seems to work opposite for restaurant currys?  I find a heated up takeaway is never as nice as it was fresh if you know what I mean   

[Dylan]

I have to confess I've never tried reheated takeaway. If there are any dregs left the next day I tend to gobble it cold straight from the fridge. I know cold curry might sound a bit horrible, but I think it actually tastes quite good - there seems to be more taste going on.

[pete]

It may be sad but true!
Last nights cold curry tastes even better in the morning.
Things do happen when you change the temperature of food.
To make ice cream you must put in loads of sugar, as you cannot taste sweetness so easily in something so cold.

[merrybaker]

So much of what we call "taste" is really smell.? So, if one is cooking a curry for a long time, those smells fill up one's nose, and there will be sensory overload, and the actual eating of the curry will just be more of the same.? Whereas curry from the fridge is reheated quickly, and the nose is still fresh, and the curry tastes new and great!

[Muttley]

I try to get all the cooking done an hour and a half before we're due to eat. Then I go for a nice long walk, whick stimulates the apetite, and clears the nose (when we've got guests, I have to content myself with going into another room). Then, half an hour before eating, I get the rice on, prepare the raita, etc, and generally find I'm as ready for the curry as if someone else cooked it.

If I am cooking with steaming dishes under my nose right up untl it's time to eat, I never find the meal as satisfying.

[Juls]

I would say yes because the favours have time to intensify and even more so after been frozen and re-heated. Now I always do dishes like curries and stews the day before we're going to eat them and nearly always make double of what we're going to eat to freeze after all a good curry takes a lot of time to prepare and cook and like so many of you after cooking them you don't fancy them straight after.

Juls