Topic: My experiments base and Dhansak

[deckitout]

I cooked what was in my opinion my closest attempt at replicating my favourite curry Chicken Tikka? Dhansak last Saturday

I used a close version of Bruce Edwards curry base, up until now I had been using the base from curryhouse.co.uk
The base is a lot more spicy and watery that my usual

For this weeks experiment I also used Ghee as opposed to groundnut oil.
The result was very very close to my local BIR, and probably better than most Dhansaks that I have eaten outside of my two most favoured? BIR?s.

I used the base last week for a CTM and felt it was two spicy, I had to add a lot of creamed coconut to mask the taste and get to where I wanted it. For the Dhansak it gave superb results and I ended up with a hot sour and sweet rich curry just how I like it.

It begs me to ask the question that maybe more that one base is used in some BIR?s, maybe a mild and a more spicy hotter version. I am not convinced that a very spicy base is the way to go with all curries, certainly Curries like Korma and CTM

My partner cook a chicken Tikka Passanda also using the same base, this was also superb with a rich creamy taste. The Tikka recipe is from the Balti Kitchen supplied by Ray Graham, many thanks Ray, this is the best Tikka to date for me

We have now cooked all but about two recipies from curryhouse.co.uk and are getting better each time as we experiment, most Saturdays we cook one curry each and a side dish

Phil

[Curry King]

Hi Phil,

I am sure that some restaurants do use more than one base and maybe the whole one base sauce idea is just to save time.  Here is an interesting base that uses 2 sauces and the curry's a combination of both:

http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=476.0

cK

[CurryCanuck]

Hi Phil -

Could you post your Dhansak recipe .


Cheers CC

[CurryCanuck]

Tried yet another dhansak experiment - I used Darth's great base and added the herbs & spices from the dhansak recipe in " 50 Great Curries of India ".The result was rather impressive .

[CurryCanuck]

Thanks to Phil...tried your dhansak recipe - very good ! So many recipes , so little time , the dilemma of matching the beer with the curry  ;D ;D ;D