Topic: Roshney Practice

[natterjak]

Did you see Chriswg's suggestion of  spoonful of curry into the tarka before adding it to the finished dish??

I did but I think the reason for his suggestion is to flamb

[natterjak]

At about 10 minutes the gravy looks to be threatening to catch on the bottom of the pan, but then a stir with the spatula leaves the bottom of the pan clean.

You can see this in Chewy's vids.

I reckon this is an important part of the overall process too, on top of the initial spice singe.

Looks great btw nat, good job

Gary

That's an interesting point Gary. Yes the sauce was starting to stick to the pan and perhaps you're right that this helps develop the flavours. Julian from curry 2 go thinks this is important:

The Curry Pan

When we were at Zaal, Az told me not to stir the Roshney once it was set aside onto the lower gas burner for the simmer stage. Perhaps the purpose is to allow it to catch on the pan a little?

[natterjak]

Hi NJ
Nice One.
Looking much more relaxed and confident  on this second attempt.
Probably, because you not cooking rice at the same time, which can be distracting.

How would you compare the taste, with the one you cooked at Zaal?
cheers Chewy

Yes I knocked up some pilau yesterday morning which does take the pressure off when cooking the final dish. Compared to the zaal dish mine was too salty, not quite as sweet and lacking in overall depth of flavour. But I'm using up my base gravy made to Abdul's basic recipe and will go to either your 3 hour base or the Zaal base next time i cook some. These I would expect to be a little sweeter as they incorporate the bhagar stage and 2nd cook.  Overall I felt it was progress and the potential to be able to fully replicate what I cooked in fleet is certainly there.

[natterjak]

Well done Chris, great video and lovely looking curry.

How much base are you using for each curry then?
I probably use 300ml at the very most, but lately I've been using a 500ml tub full for 2 curries.

So for each curry I'll add half a ladle 50ml at the start, after singeing, cook it right down, then add a full ladle 100ml.
When this has cooked right down, add the precooked meat and veg, give it a good stir round, and then add the final full ladle. This is then cooked out to desired consistency.

Oops sorry, not trying to tell you how to cook yours, just i think it's important to cook each ladle of base right down, before adding more. I used to add a load in one go and. like you, that seemed to take an age too cook down too.

To last night's curry I probably added about 450ml of base. I think it's a little too much because the taste of the masala sauce didn't come though as strongly as I expected and the cooking duration was too long. I think if everything is in correct balance I should be cooking for around 8 mins.

On the adding of the sauce I've seen both approaches in the videos I've watched. Some, like you, will only ever add 1 ladle and cook down, others seem to load the pan up with sauce and just let it cook out for the whole cooking time. Not sure of the merits of each approach so maybe I need to compare and contrast. But then there are so many other variables at play which might skew my results... Ah well I'll just have to cook a load more curries then, not a bad life 

[natterjak]

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[JerryM]

Natterjack,

don't bother sieving the base (although i've never tried). just concentrate on what the base tasted like at Az's and re creating it.

also as said above pre fry the onion and green pepper. for me in reclaimed oil on very quick hot heat.

[emin-j]

NJ your looking like a Pro  300ml of base is about right and you should be making the AZ base if you want to replicate the Zaal taste complete with the whole spiced water  ;)keep up the good work.

[natterjak]

Thanks emin-j and jerry. Maybe I'll make the Zaal base but will sieve it as I'm intrigued to see what effect this has and I'm sure chewy wouldn't do it unless it made a worthwhile difference. That guy knows his onions!