Question

[welshuser]

Ive tried a good few base sauces here and a good few vindaloo or madras recipe's, and although GOOD, there is something missing. The curry doesnt have that DEPTH OF TASTE a resteraunt curry does if you know what I mean. The curry, compared to one bought, seems to be 'blander'. Any ideas on what this could be?

thanks.

[DARTHPHALL]

Of the Takeaways i frequent all seem to have one thing in common,the lovely smell that emanates from their food does dissapear if you freeze their Curries for say a week then re-heat & most of it has gone, even eating the day after a large percentage of the smell has gone.
If you analyze the curry by eating it slowly & search for the different flavor's you will discover that it is only this strong smell that gives Bir Curries the edge over all our attempts.
Apart from this our home-made Curries are a million times better & i don't think the Bir's deserve as much credit as we give them.
my favorite Bir makes a very hot Tindalloo (their version of the mighty Phall) but no taste of Chillie powder,were as two other Bir's i visit make hot Curries but their Phall tastes very much of Chillie powder.
I believe that it is a seasoning or flavor enhancer that we all can smell,also, i ordered a Tindalloo & brought it home to discover a white powder on top of the Curry (it was Garlic powder) as we all know cooking our ground Spices does take the pungency out of them, therefore it may be true that seasoning is added to the cooked Curry just before serving then just stirred in,this would give rise to a strong smelling Curry would it not.
As always i do think were are there when it comes to cracking the Bir Curry but i also feel it is a seasoning or some additive that gives Bir's a sort of edge,this is also very logical looking at it from a business point of view.
Also if your looking for a Curry with depth try this mate you will be pleasantly surprised...  https://curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=692.0

[Curry King]

Hi welshuser,

Try doubling the amount of spice mix\restaurant massala you add to the final curry, I find this is sometimes needed especially if you make a curry with lots of sauce.? The other thing is to make your curry'sthe day before you are actually going to eat them, the spice fflavorswill come out more and you won't have that, just cooked it "curry head".? When you order a takeaway you haven't spent an hour or so making it and therefore you sense's are curry free, I never eat a curry straight after making it anymore.

cK

[welshuser]

Will try doubling the spices in the curry recipe itself. The sauce is the sauce. Done another batch of Darth Phall's sauce - great sauce, but i'm doing summit wrong.  Will double the spices for the curry itself and tell you all how it went. Entertaining tonight, doing a choice of 2 - chicken curry (milder), or chicken madras (hotter).....a case of take your pick as it were....

[DARTHPHALL]

welshuser,that is odd, you say it needs more Spice as others have commented how it seems over Spicy that is if you've used my final Curry recipe as well as my base (it is great though ain't it lol).
I'm off to my second fave Bir tonight the "Bash Baagan" in Wadebridge Cornwall,very good Curries but not as good as my local haunt that is still being renovated 

[welshuser]

Yeah it is, I must confess the recipe's are cracking and the ones i've done from the CURRY KING are also very good indeed, but when I do a batch of sauce to the amount in the reciepe, I never know how much of that sauce should be used for the actual curry reciepe, understand? I.e. how many servings is the curry reciepe itself for? As I generally use all the sauce in 1 go, I dont quite know whether to double up, treble up or whatever on the curry recipe itself to go against that volume of sauce? That is where im going wrong, I think.

[Curry King]

Hi Welshuser,

For a curry I always judge the amount of base needed by sight and try and aim for what you would expect in a standard BIR curry then add a little more.? I usualy make my currys slightly bigger than a regular BIR so add a little extra spice mix, chili and sauce to compensate.

Fo a guide I usualy make an 8 onion base sauce and that will make me approx 10\12 currys which as I say are slightly bigger than a standard BIR curry.? As I have cut back on curry lately I tend to seperate the completed base sauce into single curry portions and freeze it.? I will measure it and update my posts to clarify, i've been meaning to do that for ages.

cK

[DARTHPHALL]

Hi Welshuser if you read my recipes you will see the amounts to be used for the second stage .
I use 1.5 litres of base gravy for the second stage/making the actual curry.
Here are the links to the 3 recipes stating the amounts etc...
https://curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=692.0
  https://curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=674.0
   https://curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=673.0

Hope this makes things easier for you, .....DARTHPHALL..... ;D

[welshuser]

thanks a lot to you both. clearly like many others on here i need to experiment. Will keep you all updated.

[DARTHPHALL]

The dark lord is glad to be of service my young apprentice (now a pause followed by some ominous breathing)  ;D