Hi,

Been reading these boards for some time now but have not got around to making a BIR curry. I've tried Emin-J's curry from scratch which was awesome but I'd now like to get into BIR style. After some thought I realised the reason that I haven't yet made a BIR curry is the fear of messing up the base and tossing out a whole pot full of ingredients or turning out ok but not having the space in the freezer to store it. With limited freezer space and little confidence in creating a huge batch of base, can anyone recommend or point me to a base recipe I can try which will make about 4 serves of curry that I can 'practise' with? I originaly thought I'd just halve some recipes but going off some comments I've been reading on these boards it's not that simple.

Appreciate your help.

Hi,

Just after some advice on frying powdered spices. I've seen a few recipes that call for frying powdered spices in oil before adding the rest of the ingredients. I'm wondering how this is done exactly?

what purpose does it serve?
At what heat?
for how long?
how do you know when they are fried adequately?
would it be obvious if they get burnt?

Appreciate any info as I've tried this a few times and not sure if I'm frying them for long enough in fear of burning.

thanks.

Tried a different restaurant to my regular trusted local for something new.

Firstly, Credit where credit is due, their Samosas, Tandoori chicken on the bone and dessert were good.

But my Lamb Rogenjosh was terrible.
My curry appeared to be bits of lamb cooked in water with a few spices thrown in then poured into a serving

bowl and called a curry. Going by the taste, look and texture I was convinced that I had been served mildly spiced water, light brown in colour with bits of lamb sitting in it.

Dipping Naan bread into the curry resulted in a soggy bit of bread with no curry "sauce" on it.
Serving the curry ontop of rice resulted in the curry seeping down to the bottom of the plate and being left with bits of lamb sitting ontop of watery rice.

My wife's Butter Chicken had passable flavour, but it too was watery and missing that creamy/buttery texture and look.

Very dissapointed that I wasted our "go out for dinner night" on this. Wont be doing it again.

Seems many people here have got to around 95% to replicating a BIR curry. To those people, I was wondering if you could advise which base (and any modifcations), recipe and methods got you that 95% closeness?
As a beginner on this forum there is so much info to go through, would be nice to get some tried and true information from experienced members.

From my general browsing, looks as though the favoured bases are CA, Darth and SnS. Are these the bases that are generally churning out curries with 95% closeness?

Many thanks in advance.

Hi,

Came across a book called: "Undercover Curry: An Insider's Expose of British Indian Restaurant Cookery"

It was only published in march 2010. Had a look at the website for the book to get more information. Appears as though the author has gone and worked in some BIR and taken as many notes as possible and written the book. Anyone heard of this book or tried the recipes within it?