Quote from: Curry King on October 31, 2005, 04:36 PM

Quote from: thomashenry on October 31, 2005, 04:10 PM
Best base is Kris Dhillion. Just use that. Don't waste your time experiementing with loads of types of base.

I don't think so, Ive tried a few bases and the KD one does nothing for me, yes you can make a nice curry with it but its not right.  I'm aware that Pete and others have had success with certain variations of it but that doesn't make it 100% correct.  Half the fun is experimenting anyway if it wasn't im sure most of us wouldn't bother.

I'm now banging out perfect BIR dishes with it day in day out. Took me a while to get there (5 years!), but now I'm nailing it every time. The missing link is in the dish cooking, not the base. Dhillion is spot on, seriously.

Quote from: Midge on October 31, 2005, 04:11 PM
Anyone got a good Chicken Jalfrezi recipe by any chance? a good Britsh Indian one, one which I can add lots of sauce too mmm

]

you will need

Kris Dhillion Base
A load of finely shopped fried onions - fried for 30 mins or so until very soft.
Single concentrate tomato puree - also sold as 'creamed tomatoes' in Sainsburiies.
Garlic Puree/Garlic Ginger Puree.
Curry Powder
Chilli Powder
Salt, Sugar
Dried Fenugreek
handful of diced fresh tomato
150-200g of pre cooked chunks of Chicken
4 green birds eye cillis, hallved lenthways

Method:

Turn your biggest gas ring to MAX. If you don't have a decent gas ring, you cant do it!

Heat 2  1/2 tblespoons of oil in your pan until smoking hot. Add a tblespoon of garlic or garlic ginger puree. Stir it round for about 30 secs, until it starts to brown. Add 2 tablespoons of pre cooked onions. Stir fry for about 20 secs. Add 1 tablespoon of creamed tomatoes. Stir fry for 30 secs. Add 1 teaspoon of curry powder, 1 teaspoon of dried fenugreek leaves, and 1/2 each of salt, sugar, and chilli powder. Stir Fry for 10 secs, then add your meat, 2 tablespoons of curry sauce, fresh tomato, and your fresh chillis. Stir fry for a minute or so.

During this phase it is vital that your gas ring  is on max, and that everything is as hot as possible. Try and flambe your dish for a bit of fun!

Turn heat down slightly, and add 7 more tablespoons of curry sauce, then cook for 5 or so more minutes, until the sauce is a bit thicker. Stir in some fresh coriander. Transfer to a plastic takeway contrainer, sprinkle with coriander, and leave for 5--10 mins. (its too hit to eat at the moment, and the extra 5-10 mins of sitting will allow it to mellow, and for some more flavour to develop)

Eat.

Best base is Kris Dhillion. Just use that. Don't waste your time experiementing with loads of types of base. USe the KD one, and concentrate on cooking curries with that. You can get perfect BIR dishes from it.

Quote from: John on October 29, 2005, 11:25 PM
When you get round to watching it, The end part is kinda intersting as they scoop some oil from the Rogan Josh curry and say something like "we can then use this oil to add flavour to another curry dish, we all do it"
now if that doesn't answer the question of reusing oil then i don't know what will.

This answers nothing as far as I'm concerned. We've known for ages that some places re-ise oil, and that some places don't.

The question is: is it an essential part of acheiving the taste at home? The answer can only be no, given that mant many resturants do NOT re-use oil, and they certainly manage to achieve the taste.

There are people here who believe it is important, but I know from my own experience that it isn't.

I think making Dillion base as specified in the book, its quite asy to nail it down the same each time. Weight everythign properly, measure out the liquids proplery - I don't see how you can go wrong.

Quote from: slimboyfat on October 27, 2005, 09:21 PM
Can someone post the link .....


thanks

Top thread in the BIR Recipies board.

Ok, I've tried the simple Madras/Vindaloo recipe as posted by Pete, the one he part cooked in a BIR.

100% success - absolute carbon copy of a decent BIR Madras/Vindaloo. Everything was right about it - taste, looks, smell. Perfect. BIG respect for Pete for this.

As far as I'm concerned, the hunt for a BIR Vindaloo is now over. We know how to do it. I'd advise EVERYONE who has not tried this recipie to try it asap. It's PERFECT.

Kris Dhillon base used. For the tomato paste I used tomato puree with a little bit of water to thin it a bit. I'll try tomorrow with creamed tomatoes, I bet any money they'll work fine. For the ginger/garlic paste I used a ratio of about 3:4 ginger to garlic, and it was fresh - so its not important to leave it go green/blue overnight. I cooked with bog stadnard oil - so as far as I'm concerend skimmed oil is not a requirement for this. If your garlic/ginger the right consistency, with enough moisture, then you can stir fry it for a good 2 mins or so at max heat without it burning.

One tip - this applies to ALL our BIR cooking.

In a resturant, the base is sitting next to the chef, ready to be added to the pan. ie, it is at room temperature - and a warm room at that. The temp in a BIR kitchen is probablt not far off 30degrees. I bet a lot of us take our base out of the fridge, then add it in - meaning we are putting it into the pan when it is about 4 degrees, a LOT colder than in a BIR. This will cool the pan right down, and prevent you from maintaining the sky high temperature that BIR chefs achieve.

So - my tip is to warm your base up before you start cooking. I put mine in a pan and heaty it it gently to the point of simmering, then take it off. This means that its going into my pan hot, and its not bringing down the sizzling temps that we need.

Well done Pete.

My thinking is that we should NOT be making changes to the Dhillion sauce. It works fine as it is - people have had success with it, so we should stick with it and concentrate on the other stages of cooking Namely - the right pan, the right heat, etc.

Glad also to read at a new convert to Kris Dhillion sauce. That stuff WORKS.

I am not convinced that re-claimed oil is important though. I will find out in a few days time after some carefully conductred trials. We all need to stop changin our techniques so much - if we change more than 2 variables between dishes, it makes it imposible to pin point the areas we are failing in.

What I have found is that the EXACT same ingredients in the EXACT same amounts can sometimes produce a spot on dish, and sometimes can be some way off. It's in tehcnique, heat, and oil volume.

Quote from: Mark J on October 15, 2005, 01:06 PM

Quote from: Yellow Fingers on October 15, 2005, 11:43 AM
This got me thinking. Could it be that it isn't tomato puree at all? Did you actually taste it, did the chef call it puree?
I think it could have been this red paste that a few people have mentioned. I wish we had more information on this red paste in general, even if this isn't what it was this time around.
Here's a thought though. Whatever it is, it is almost certainly tomato based. Could it be a well fried down can of tomatoes with a few added spices, paprika and turmeric for example? This is similar to what Kris dhillon uses in her base.

Of course! what a great idea YF, every time I have seen the red stuff the chef has called it tomato paste, doesnt mean its straight out of a can though (although 1 guy has told me it is), it could well be prepared /tarka'd etc in some way, interesting.

From what I have seen its the consistency of a slightly runny ketchup and very smooth, not at all like tomato puree

The stuff Pete used and saw is tomato puree doubel concentrate - regular tomato puree. The stuff you saw is creamed tomatos - Sainsburies sell this is cartons for about 40p. Its smoother and thinner than Passata - basically like a thinnner tomato puree. I'd hazard a guess that these could be swapped around, and 'the taste' unaffected. Will try Scientifically.

Big up to Pete for posting this recipie. MarkJ's stuff has allowed me to nail down my bhuna/korai/Jalfrezi sauce - this looks like its a goer for the Madras/Vindaloo taste.