Oh... Didn't realise they were upside down. They're right way up when I view the page on ipad. I think this is an apple thing, has come up before.

The kalonji works well in the pastry chewy, don't write it off. Not too much though, definately adds something appealing to the samosas.

Will have a look at your links ta.

Only two members tried this so far? Come on folks..!

Well that was an altogether much more successful samosa making exercise... Experience really counts in this samosa making lark as you need a feel for how to roll the pastry and how to wrangle those little semi circles into samosa shaped cases.

Some adjustments / things I learned:

- made my pastry just that bit dryer this time without adding the extra tsp of water after the dough came together. Think this helped but it sure is a fine line between it being too dry to roll out easily (springing back) and too wet so it sticks to the rolling pin too often.
- I didn't use the plastic bag, just laid them out on a plate. I think this helped me maintain the semi circle shape without them sticking together. 
- I didn't use the "toasting on a hot frying pan" trick and they were still ok to put together by hand. I might yet go back to the hot sear method but I was trying to keep handling of the pastry to a minimum
- I knocked the salt back to half a tsp in the pastry and that was spot on for me. Also reduced the Kalonji to a third of tsp which was about right. Enough seeds for flavour without the samosas being too spotty.

I used a 7 inch diameter bowl as my template to cut around and this is possibly the limit of size which you can readily handle when putting the samosas together (unless you're using that tawa trick to sear them a bit)

But... I still have a third of the filling mix left over! This is after making two batches so I can't help feeling the ratio of pastry to filling qty might be off. I would halve the filling amount next time (I used the suggested 750g of potato).  Overall this was a massive improvement on before and I was able to make 12 respectable looking samosas, 4 of which I have frozen raw (along with a cooked one). Next weekend I'll try frying them from frozen and will try defrosting the cooked one in the microwave to see how they fare.

Having again sampled the freshly fried ones versus the cold-from-the-fridge versions this morning I think I do prefer them cold. Just seems to bring the flavours out more.

Thank you very very much to CH for the recipe post which has inspired me to try these and contrary to my previous frustrated pronouncement I will be making these again as I feel that with experience they will only become easier and even though they take time, I guess we are all here because we actually enjoy time spent in the kitchen (as long as the result is a good one). The results from this recipe are certainly very good.

EDIT: my final top tip - always orient the pastry cases the same way, so you're picking them up in the same way. That way you develop your method so you can wrangle them consistently. Starting with one upside down all of a sudden doesn't half confuse your little fingers!

Ok,  I think perhaps I was suffering a grumpy attack yesterday and felt a bit of frustration over how hard I had found the method. Didn't mean to come across so negative and I have to say I've just enjoyed some of the most delicious samosas for breakfast, straight out of the fridge. I'm having a hard time deciding whether they are better hot or cold.

So... Undaunted and contrary to my somewhat petulant "never again" stance of yesterday I'm going to have another try today with an equal amount of pastry to use up the untouched half of the filling mix left over from yesterday. If I manage to make anything resembling a samosa I will set aside and freeze some uncooked, to test deep frying straight from frozen (which must work as many of the supermarkets sell "cook from frozen" samsosas).

I don't mean to discourage anyone from trying this recipe, in fact give it a go but allow yourself plenty of time so you're not under pressure.

My curries improved when I came to realise that, even on full blast my domestic hob wasn't a match for the burners we see in BIR kitchen videos and that I shouldn't try to match the cooking durations seen in those videos. Extending the spice frying stage with a chef's spoon of base a couple of times and waiting till the dish is fully cooked, rather than for some arbitrary time limit to expire, pays dividends IMHO

Oh. My. Goodness...  Possibly the hardest thing I've ever cooked. Nearly drove me batty trying to roll out that damn pastry which kept sticking to the rolling pin!  Then the nicely prepared semicircular pastry strips managed to glue themselves in the plastic bag so as I unpeeled them they stretched out into elongated crescents rather than semi circles.

I love the fact CH posted this recipe in such a nice how-to format but honestly I won't be making it again. Took nearly 3 hours of work in the end to get 10 samosas, half of which were weirdly misshaped :/ I had more than half of my filling left over as the amount I could actually fit into my badly shaped pastry cases was very limited. This was just beyond me in truth so hats off to those Indian housewives who stay home and make these each day for their families. And to CH for mastering the technique and producing such nice looking examples in his original post.

For what it's worth I've shown pics of my filling and uncooked and cooked samosas. I've only shown the best ones, there were about 5 more which I had eaten as soon as they cooked to cover up the evidence of how clumsy my pastry rolling had been. 

Ultimately I did make enough for lunch today and tomorrow and they were tasty, although next time I would halve the salt in the pastry and reduce the chilli powder to a quarter teaspoon as it was still too fierce for me even though I only put half a tsp in.

Another bulk batch of this great chilli made today, 3 x the quantities listed by uncle buck in his OP. great recipe, thanks UB.

I have the impression there's going to be a sudden outbreak of Samosa making across the land this weekend! No offence to CH though but I will be cutting down the amount of chilli powder as I like my samosas mild

Super work there CH, I WILL be trying these at the weekend! Great to see someone selflessly sharing their experience and helping others to improve their results. What this forum is all about.

1600 degrees C still seems a bit on the high side... You didn't spot my comment on that then!