Aims and goals :

1) A group effort to create an improved base sauce, and madras recipe to go with it. 

2) The base sauce will be loosely defined from the start, but subject to iterative changes over the year. The goal is to create a base which is well suited to bir style madras, and tested with a madras recipe. Not a general purpose base. 

3) the madras recipe (spicing and technique) will also be developed over the year. BIR techniques and style apply

4) One aim of the project is to see if its possible for cr0 to work as a group , rather than all working as individuals. And to see if this group approach delivers more than would be expected, if you worked alone for a year.

5) The final aim is to have some fun , and see where it leads ! if thats not asking too much ? !  ;D

I have not forgotten about this project. in fact quite the opposite !.  I am working on a possible contender for a base. The spice mix should be left undefined, and we will work on that as a group over the year.  That will be the hard part, and the interesting part.
     I think initially we have to find a base which everyone will be happy to make more than once. i.e. a base which may not be everyones personal choice, but which is good enough for us all to make regularily. without a base we are all likely to work with ALOT, the project wont succeed.
     I am happy to direct the project when it gets hopelessly stuck. but i feel it will work best in the long term if no one person assumes control. instead a group of genuinely committed members, manage it together. If all goes to plan it should gather its own momentum. The main problems will be finding a suitable base, and then collectively evaluating individual members "break throughs" to see if they are a step forward or a step back. I am unclear how this would work. would other members be committed enough to evaluate others work? I will begin a new thread in the group test section and start a skeleton base recipe we can all discuss.

a lot of chefs are religious people , and may regard offers of money as a western idea.
I kid you not ! they have not lived in our selfish western world all their lives (often)
I actually found friendship and kindness and sharing was what got me quite a few lessons in a bir kitchen. I used to teach there boy computers knowledge for lessons in cookery. Sadly I changed my working hours so it stopped.  I never could tell if they were harbouring a secret. or if they just had a very involved elaborate method of preparing everything. I concluded that the base sauce was a guarded secret, as it gives each restaurant a unique taste. a bit like the difference between galaxy and cadburys. However when i purchased there base it did not improve my curries. odd hey!
  I think restaurants buy a lot more meat, and know how to get the most flavour from this meat and turn it into a good stock. this is hard for us lot who buy at most a tenners worth of meat at a time.  And i douby boiling whole carcusses, has the same effect as what bir chefs do with a bucket of chicken breasts for example.

does the taz base have quite a strong spicy flavour, like eg ashoka base, or is it mild and soup like? 

i hope its tastier than warm motor oil  ;D 

Hi Paul p, you have totally summed up my current stance/approach to bases and curry. Thats why i quite like the kd 1 base, its got a nice tomato , garlic and onion ratio  , which is suited to the madras sort of texture flavour. i.e quite garlicky with tomato noticable. I will try that taz base, and report back. Perhaps we could work as a group and develop a new base for this project, which is like a taz and kd1 combination. I like a base to be lots green pepper, onion garlic, some ginger, and a nice tomato puree element added late. the spcing is kept simple with tumeric for color, and paprika and cumin as must haves. I think getting a base to the right thin-ness is an under estimated factor. in fact i am sure my best curries are when the base is just the right thin-ness. anyone else find this?

i agree that we need to have a flexible attitude . and like others on this thread, i will go with the flow.  i get the impression many will be happy to use CAs base. perhaps its time for members like me , who have never made it, to try it out and report back. If we are going to use an existing base (which seems sensible) then we should all be agreed from the start, that its good for madras. dont evaluate it as an all round base, as i can see from the spec that it would be a good all rounder, but until i make it, I  dont know if its good for madras. From experience with safron base, i found that was a good all rounder, but it was not to good for madras. the kd1 base improved my madras immediately. I will reserve judgment on CAs base until i make it. hopefully next weekend. Maybe a few of us should compare razors and cas base in the coming weeks

I agree emin-j that we should aim for a new base we all design together. so in the long term we all arrive at a new base. To kick of with, it might be best to use an existing base, what do you guys think?
approach 1)  we design a new base in the next few weeks collaboratively, and begin testing it against our favouriate madras recipes , then all report back with scores etc. Then possibly modify the base again until its acceptable.

approach 2) we pick an existing base, eg, kd1 , CAs, or razors, then all do trials with our favourate madras recipes, then report back with scores. Then begin improving the base, and madras recipe over the year as a group. 

what approach sounds like the quickest, least hassle and most agreeable?

this project will work best if its kept simple and informal ! then we might actually get somewhere as a group for a change !  its stupid not collaborating more as a group, , as its our main strength. Should we start a new thread for this to alert more members? where in the cr0 web site site should the project be based?

lets call the project 'madras 2011', giving us all year to come up with something improving upon what we have already.  I dont mind trying CAs base with a few madras recipies. i am interested in razors base + madras also, that sounded promising. I wonder which of the 2 would be best for this project? any one compared the 2 when it comes to madras or vindaloo? both might produce a tasty curry, but which is closest to bir madras. Is CAs base similar to the safron base?  I seem to remember it is?

lets start by getting some ideas on possible contenders for a base which seems suited to madras in particular. The test would be making the base, then using your prefered madras recipe, and 1 or 2 other madras recipes other members suggest. Then we report back and try to agree on what base has potential. remember the base might evolve over time (along with the madras recipe to go with it) , so it should be  just a simple base, we all agree as being a good building block base, which we can build upon.  I personally found the safron base, and ashoka base, did not produce the best madras i have made. I got better results with kd style bases, which have a large amount of onion. my contender would not be the kd base though, but something along those lines.