Spiced oil or spiced water the oil or water is the carrier of the spices/flavour and only once or twice have I had the right ratio of whole spices in my base that produced the most savoury flavoursome curry's I have ever had  no joking I could have licked the plate  ;D and my Mrs who can never finish her Saturday madras and saves some for sunday supper scoffed the lot saying it was the tastiest curry she's ever had  I only need to work out what ratio of whole spices are needed in a 6ltr base to give this wonderful flavour and I'll be sorted.I do believe it's quite a lot of whole spices needed in a base to be able to give this level of flavour in the finished dish and I have tried what I thought would be enough but the base fell short on flavour,when you do get it right the aroma is fabulous.
Just to add,the times I did get it right was when I added whole spices to the 600ml of base I had in a saucepan for the nights curry's and that was left for a few hours (infusing the base  ) while I was preparing the rest of the meal.

Quote from: 976bar on April 03, 2012, 11:11 AM

Quote from: Whandsy on April 03, 2012, 10:26 AM
I've pencilled myself in a trip to C2G on Thursday, I need to know what I'm replicating , think I'm gonna be trying the 3ltr Bangladesh base 1st, I'm up for the pressure cooker sketch, but the wife'd flip trying to shove that much base in the freezer hehe

What's everyone else's thoughts on gravy choice or are the fleet 5 sticking to the zaal stuff

W

Hi Whandsy,

I bought the book this morning and I like you do not have enough freezer space to make a large batch, so will try the smaller one first. It's a shame because up in my loft I have a baby Burco Boiler which I used to use for home beer and wine making, so would suit absolutely fine for cooking a large batch of base very slowly

Ironically, reading through this book this morning about the tomato puree and adding Tandoori Masala...

QuoteI bought another book over a year ago, "Undercover Curry", by Dave Loydens, and in his recipe for tomato puree, he also mentions adding Tandoori Masala and also a level teaspoon of Ginger Powder too.

I've never put this into practice myself, but will now give it a go

Seem's like a very goof informative book to me. Let me know your results when you pay them a visit

Julian must have bought ''Undercover Curry'' too 

Asked our T/A and self raising flour is what they use 

It seems that the BIR's I use,where I have asked,use plenty of veg ghee,one even deep fries his bhaji's in it 
but these happen to be the tastiest bhaji's Ive had  My favourite T/A use it in their base gravy and final curries and I reckon most of the BIR's in the UK use copious amounts of the stuff,and I bought a 1/2 gallon tub of it from Asda yesterday (taj mahal brand).Used it for the first time last night and it made no difference to the taste of our curry's  glad really cuz I'll probably bin the rest.Why do BIR's use it I wonder ?

My wife buys a very nice chinese curry powder called ' curry king ' this tates just like our local T/A. 

Quote from: Salvador Dhali on March 29, 2012, 08:27 PM
The other great thing about making a batch of g/g paste with 50-50 oil and water is that it will keep for weeks in the fridge - and (IMO) improves with age.

The oil acts as a preservative, and the water helps to stop the paste burning when you put it in a hot pan.

If you hate peeling garlic, someone posted a great clip of a superb method to 'peel' a whole bulb in about 10 seconds. (Essentially, you chuck all the garlic cloves in a pan, put the lid on, and shake like merry **** until they're all nude.)

Otherwise, soak your garlic cloves in a bowl of water for a while before peeling.

Another little tip is to chop your ginger into the same size as your garlic cloves. This makes it easier to get that 50-50 mix of garlic/ginger (though I guess you could weigh them).

SD, you might want to add a good dose of salt to the G/G paste if you intend to keep it more than a few days,salt is a natural preservative and garlic will turn even in oil without salt.

Quote from: PaulP on February 27, 2012, 01:00 PM
Thanks Russ, I've already got exactly the same pan! You're right about not claiming 100% as it leaves nowhere to improve on.

I tried the singe technique for the first time on Friday and had a partial success. Unfortunately I let the garlic go brown and ended up with a strong burnt garlic flavour. I cooked the spices quite long and hard and they didn't look or taste burned. I managed to eat the curry (just) but the burnt garlic flavour was quite a spoiler. A pity as some other nice flavours I don't normally detect had developed. I would also agree that when properly cooked the chilli powder has a hotter effect.

Next time I won't cook the garlic for as long.

QuoteDo others brown the garlic or stop short?

Cheers,

Paul

Hi PaulP, a good tip which I think came from Julian (Curry2Go) is if you make your G/G paste  with a little oil and water when you start to fry it you will hear the sizzling and this is the water cooking out of the paste,when the sizzling stops it is starting to brown lightly so then take off the heat and add your next ingredient.Until recently I would have added the spice mix/chili after the G/G but have found the spices mop up most of the oil and leaves little oil to 'singe' the spices in (I do use quite a bit of oil  ) so now I get much better results by frying G/G as above then take off heat add 1 chef spoon of thinned tomato paste then add the spice/chili mixture this then allows plenty of liquid to fry spices and I can fry this mix down to almost a dry pan without it burning.

This was my baby,owned it for 13 years and only had 5k miles on it when I sold it 





Suzuki RG 500 Gamma.

Quote from: Bob_P on March 22, 2012, 12:26 PM
Had an early meal at Zaals..Went for the Achari and the Mint chicken dishes, with Tarka Dhal, breads etc. The dhal, paratha and naan were great,

Quotethought that both meat courses were a bit too runny, with no real substance

to the gravy.

Maybe I've been spoiled by my local restaurant in Yateley (Kismet) that seems to have  a more authentic menu. I had never seen BIR (the acronym) before yesterday, and still not really sure what it means, but I'm here to learn.

QuoteNot sure I'd bother going back to Zaal

, we are rather spoilt for choice hereabouts. About to dive in to the utensils thread, may be some time before I surface. Many thanks for the warm welcome.

That's Peed on the Fleet 5's bonfire then  ;D ;D only joking lads 

Had a Madras from our local BIR last night which is usually very good ,especially the Bhaji's  but last night the curry was hot with little flavour and the Bhaji's were under cooked and cake like I think most BIR's have their 'off nights' sometimes.

What about doing a delivery only service ? Cook from home (providing your kitchen is up to hygiene standards) ,no one in the waiting area looking daggers at you waiting for their curry  Just get some leaflets out and wait for the phone calls  ;D