Hi again Haldi

What this means is that I cooked for 5 people - own family aged between 75 and 18
I was begged to write down the recipe and never change it again by all of them including my 75yo mother who wanted the complete recipe written down so she could make it at home - she lives just 50 yds from a BIR and uses it once a week.

They have always liked the korma no matter what base but this they stated was a step above what they had tasted before. By the way I was surprised - the chicken I felt was going to end up overcooked but it was perfect and virtually melted in the mouth.

The Pathia - they are korma or CTM eaters but the whole dish was cleared for the first time ever and it was extra hot due to too much chilli. Speaks for itself really.

Haldi,

Its the combination of factors that lead up to the successful outcome

I've been in BIR kitchens a lot and always have asked questions, but this last time was the first that I had tried the base on its own.

My surprise came at tasting what I felt was the ( and remember this is only my opinion and also that every BIR produces slightly different tasting curries and you will get used to your personal favourite) sauce that reminded me of the most basic first chicken curry I had eaten in a restaurant.

The last and probably the most versatile base I made was the BE base. The curries produced were as good as most of the local restaurants. I tasted the BE base and it wasnt as tasty ( see original post) as the restaurant base I had tested.

My original base (see currytesters soup) was made one Saturday because I got pi**** with a discussion about adding potato's to a base.

It produced for me a perfectly acceptable curry if a bit rich due to the ghee and chicken stock but was still similar to the best local BIR.

As we all do I wanted to strive for better still and so tried the BE base.

Today I made some decisions - I took what i felt was the best parts of my own base and married it with the BE base plus my conversation with the chef plus the quidance on making the garlic/ginger puree and a bit of artistic licence and some other hints that i uncovered on the site.

This resulted in the base described.

There were other changes I made when I cooked the curries - I precooked the chicken in the oil from the top of the curry and added some curry base and water as needed to keep the chicken and sauce from drying out and boiled the chicken until it was just undercooked.

I then left it to marinate in its juices for 1/2 an hour before making the curries.

In both dishes I added the chicken and juices and made up with the rest of the ingredients and curry sauce to give the amount of gravy I wanted.

There was no exact science here I added ingredients purely by taste alone but using guidelines from the recipes.

I can honestly say that I have never tasted a better chicken korma and the pathia I forgot to add the amchoor and slightly overdid the extra hot chilli powder but it was still better than any of the local BIR's

I dont want this to come across wrong I was happy that I had achieved the best result which was better than the vast majority of BIR's I felt it had the taste.

I can only suggest you try it and compare it with your own best efforts however dont be too surprised if it isnt like your own BIR

By the way I have missed something out of the base recipe which was a small pinch of ajowan added after the liquidising stage.

Admin - you had better move this somewhere more visible - the taste has arrived.

Made the Korma - 4 X Write this recipe down
Made my Pathia - 4 X ate everything even though I used the rajah extra hot chilli powder

After 25 years I can now forget about curry base sauces ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!! Relaxation

Well what do you know - I'm better at this than I thought - I have recreated my local bir curry base - if a little bit thicker but the taste is the same.

Ingredients

3 large onions (600gm) total
4 medium carrots (400gm)total
1 oz coriander fresh
1 pinch methi
2oz Fresh Garlic/ginger Puree
10ml g. coriander
10ml cumin powder
10ml turmeric
1/2 yellow pepper - didnt have red in stock
3 tinned plum tomatoes
2 tbsp tomato puree double concentrate
30ml BE spice mix
400ml Veg oil
1 green mild chilli the big fat ones
1.5 tsp salt

dice onions,yellow pepper,chilli and carrots and add to hot oil
Fry for around 10 mins until onions are translucent and beginning to take ona slightly golden appearance around edges.
add plum tomatoes all the spices including methi but only half of BE spice mix
Fry for a further 4 minutes to cook off the spices
Carefully add a full kettleful of boiling water
Add Garlic/Ginger puree
Bring to simmer and hold at this point until carrots are nice and soft
Remove from heat and allow to cool
Liquidise
Bring back to simmer and add another kettleful of water
When oil starts to separate stir in tomato puree and chopped coriander
simmer for a further 10 mins
now add remainder of BE spice mix stir then add salt to taste

continue simmering adding water as necessary until oil full separates

Taste again and it should taste like the most basic curry sauce you get from a BIR

I'll let u know what the final curry tastes like later

In reply to some of your questions

The chef said ginseng but the colour for me was more like Amchoor and having cooked my share of Patia's I would definitely suggest that it was Amchoor - I was only relaying the answer the chef gave me.

Not convinced about red onions or white or yellow or brown onions - well once again the chef said red but he also said it makes a difference. Now I am not suggesting that he would deliberately lie to me so I suspect some red onions were used in the base - not necessarily all

Red or green Pepper - the pepper must make some slight difference to the outcome as green peppers arent anywhere as near as sweet as red peppers. The chef said red peppers - but he could also have meant paprika or chilli powder if you think about it. And the oil colour was red so therefore chilli powder/paprika/tomatoes must have been used.

Ghee or Veg oil - the oil came from a ghee metal container which could have just as easily contained vegetable oil - I didnt taste it.

I need to make some base today so I intend to use an adaptation of my soup - which I still think has merit - BE's base and some artistic licence. I'll let you know if it  tastes anything like the one I tried which I thought was pretty good.

Tried this in the week and had compliments from all the family - well done CK

An interesting point I discovered from the recipe notes was the cooking out of the chilli powder. Yesterday I made the BE Madras and tried my Extra Hot Chilli Powder out - cooked it out as described the Madras was OK (never been a favourite curry) but I got less heat from the chilli powder and havent had the flaming Ar###### effect afterwards. So I have definitely learned something of use not just in BIR cooking but for all aspects - Thanks a very good tip

Well since making this the first time I am on my third offering this week by popular request.

This time the only nuts I had left was walnuts - popped up to Tesco Xtra and guess what they only had Dry Roasted nuts - sod it I'll give them a go.

Made the normal Korma recipe for two about 100ml evap, 75gm Dry roasted nuts ground to a powder, some base sauce and oil and 3 dessert spoons sugar and tasted it. Bloody hell I've created the perfect SATAY SAUCE. So as we all love Satay chicken we ate that instead of Korma.

Theres one to add to the recipe list.

Most likely colour I would suggest plus a slight variation in flavour

Haldi

I have recently poste a recipe for Brinjal Aloo, (Potato and Aubergine Curry) - I havent got the book - could you do a quick comparison between the book and the one I posted - My family all think this one is great - it may just be different perspectives

Thanks