Quote from: Cory Ander on February 11, 2013, 11:04 PM
There appear to be some dubious calculations going on here.

Stop pinching my words.

And I agree that your revised oil per base by volume is probably the most accurate way of assessing the oil content of the various bases. Which shows clearly that yours (which is what my own is broadly based on, with some personal modifications) contains the least oil.

Accepting (as you rightly point out) that more oil is added at the initial frying stage, but you can control and modify that according to your own requirements which you cannot do with oil contained within a base.

Quote from: Secret Santa on February 11, 2013, 10:51 PM
It's impossible to argue a point with someone who lacks common sense, never mind a realistic grasp of the science spicey, so I won't try to.

I see. So now I'm stupid and don't understand science, despite a perfectly rational and logical explanation of the scientific (water evaporation and emulsion breaking) reasons for why oil separates.

And the best you can come up with is...

Quote from: Secret Santa on February 11, 2013, 10:51 PM
...the base is usually cooked on until the oil separates and appears on the surface.

:

Quote from: Secret Santa on February 11, 2013, 10:51 PM
Perhaps you'd like to give that some thought as you ponder your 'the oil only separates when the water is removed' theory!

Perhaps, I'll just go away and have a good chuckle and leave you in your ignorance at how you've not given any explanation for how and why sauces with water in them reduce and leave you to ponder the reason for why if you continue to cook after oil separation has occurred and without stirring, the sauce will stick and burn to the bottom of the pan!  :

Perhaps it's because there's no water left to stop it from happening? Nah far too rational and logical!

Quote from: ELW on February 11, 2013, 10:19 PM
Agreed they are two different bases

Which is why it's a little dubious to do an oil comparison between them given the very different levels of dilution each one contains.

Has anyone done a significant scaling down of this base yet, as I would like to try it in a scaled down version.

Quote from: Secret Santa on February 11, 2013, 09:57 PM
Show me the science.

I've already explained to you why!

When you heat up (or cook) a vegetable that contains water or in this instance a puree of onion, garlic, ginger, tomato puree, spices, oil, water etc., it releases all that water that you refer to and initially creates an emulsion (a mixture of all those elements, water and oil) in the pan so you don't see them as separate elements. The water evaporates as vapour and steam as you heat and cook it.

When you do a base sauce (or any sauce) reduction, what do you think comes out of the sauce and where do you think it goes? Or are you going to contend that too? This is empirical, we know it reduces significantly from the volume we start with and we know that it's water that's evaporating from it.

When enough, (usually most) of the water has evaporated from the mixture the initial oil/water emulsion created breaks (because there's now not enough water to hold it together) and the oil separates from the now virtually waterless mixture.

If you're going to contend this, I'm looking forward to your explanation of exactly what disappears from a sauce when we reduce it and where this thing actually goes to!

Quote from: Secret Santa on February 11, 2013, 09:57 PM
How about I don't until you explain why, when we know the vast bulk (80-90%) of the contents of the pan are water

Because it's not 80-90% and water only evaporates when it's heated. Your maths are FUBAR'd.

Over to you, for your explanation.

Quote from: ELW on February 11, 2013, 09:29 PM
1ltr 5kg onion -2 litres water-could vary

It could.

But CA's base contains over 13 litres of water in it for a 5kg / 600g onion ratio.

That's significantly diluted, so much so that 1.5L of oil per 13L of water means you're getting far less oil per portion than the Glasgow base, regardless of the fact that CA's contains more oil.

Quote from: Secret Santa on February 11, 2013, 09:19 PM
Nonsense. The bulk of a curry is made up of tomato and onions which are about 90% water. If you drove off all the water you'd be left with a tiny dry dollop sitting in the pan.

Not nonsense at all, it's scientific fact.

However you seem to know it all. How about you give me your non nonsense explanation for why oil separates from the mixture if it isn't due to water evaporation and removal.

Off you go smarty pants.

Quote from: ELW on February 11, 2013, 09:13 PM
obsolete recipe by the original poster, should have been 1.5 ltrs...

Now I'm getting confused.

1.5L of oil per 7Kg of onions or 5kg? If it's 7kg then its the same ratio of oil per onions, if it's 5kg of onions then it's less oil than CA's but...don't forget the massive water ratio of CA's compared to the Glasgow base, that's significant.

Because CA's base contains so much more water, the amount of oil per portion will be significantly less.

Quote from: ELW on February 11, 2013, 09:13 PM
my point is the revised 5kg version, of which i made exactly half batch, comes in less in oil content than ca's

How much oil does the 5kg version use? 1.5L? As I said, don't forget the much increased water ratio of CA's, it's quite significant.

Quote from: ELW on February 11, 2013, 08:59 PM
Thats exactly what you'll be doing if you decide to make this curry base 

Well, given the huge onion ratio of this base sauce I would agree. It can only be this that's making it work!

It's intriguing because I've been contemplating making quite a large onion ratio base sauce for a while now.

Quote from: Martinwhynot on February 11, 2013, 08:24 PM
By my calculations that means that CA's base would work out at 1.458L of oil.

Hum!

Glasgow base: 7kg of onions to 2L of oil.

CA's base: 600g of onions to 125ml of oil.

7Kg/600g = 11.6. 125ml x 11.6 = 1450ml of oil.

The last time I looked 2L was more than 1.450L.

Quote from: Secret Santa on February 11, 2013, 08:30 PM
So the fact that it may contain slightly less than other bases is moot because it all stays in the finished curry.

It doesn't contain less oil that CA's, it (the Glasgow base) contains about a third more scaled up on the onions. But the major difference is that the Glasgow base contains a fraction of the water CA's contains.

Glasgow base: 7Kg of onions to 2L of oil and 2L of water.

CA's would be (scaled on the onions, 7kg to 600g)

7kg of onions to 1450ml oil but 18560ml of water.

HUGE difference in dilution.