Quote from: merrybaker on May 02, 2005, 04:40 PM
Has anyone gone to a BIR that calls itself a "vegetarian restaurant" -- where no meat at all is served?  Do their curries have "the flavor"?

I've been to two restaurants in a street full of Indian vegetarian places near Euston Station in London. Their food is excellent but I consider it more like the 'authentic' Indian food you get in India - it's nothing like BIR food, in my opinion.

Quote from: stephen west on April 30, 2005, 10:13 PM
I made about 8 kg of korma using Ghanna's recipe with the whole spices added, and two portions of the above recipe and was told they were both as good as restaurant meals, so am very pleased.

Stephen - do you mean your korma had the same type of flavour as a BIR korma, or was it just as good as, or better in a different sort of way? I have made good kormas in the past. My friends would say they are "as good as restaurant meals" (or better). But they are not the same!

Regards
George

Quote from: merrybaker on April 24, 2005, 05:20 PM
You could add the tiniest amount of ground fennel to each different curry you make.  If they all taste better with it, then it should be a good addition to the curry base.  If even one curry tastes wrong, then it?s probably something they add later to individual curries. 

Good idea. This strikes me as sound logic.

Quote from: stephen west on April 27, 2005, 04:15 PM
Definitely smoky taste from all the local takeways around Oxford.

Has anyone tried black salt? I read that this spice has a smokey flavour. It might be worth a try at only 95p a jar. Please see:

http://www.natco-online.com/acatalog/Spices_N_to_Z.html
"Kala Namak (Black Salt) It is a purplish brown colored rock salt, with a DISTINCTIVE FLAVOUR. A special type of Indian mineral salt and has a very special SMOKEY FLAVOUR."

I added the capitals for emphasis.

Regards
George

Quote from: pete on April 21, 2005, 07:58 AM

Quote from: George on April 20, 2005, 11:56 PM
curry powder. Don't we need the recipe for the first curry powder too?

Curry houses do use prepacked curry powder.
Rajah and East End are two makes.
We're trying to get their flavour, so we do the same.
But, yes, I see your point!!

It might be stating the obvious, but shouldn't the recipes then specify Rajah, East End or whatever curry powder? And indicate the level of confidence that this is the actual (input) curry powder used by the chef. I feel this is the problem with many recipes where they don't want to give too much away, e.g. a western recipe might specify 0.5 litres of chicken stock without telling you what's in the stock. There is enough scope there to hide all the chef's secrets.

I'm at a bit of a loss to understand how each of these recipes for curry powder, themselves include (another) curry powder. Don't we need the recipe for the first curry powder too? There is huge scope for variation unless everything is closely specified, including the garam masala. That's not only the spices, but whether any of the spices are roasted, etc, etc.

Regards
George

Quote from: Mark J on April 19, 2005, 07:02 PM
I think when you start adding those types of spices you get into the territory of a traditional authentic korma (no bad thing), I think Ghanna posted an awesome authentic korma recipe somewhere in the forum

I was wondering much the same thing. Stephen and Ghanna, regardless of how good your kormas in this thread are in absolute terms (and I'm sure they are), how close would you say they are to a korma in a typical BIR, warts and all?

It is so good of you to post invaluable recipes like these.

Regards
George

Google groups can be a very useful resource for personal views and discussion on almost any subject under the sun. It's a great pity when any forum gets taken over by people who end up using abusive language much of the time. I just read another thread at uk.food+drink.indian, being very rude about a couple of celebrity chefs. Sad.

I hope admin would delete any such messages here. Long may this forum stay useful.

A suggestion for admin that would apply to many forums but rather you than me to carry out the work:

Edit the whole forum to put everything in the best pigeon hole, in some sort of archive for postings to date, eliminate topical waffle, etc. - a potentially huge job.

Then update that archive from time to time.

e.g. a posting that spanned basic sauce and suggestions for ingredients for CTM would be split up.
My posting of earlier today would be eliminated because it's not useful in the long term - just to help someone find a recipe today.

Quote from: Curry King on April 18, 2005, 10:27 AM
Ive tried the search but no luck?

Curry King - I referred to Ghanna's generous posting of a potentially great looking Korma recipe. It's on a thread started by you! Curry chat > lets talk curry > whos happy with what they can reproduce
Reply #7 on: April 01, 2005, 09:01:39 PM

Regards
George