CAs time on here is in the past, of course, but I believe there are always lessons to learn from history. As for his forum, I had to smile when I read he was thinking of jacking it in a year or two ago, because it was taking up too much of his time,. It shares a few similarities with Andy's pathetic attempt to do better than cr0 - far too many rules and absurd restrictions, like needing to make 'meaningful' posts before being able to read much. I question his judgment, like posting a video supposedly about pilau rice and not even completing it, even if there was a gap of several weeks in the middle, due to his accident. Judgment again. How many people fall off a chair?

CarpCarp - don;t let ChewyTikka put you off, As you may have read in my reply#4 from 2012, I rate this stuff highly and find it a very useful ingredient in one-dish cooking, using anything from a pinch to a level teaspoon. Thanks also for including photos but I don't know why ChewyTikka flet the need to repeat them, especially only .a couple of posts later - a waste of space in my opinion.

So project fear has now raised its ugly head on this forum. Can there be any less significant or important aspect of daily life than the future of Indian restaurants? Moreover we haven't yet left yet and can't be sure we ever will so it's far too early to assess what will actually happen. Indian restaurants only have themselves to blame for declining standards and a likely (near-racial) reluctance to take on non-Indian chefs..Also, with the recipes on this forum,it's not exactly essential to use the restaurants any more, is it?

Livo - I will be interested to compare notes with your tandoor experiences because my tandoor is near-identical to yours, As I said in another thread about cooking naans, it struck me as too risky to put naans in there because of the intense heat, But you managed it, so I'm well impressed.

I just checked bags of flour in the cupboard at home. From Lidl actually, although I expect other brands are similar. The self raising flour contains 1.1g of salt per 100g of product. The plain flour contains only a trace of salt at less than 0.01g. I never knew that self raising flour contains salt. But I still reckon any cake, and especially bread type recipe, requires more salt than 1.1g per 100g. I've tried the H4C naan recipe(s) and I was impressed. They produce good results even though I don't understand what's going on with leaving baking powder to 'prove'. I can believe the standing time may not be necessary.

Also, I abandoned attempts at placing naan in a tandoor oven which I have. It;'s simply far too hot and, as I can get good results on a domestic gas cooker, it doesn't seem worth the risk of serious burns.

Finally, why call h4C Christopher? And why hijack a celebrity name as a user name?

Quote from: hs01 on May 04, 2018, 08:37 PM
Hi, I tried to log in the other week and thought that the site was down/finished. I am a bit of a lurker who pops in now and again, I know I don't post enough, but I have so many other things to attend to. Anyway just a thank you to the moderators who keep the site going, you do a great job.

What a delicious looking serving of food.

Don't worry about not posting enough, though. Thank goodness this forum is not run like at least one other forum where the dictator who is in absolute control will prevent much access if you don't post often enough. It must be good to have many other interests, rather than becoming a kind of obsessed worker bee for a dictator. Another point - the existence of this forum is thanks to the owner, and almost nothing to do with moderators.

How does your recipe vary from the original by big boaby?

Quote from: Garp on May 16, 2018, 09:09 PM
I have no idea where you get this notion of Punjabi BIR chefs adding raw ginger to a finished dish.

Madhur Jaffrey's early 1980s recipe for Makhani sauce includes grated fresh ginger. The sauce is warmed up a bit but the ginger isn't fried or hardly cooked. The overall sauce is delicious so the approach does work. Neither is there an obvious ginger flavour so how would you know if it was included in any sauce?

Quote from: Peripatetic Phil on May 09, 2018, 09:00 PM
...it was truly superb.  Not swamped with turmeric, as supermarket pulaos so often are, but delicately spiced, real basmati rice, and a definite hint of saffron.  Well done Lidl.

I'm sorry but I beg to differ. I guess we can't all share the same tastes. I bought Lidl's rogan josh when it first came out, perhaps a year ago,. It's roughly twice the price of their standard chilled curries, like CTM, korma and Thai red. I didn't feel it was any better and I certainly didn't notice the rice being anything special.. But after reading your glowing review, I decided to give it a second try. The meat sauce part is good but so are Lidl's other curries. The rice strikes me as near-identical to the passable yellow rice included with the non-deluxe curries. I don't find it very pleasant at all

Quote from: Les on May 09, 2018, 11:01 AM
I think bottled or packet mix's are supposed to make more home made style curry's, rather than BIR, so they will never come close to restaurant style cooking.

My recent findings on BIR food are not very good so I suggest the packet mixes are more than capable of producing superior results. So I could rephrase Les' comment as: "they will never drop to the poor standard of restaurant style cooking'.

Further information - last night I had a chicken biriani at a BIR which had impressed me the last time I went there about 10 years ago, First impressions were good - it looked good,. But the more of the rice part and vegetable sauce I ate, the less I enjoyed it. How could they fail to inject so little flavour into this classic BIR dish? Prices are also too high, partly as a result of a rise in business rates. It's all too hit and miss. If only something like 1 in 4 restaurant visits delivers a good tasting meal, it fails to be economically viable. I'd go as far as saying a chilled food biriani from M&S or Waitrose probably tastes better, at a fraction of the cost. And I can definitely produce a superior tasting chicken biriani (rice part) myself, so all I need to do, is restart my R&D into producing a BIR style vegetable sauce. When I asked if anyone here had ideas on that, before, there was no response, other than Phil saying he hates the stuff so perhaps I'm the only person interested in a vegetable sauce to accompany a biriani.

Quote from: livo on April 14, 2018, 11:29 PM
One food scientist with 50 years experience actually said that the Makhani word in this dish name is used in the context of the mouth feel of the dish being buttery in texture only and has nothing to do with the use of actual butter. He actually says that a dish containing lots of butter would be unpleasant in it's oiliness. 

I don't care how many qualifications or years' experience he has, His opinions are at complete variance with my findings. One of the first really good Indian dishes I ever made was Madhur Jaffrey's sauce to go over chicken tikka, from her first BBC TV series. I think she called it Makhani.  Anyway, whatever it's called, it comprises almost 50% butter and 50% cream, plus a bit of tomato and a few other ingredients as flavouring, So it must be about 90% fat / oil but it isn't unpleasant - it's delicious. It just goes to show - never trust a so-called expert,

Another thing - it's great how this thread was resurrected since previous postings in 2011. Long may it continue ie. being able to post to threads, no matter how old they are, Some forums don't allow this and force you to open a new thread - bad practice and so irritating in my opinion.