Quote from: Curry King on October 10, 2008, 11:51 AM
Out of interest has anyone tried using their contact us page yet for some recipes? 

Hmm after watching the BBC video I think they like the attention, how about contacting them about the interest around the world they are getting from us?

Quote from: IJRICHARDSON on October 08, 2008, 03:38 PM
can someone define for me the volume of a ladle used ih the recipes. i assumed it to be 200mls approx but some recipes for one person say use 2-3 lables of base gravey
which would be 400-600mls a large portion indeed

I think it varies, measured mine as 100mls and I go for 3 ladles.

Quote from: George on October 08, 2008, 10:18 AM

Quote from: chowie on October 06, 2008, 10:11 PM

Quote from: Graeme on October 06, 2008, 10:02 PM
Hi,
Quite a few posts and threads about this but i will post here and hope
it gets read/moved...
The first two containers in the video are not coconut and sugar,
but Cocount and Almond powder.
I have seen the two sitting together before
in other BIR kitchens.
yes/no ?

That's interesting, I'll go with that. As I posted in the recordings thread, but thought one was sugar, so what do you think the clear bottled sauce is that's added and do you think it's cream added when he turns?. If we can work that out we almost have a BIR Korma recipe on our hands plus the video to go with it.

I assumed they were coconut 'flour' and sugar. As one of you correctly pointed out, the chef adds quite large quantities of each at the start of what we assume to be a korma.  Powdered almond is very expensive and no way would they add so much to a korma, when korma is one of the cheapest dishes on a BIR menu. I assume the bottled liquid from stage left is lemon juice and I must try that. Alternatively, it could be something like kewra water but lemon juice is my best bet. Has anyone seen what they assume to be a dhansak and/or any sign of lentils? Perhaps he adds the same bottled liquid to other dishes, which might help us figure out what it is. I've always noted the 'caramelised' flavour in good kormas and I tried heating sugar once, myself. That's exactly what he seems to do. He leaves the two powders on the heat for quite a long while. The bottom layer would be well warmed/roasted/caramelised during that time.

Regards
George

After my post above I did look into the cost of Almond Powder, found 2.75 GBP for 300g which is more than coconut but I did not think was too bad. Not having much experience with Kormas but would have thought Almond is there somewhere?

Yeah I bought a chef spoon around 5 weeks ago and love it, I can't really explain why it just feels better when cooking.

I had to throw out the rest of this base, so did not get to give it another try. But I like this one and will be using again, I agree that many bases on this site are very good but the quantities and some practices still may need tweaking a bit. I think this is the one I'm going to be using until I see something that is very different.

Thanks for the responses guys, I will try it next time and I may be surprised but like what Josh says, I get lots of heat, I can't cook a curry on full heat with my electric hob as it just burns/splats/evaporates everything far to quick, this is why I was also surprised when seeing the videos of Maliks because if I had left thing on the heat like I've seen them do, well, I would have some bad curries. But I guess it's a different kind of heat so I will be stinking the neighborhood out for my next curries outside.

Quote from: JerryM on October 07, 2008, 07:12 AM
Panpot,

the electric hob is absolutely of no use in frying a curry.

i have had a 2.5kw LPG stove for perhaps a month now and can't believe the difference in cooking on a real flame. the camping stove is effectively what i've got (one of parker 's recommendations). my only reservation is that if it's the size that u can pack in your rucksack - then it's no good - not enough whumpf.

the 2.5kw is a balance for me and suits my needs - it works much better than hob (and i mean much), i use it to cook base and i use it in my kitchen. i have an option to get a bigger jet but as yet don't see a need.

https://curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=2894.msg25642#msg25642

That's interesting but I use electric and my pan gets hot enough I believe, when cooking the curry it's only in the pan a short time really and have always thought heat is heat so to speak (unless your trying to char something), what difference do think it makes? I have an outside grill with separate propane burner I could cook my curries on that next time

Quote from: Graeme on October 06, 2008, 10:02 PM
Hi,

Quite a few posts and threads about this but i will post here and hope
it gets read/moved...

The first two containers in the video are not coconut and sugar,
but Cocount and Almond powder.

I have seen the two sitting together before
in other BIR kitchens.

yes/no ?

That's interesting, I'll go with that. As I posted in the recordings thread, but thought one was sugar, so what do you think the clear bottled sauce is that's added and do you think it's cream added when he turns?. If we can work that out we almost have a BIR Korma recipe on our hands plus the video to go with it.

Anyway back to this base, I cooked some Madras last night, could not wait any longer.. I used recipe as above but with 1tsp of Garlic Paste and 1tsp of Ginger Paste and no lemon juice.

First up I made some Bombay Aloo, thats was ok but also used that to season up the pan.

So being inspired by the recent videos I got to the Madras using a Chefs spoon of oil from the top, adding a little onion (frying for seconds here) then all the purees and spices. A big shake a swirl around with the spoon again not cooking for long, removed from the heat just to add the chicken, again big mix together (mainly scraping around the edges) now it's like a big chicken paste, what it also looked like on the videos. Then 2.5 ladles of base and simmer for a minute whilst adding some ground Almond, did not clean the pans between curries and woke up this morning to find orange splash dots around the cooker area so some spiting was going on.

I eat the curry very quickly, it was moorish, I was also hungry and a few beers were on board, but for me to much Ginger it was overpowering so will reduce/eliminate that when making some more curries sat night maybe then I'd be able to taste it better.

Quote from: Jeera on October 02, 2008, 08:10 PM

Quote from: Secret Santa on October 02, 2008, 08:05 PM

Quote from: JerryM on October 02, 2008, 08:22 AM

1.I can't make out when the tom puree is added - is it behind the chef. A lot of the dishes appear to change to the redder colour late on (except for CTM which is straight away)
2.Cleaning of pan done with fresh oil then scraped onto cooker. No water used.

The stuff that goes in to the ctm has to be tandoori masala, it's not puree there's just too much of it. There has been very little in the way of cleaning pans that I've seen. The curries are cartoned up off cam and the pan goes straight back on the shelf. If you watch for long enough you'll see that when they need a new pan they sort of have to look at each pan to see which one they want for the next curry. Obviously they will take an old korma one for the mild curries and one which had a hotter curry in for the madrases etc.

Yeah, I noticed that - I assumed there was a slot up there into the where the dishes & pots are cleaned in an adjacent room. I wonder if it is just a shelf as you say - no cleaning.

If there is a cleaner from that shelf he needs to be sacked  ;D some of those pans come back down from that shelf in a right state, I agree they seem to chose a pan that had a similar curry cooked in it last time. The seasoning  :-X