The recipies given are certainly 'interesting'....

hahah nice, yeah it's pretty lethal if you're not careful

I use garlic puree from a tube for my dishes (following Mark S's observations of his local Indian). I don't use ginger in dish preparation, so its not an issue. When making my base (Dhillon style) I use fresh ginger and garlic.

That is being pedantic about definitions tho. Many BIR curries are a bit sweet - and adding sugar makes things sweet. I visitied my favourite ever Indian on the weekendfor the first time in a while, and was surprised at how sweet it was. I'd just not really thought about it or noticed it before.

A different issue from the toffee taste tho, certainly.

yeah, finely chopped, and pre fried. Nice and slow... really coax out the sugar in the onions. Leave them to stand for a few days too.

Generally though, my experiences with local BIR vindaloos are they they don't really have the smokey toffee taste. I've not tried adding the pre fried onions to a  home brew Vindalloo - will give it a go though.

I don't rate any of the recipies which are meant to be Curry Shop recipies -they are miles off the mark. Some of the 'authentic' ones are better though, and I did like the Goan Vindaloo recipie, even though my Goan friend says it is far from authentic.

I'm prerty sure the 'toffee' flavour comes from pre fried onions; fried slowly until they are soft and slightly coloured. Leave them a while in your fridge, then when you use them in a curry after a few days, thy will impart a 'toffee' type hint.

MarkS has seen curries cooked in his local - we know the ingredients were. He speaks of tablespoons of pre fried onions going in early to the pan. If you follow this method, using soft, sweet onions that have had a bit of time to stand... you'll get toffee. If you use fresh fried ones, you won't.

I've been using sugar for a while now, I think quite a few of us do.

A few people have mentioned in the 'describle the taste' thread that BIR dishes often have a slight toffee type flavour. I think I know where this comes from.

Mark J's observations from his local involved the addition of finely chopped pre-fried onions, and pre fried pepper/onion chunks into the dish. I prepared a bowl of both of these last week when following the recipie - last wednesday to be exact. I returned from a weekend away today and made a curry using the last of the pre fried onions and onions/peppers. These tasted slightly sweet and toffee like - exactly like the toffee taste from a BIR. They were fried 6 days ago, and have been in the fridge since.

This makes quite a lot of sense - VERY few of us will have ever used week old pre fried onions in our home cooking, but it must happen all the time in a resturant. Using them brought the 'toffee' taste that no-one seems to be able to get. Try the above, and I think you'll find you do get it!

Blondie: I just popped into Borders and found The New Curry Bible. It is indeed a re-hash of the original 'Curry Bible'. I copied out the vindaloo recipie, so no need to do it yourself!