Unfortunately yesterday after completing the base sauce preparation I had to go out - last rugby match of the season. Went to Aldis on way back to pick up some chili's and they were out so no Balti.
A quick look in fridge revealed an unopened pack of mushrooms so I decided on a Chicken Patia with mushrooms - for years one of my favourites with mushrooms and bindhi.
Also something that I had never reproduced with the right taste at home.

Now it was time to do a taste test on the the three sauces.

First observation - the colours were very similar with the one with added tomato's looking just vaguely darker. Expected

Instead of oil on the surface of the new bases I had set ghee - but interestingly nowhere as much as what had been used in the cooking process.

The saffron I had made the day previously had released virtually all of the oil.
Tasting the saffron to me it tastes like a raw oniony garlic sauce very slightly tart and also quite salty. It instantly reminded me of the taste I had probably over 10 years ago when making the curry secret stage 1 base. I instantly decided if I were to make the saffron again I would leave out the salt or leave it as it is and use it for the pre-cooking meat stage as per the curry secret method. I will go on to this later.

New Base without tomato tasted velvety smooth - a sauce that I could almost eat on its own - no bitterness just a hint of ghee in the background no major flavour discernible or overpowering it.
New base with tomato tasted slightly fuller but with a slightly bitter after taste.

I concluded the following from the look and taste test:

The 2 new bases were edible on their own. Straight out of the pan. The saffron base needed futher cooking and flavourings to make it a complete item and remove the raw taste. See next post for curry results

Good point on the chicken stock. Hadnt thought of the vege's I must admit but for today stock is stock I am afraid. However if this is successful - and I have to say its looking good at the moment - I will look at some tweaks to improve the veg stock quality.

Some interesting points raised by other people - I cant smell a thing as the house probably still smells of yesterdays curry.
If the base coats the back of a spoon it is too thick to release the oil to the surface.

The chicken stock is now done and all the ingredients have now been prepared and cooked according to my original plan using ghee. The stock has been added and the base is now bubbling away quite happily. Every step has been documented and photographed and measured to the gram.
The comparison will be three fold
1. Taste test against the saffron base which is still on the stove.
2. Taste test against the same new base with added chopped tomatoes
3. Taste test against yesterday's curry (Balti)

Theory
By cooking the onions and carrots in ghee until caramellisation just starts should release the natural sugars contained in the onions and carrots. The addition of the celery should add a more complete flavour. By frying the garlic and ginger this should remove the rawness of flavour you get and also the bitterness from them.
By frying the spices this should improve the fragrance and colour and produce slightly more depth of flavour.
The chicken stock will add more richness to the flavour. I also left the fat on the stock when it was added. This should add more flavour to the ghee when it separates.

The base I am expecting to produce should be slightly sweeter and much more flavoursome than those previously tried.

What I am hoping for is a base that will suit all types of curry - hopefully for everything from korma to phall depending on the additions at the next stage of cooking.

By the way no salt has been added at all at this stage - I feel that you should season each dish individually to your own taste.

In reality all I wanted to do with my post is bring to everyones attention that the base sauces on this site are probably representative of the variations between curry houses and their own recipe for base sauce.
I would not suggest for one second that you should use a canned soup for production although according to one recipe for a quick curry base it is said to work.
The other point is that they all invariably use vegetables in various quantities.
So the format for a base sauce is quite simple.
Garlic/Ginger  mix
Vegetable soup - various recipes contained in existing bases
Various proportions of standard spices
Additions such as tomatoes, peppers and other spices.
Today I am going to carry out a trial for you all.
The chicken stock is already on the go and will be ready in 2 hrs time.
Two chicken carcasses, two carrots, one onion, 10 peppercorns, 4 bay leaves - chicken fried before boiling - covered with water.
I will then use a cut down version of Saffrons base to establish the spice mix and proportions of garlic and ginger. I will then make a vegetable soup (onion based) using my stated method and using ghee.
So I will either shoot myself in the foot or have the recipe. Whichever to me it doesnt matter. The search for perfection continues.

The point I am trying to make I suppose is that if you check through most of the base sauce recipes you will find the same or similar ingredients used in each one perhaps with a bit of this and that added.
I have tried and tested most of the base sauces over an extended period of time having started with the curry secret base and used exactly the same curry recipe to test them. My findings are as I describe there is a very marginal difference between "the taste". Today I have tried a comparison between 2 bases Saffron and another - one with chopped tomatoes and one without - the one with suited my taste (or the recipe I am using) slightly better than the one without.The difference was very marginal.
I like you have been striving to make the perfect BIR curry in my case for over 20 years. This site has probably the best and most accurate recipes for stimulating the curry lovers tastebuds. As you can see from the following recipes they all use a version of Onion soup - one even gets it from a can - Check Saffron,New base Sauce recipe (with tomatoes),Rajver (with tomatoes), UB's (lots of extra bits), KD's, Darth's Madras etc etc.
So have a look for yourself - you will see the similarity between recipes but you have to step back to do so.

Yes I have tested most of the curry bases on the site - and to be fair the recipes provided have in general produced a fairly decent curry. Yes some have more appeal than others and some are more for mild dishes or hot dishes.

But I was going through my recipe books for base sauce this morning trying to decide which one I was going to use when I decided to do a comparison. I looked at curry queens, Darth's Base, ifindforu's original base without coconut,generic curry sauce - interesting one that!, and many others.

If you take out the spices ginger and garlic you end up with a basic Onion soup type recipe with the other vege added for "stock purposes" to help improve the texture, consistency or taste.

So my point is this - step 1 make a soup that you wouldnt mind eating on its own without the garlic and ginger and spices - if it tastes good now then the curry stands a good chance of tasting good. Once this recipe is perfected start over and make your curry base add your garlic and ginger in a 2:1 or 1:1 ratio as per Saffron base. Then add your 4 spices in equal measures.

Then you have curried onion soup base gravy that should be better than your local bir takeaway.

moved by SnS - new topic here:-

https://curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php/topic,2614.msg22980/topicseen.html#msg22980

Hi Secret Santa,

Heat was on medium I would say, chef literally picked up some garlic paste with back of serving spoon and wiped the surface of the hot pan with it. H then did exactly the same with the ginger - added a tablespoon of what looked like vegetable oil and then onions. He fried these for a couple of minutes then started adding the spices.
After a minute or so he added the precooked chicken fried for another minute then added base sauce. Turned heat to high and threw in around a tablespoon of chopped coriander leaves. He then added the sugar and a squirt of lemon juice from his bottle.
Quick stir and then into the takeaway container.Which he then sprinkled more coriander into.

Curry Done and internally digested 15 minutes later

Was in local curry house last night and managed to get into kitchen with very helpful chef.

The ingredients used and quantities for this recipe looked about right - only difference was the chef right at  the beginning wiped the pan with 1/2 tsp garlic puree and 1/2 tsp ginger - then added remainder of ingredients however instead of peppers he used thinly sliced onions - a good two tablespoons of them.

 ;D ;D ;D Today I made up the new base - double quantity as I luv quick and easy meals even though the initial prep and cooking takes some time and then as I had no onions or peppers left decided that I would give Chicken Ceylon a go. I made it exactly as in the recipe except for reducing the amount of chilli powder to half a teaspoon ( I reckon I must have the hottest of the hot chilli powders)added the rst of the ingredients then cooked for 5 minutes and added chicken and some stock the sauce tasted salty and sharp so i added 2 teaspoons sugar and three tablespoons of pineapple chunks - it then tasted better than my local restaurant's by a mile - keep the recipes coming they're great.