Not necessarily. My base is very condensed and needs to be watered down at the curry cooking stage. As it stands, it is too spicy and salty - once it is watered down sufficiently it tastes lovely.

Ha, maybe you could serve them stuffed with a yoghurt sauce?

The base I make tastes pretty gross. It is very thick, spicy and ever so salty. I don't think you did anything wrong, just finish off making the curry then decide how good it tastes.

The new pans arrived today and I'm planning on Christening them this afternoon. They look excellent although the handles are very skinny and they are bloody heavy! The angles of the sides seem to follow the exact same curve as my chefs spoon which should make it very easy to use.

Thanks for the advice guys, 11 inches it is. It will be interesting to find out how different an identical curry tastes cooked in a steel pan as opposed to non-stick. Do you think this will effect the flavour?

Hi all,

I'm looking for a couple of nice steel frying pans as I keep scratching all the non stick off our usual ones with my chefs spoon while curry cooking. They seem to be very expensive for a decent one, but then I found these:

http://www.nisbets.co.uk/products/productdetail.asp?productCode=Y321

I saw them initially on Ebay for about ?50 delivered so ?17.99 as an overstock price seemed excellent with free delivery for orders over ?30! The only trouble is that they are 11 inch diameter which I'm concerned could be too large, it might reduce the sauce down too quickly. The smaller 9.5 inch ones aren't reduced so are ?26.99. It seems a lot to pay an extra ?9 each for smaller pans.

Any help would be appreciated. If the larger ones are fine then I'll go for them. What size pans do most people use?

Thanks
Chris

Slap Chop is about ?10 delivered on Amazon. It does look good but would probably end up at the back of the cupboard gathering dust. I bought a similar device a few years ago and although it worked well, the hassle of cleaning it meant we almost always just used a knife instead. IMO stuff on infomercials always look brilliant but always underwhelm when they arrive.

I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has tried this one though.

Hi 976bar

As BIR's vary wildly from chef to chef, you are going to have a tough time getting your perfect CTM. The only reason arguments rage on here for so long is because we are all searching for different things. This brilliant forum will show you the basics but if you want to cook a CTM like your local BIR then you have 2 options. a) Spend potentially years trialling different methods and ingredients until you get close enough, or b) get them to show you how they do it. Most chefs I have spoken to are delighted to have the chance to share their knowledge (the owner might not be so keen).

You need to really make yourself known to them, learn all their names make sure they know yours and keep chatting every time you pick up a takeaway or dine in. Once you are sufficiently ingrained, start asking questions. Tell them how much you enjoy cooking curries at home etc. If you are really lucky (like I was) you might be invited to the kitchen to see first hand how they are made, at the very least you might get 5 mins to chat to the chef about how they make it. Try to get an email address for him so you can keep in touch. As long as you keep buying from them, they wont mind sharing information.

I can now make a Madras exactly as I wanted to be able to. It's not what others might be looking for, but its perfect for my taste. I'm going to move onto CTM next so hopefully I will be able to get some recipe ideas, or even a demo if I'm very lucky.

Hi Derek

Thanks for your feedback and for trying the recipe. Once I have had a chance to make it myself a few times I will post a proper recipe with exact amounts. The quantities in the OP are not right and need a bit more refinement. The plum tomato I added was half of a blended tin of whole plum tomatoes. The yoghurt was probably a bit less than specified.

I found when I made it at home, I could taste the yoghurt and lots of salt and chilli in the base, but by the time it was watered down in the curry, it didn't come through as sour. Also, the lemon juice shouldn't really be a primary taste either, everything should combine into one lovely tasting curry.

You have to be a bit careful when storing them in oil. They can go very toxic if you dont do it right. I'm looking into making up some hot chilli olive oil but it isnt as straightforward as I thought.

I grew hundreds of chillies this year in pots. They were really easy to do and need very little looking after once germinated. I'm sure you will have a much better climate there than I did in the UK, but the results have still been tremendous. I think I have about 300 whole chillies in the freezer waiting to be used over the coming year. As long as you have a windowsill, or conservatory, or just a sunny corner of the garden there is no excuse for not growing your own.