Here are some of the key moments which I recall. My order may be out in terms of the chronology:

- Stew started the forum and, unlike owners who followed, seemed to have an interest in good recipes, himself
- Darths 100% clone recipes
- Ghanna's brief involvement including revealing an outline of how to make a good korma
- Andy's arrival making out he was privileged to know lots of secrets. I think he was banned after setting up realcurryrecipes
- group test sessions, coordinated by Chris
- visit to a restaurant kitchen in Fleet by a few members
- CoryAnder's period as moderator, leading to lots of arguments and his eventual ban. Went off to start up his own forum.

and I can't think of much since, i.e. for something like the past 10 years.

I'm sure others will recall much more, in terms of significant occurrences.

Quote from: livo on May 24, 2022, 12:37 AM
I believe it was started / originally owned by Stew.  When? See below.  Possibly the longest contributing members (still active) and best placed to answer your question are Phil, Sep 13 2006, Secret Santa, Dec 24 2006 and Uncle Frank, 2008.  There are still occasional posts by other long term members Stephen Lindsay, 2007 and Pete (dating back to 2004 but I think he has had a few incarnations here. Not sure.) et al.

History is sometimes distorted by those who attempt to write it. I joined in Feb 2005 and have one of the highest post counts but apparently justify no mention.

Robbo - I have only used curry leaves bought from an Asian store, in cooking so far. I will wait a while longer before trying leaves from my relatively young plants. In June, at the start of the brief British summer, I will put them outside in a greenhouse. My aim is to see if I can get them to flower and produce seeds, so I can try to grow even more plants.

Here's a further photo, just over 4 months after the previous one. For anyone who likes the flavour of curry tree leaves, the plants are recommended and quite easy to grow.

Quote from: tempest63 on March 05, 2022, 07:16 AM
Thank the heavens the Covid restrictions are lifted and we can return to the new normal.

I don't get it. Yes, the restrictions have been lifted but the infection rate is reported to be almost as high as it ever was. Plus, immunity from jabs may be wearing off. Good luck with socialising but it's not for me, until the infection rate goes down.

Quote from: Secret Santa on February 21, 2022, 06:35 PM
People don't go aimlessly wandering around Africa expecting not to be eaten by lions and hyenas or trampled by elephants. I don't aimlessly wander into a road expecting not to be run over. Why do people assume they can swim with sharks and not get eaten?

Daft bugger. Zero sympathy here.

I agree with Secret Santa. He presumably lacked any common sense and paid a high price for his reckless stupidity.

The alignment of the quote marks on this forum is poor, so my previous quote was completely wrong. I know I should have previewed the post but I have better things to do with my time.

Quote from: Peripatetic Phil on February 18, 2022, 09:04 AM
OK, but that's close to "name magic" — saying that it creates a roux doesn't explain why one might want/need to create a roux — is it for thickening, is it for colour, is it for flavour, etc. ?

But I did explain - it's to thicken the cottage pie mixture, mince 'casserole' or whatever you are making. My Mum used to do the same thing, with plain flour. She never made a roux based sauce as such, but it would have led to a similar result.

Quote from: Peripatetic Phil on February 17, 2022, 08:43 AM
Now why would one add flour to the onions ?  I understand why one would want to brown it if one had added it, but why add it in the first place ?  What is it intended to achieve ?

I assume the onions are being fried in oil or butter. The flour will act as a thickener when added to the fat. The process, as you must know, is called roux. Then, depending on how dark you want the sauce, you brown the oil/butter and flour to the level required.

Quote from: britishcurries on January 30, 2022, 06:58 PM
I used a caramelized onion paste (see: "How to make Onion Paste (a Bunjarra for extra flavour in Curries) by Misty Ricardo.)

Misty Ricardo should receive zero credit. The onion paste idea was around for at least 10 years before he appeared, to make money from other peoples' recipes.

Quote from: seekingcurry on January 12, 2022, 01:31 PM
the result was excellent, by a margin the best I have ever produced and closest to what I'm looking for, appreciating we're all looking for something different....I would never boil onions without having fried them first in any other cooking)...'service onions' from the Jalfrezi recipe is also a revelation.

Interesting, thanks. Did you roast the spice? I agree with you about frying onions before adding water. Do you mean you used Syed's service onion recipe for adding to the the Jalfrezi? Your feedback means I will probably try the Jalfrezi recipe, too.