Curry Thread

My neighbour is of Indian/Pakistan back ground, I think, sure he won't mind me saying that. He cooked a mega vegetable curry, for an event recently. The spice blend was superb. He says he will share with me the recipe. :clap:
 
A tip. If any curry recipe calls for cashew nuts* toasted, ground, and then made into paste, a suitable alternative is peanut butter (of course if one has cashew nut butter to hand then that can be used, personally I don’t have any).

I did this last week and ended up with one of the best chicken curries I’ve made to date.

*Similarly, if a recipe calls for similar made with sesame seeds, use tahini. It’s basically the same thing.
 
A friend in Blighty is having this Vindaloo for dinner, looks really lush:

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I have been in the UK for 23 years and every curry I have had does not really agree with me.
I dont have stomach issues, but I eat maybe half and feel so full.

TBH I have not been to a proper curry restaurant which use good ingredients.

I am wondering if I buy all the stuff and make it myself, if I would like it more.

I do love Green Curry, Thai stuff. Its just the Indian curry I have had so far is just Blahh.

But I will admit that I only either buy store bought paste or sauce.
 
Hmm, the photo I posted got nuked somehow.

Those Indian 'curry' things you can buy from the supermarket in jars, or what have you, are complete crap in my experience.

The Thai curry paste is made quite strong, but the recipe on the jar is weak sauce compared to how they actually make it, again in my experience.

Today I made the best curry I've had in ages, & it's very similar to how I made it years ago:

two large chicken breasts, chopped into bite-size pieces
grated Turmeric & Ginger, coarse-ground black-pepper, Cayenne pepper powder

that's just to get it started, once the fat of the chicken rendered I poured a healthy amount of Sambal on it & stirred as I waited for it to finish cooking

With RED curry I don't have to worry about messing up the green paste with sambal

added a whole can of the good coconut milk, the good ones are about 1/3 cream, then

the curry *paste, at least double what the recipe on the jar claims

A whole clove of Garlic, finely chopped

A whole capsicum, not so finely chopped (as you can see in the photo)

instead of onion I used a whole Shallot, in-between size chopping, between Garlic & Capsicum

a little Coriander powder & Lemongrass powder
It's too bad I didn't have fresh Thai Basil, or I would have added that last

Almost forgot, I started Jasmine rice before all this, steamed for an hour in chicken broth:

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I ate two bowls this size & a lot more rice the second time around. The rice on its own was quite good, if I do make the comment myself.

It's going to be even better for breakfast tomorrow.

*
MaesriRedCurryPaste14ozfront_300x300.jpg
 
Hmm, I was just watching Pailin compare curry paste, because I'm about to stock up & I was surprised that she rates Mae Sri 4th out of 5:



It's the most stocked brand locally, but Mae Ploy & Aroy-D are also available.
Her opinion of Mae Sri would explain why I use at least twice as much as is recommended on the container.

In my experience, all of that Thai Kitchen stuff is to be avoided.
 
I have been in the UK for 23 years and every curry I have had does not really agree with me.
I dont have stomach issues, but I eat maybe half and feel so full.

TBH I have not been to a proper curry restaurant which use good ingredients.

I am wondering if I buy all the stuff and make it myself, if I would like it more.

I do love Green Curry, Thai stuff. Its just the Indian curry I have had so far is just Blahh.

But I will admit that I only either buy store bought paste or sauce.
I would definitely recommend making one without shop bought sauces.
I’m making a chicken chasni this afternoon and it’s unbelievably simple once you have the spices.
 


Curry simmering and onion bhaji mix being prepared 👍🏻
 
Is it true that chicken chasni was invented in Glasgow? (that's not a sleight BTW)
 
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Is it true that chicken chasni was invented in Glasgow? (that's not a sleight BTW)
I have no idea, I know it’s scotlands favourite curry.
To be honest I’m not a massive fan, it’s a masala basically and I prefer a bit more spice.
Family likes it so I do it for them 👍🏻
 
I'm not sure what the failing factor is for Indian curry sauces in a jar, but I've only ever had one good one, but it was a kit that had some ingredients in a preservative which you poured off & didn't use.

I've had Thai curry from scratch & I couldn't tell the difference vs. the paste, but...
at the end of the day the paste is basically the same they're going to make by hand. They just put the same ingredients into a mortar & pestle.

One thing I can tell is fake (packet ingredients) right away is Tom-Yum (sweet-sour soups). Knorr packets are popular, but they're just not as good as the real ingredients, including lemongrass.

follow-up photos, Thai curry paste in my local markets:

PXL_20230507_130120503[1].jpg


To the left is Aroy-D (which means Tasty Good), from the green over to the end is Mae Sri & the big green ones on top are also Mae Sri. That's the Thai-owned market.
They cater mostly to Asian cuisine with a smattering of things for Latinos.

Below is the Hispanic-owned International market, which is exactly the opposite, mostly Latino based things with three aisles for other regions (middle-East, Japan/Korea, other Asia)

PXL_20230507_131855276[1].jpg


I really had planned to get red of each, Aroy-D & Mae Ploy, but the red Mae Ploy was sold out, the empty slot next to the yellow.
So I got green Mae Ploy, even though I have half a jar of green Mae Sri at home.
 
^ cos I’ve got all the spices and always have onions, garlic, ginger and tomatoes to hand, I never make any Indian curry from a jar.

But in my early days of learning to cook, I did use Pataks spice paste from the jar. I know it had good stuff in it and it always smelled and looked good. I thought it was good at the time but I really noticed the difference when I did a from-scratch curry.

I’m also not sure why the ready made Indian paste doesn’t work that well.
 
I think the aromatics go off, that's why Patak's now ask you to add the ginger and garlic fresh.
 
It's nice when the instructions actually tell you to add certain things, like peanuts & potatoes for Massaman:

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I think the aromatics go off, that's why Patak's now ask you to add the ginger and garlic fresh.
Makes it even more redundant for me then!

Reminds me of some of those ‘instant’ cake mixes where ‘only’ egg and oil need to be added (as well as water, but water is a totally reasonable/understandable addition).
 
Totally agree :thumbsup:
 
Haha overnight I went from being that virtuous “I OnLy CoOk cURriEs fRoM sCrAtCh!!’-type person to…using Penang paste from a packet today even though I have all the ingredients for it 😂 (in my defense, I was a bit tired cos I cooked pollo guisado this morning from scratch).

But damn it’s delicious!

I reduced my sauce down further than the norm as it’s my preference. Whole house probably stinks to high heaven (open plan house through three levels probably isn’t that suitable for a curry-loving cook, and my neighbors probably hate me).

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That's authentic Thai, Pailin (in my post above) liked the Nahm Jai brand best.
NamJai (pronounced nahm-jai) = good spirit or literally water of heart

I think the pastes for coconut milk are fine, but against my better judgement I tried an Indian curry in a jar this past weekend. It was terrible, adding various spices or veggies did nothing to help it.
 
That's authentic Thai, Pailin (in my post above) liked the Nahm Jai brand best.
NamJai (pronounced nahm-jai) = good spirit or literally water of heart

I think the pastes for coconut milk are fine, but against my better judgement I tried an Indian curry in a jar this past weekend. It was terrible, adding various spices or veggies did nothing to help it.
I trust everything she says, and she is definitely right about that ‘Thai Kitchen’ brand of paste, I did buy it a couple of years ago when it was the only option, it’s quite crap compared to others! But one can tell from the name, so I wasn’t expecting much from anyway. It was fine in a pinch though.

Today I discovered a new (to me) YouTube channel called School of Wok. Some excellent looking recipes on there and I am very keen to try this chicken rendang curry:

 
Love a good remdamg
 
What a delight to see a curry thread!

For what it’s worth, here’s my wisdom on the subject…

Always start by flavouring the oil with a few things first by frying some ginger, cinnamon, cumin and cloves.

You can purchase various packets of curry mixes that are specifically prepared for mutton, meat, fish, chicken etc. I find them to be excellent. You will only find them in a proper Asian supermarket, not in the four main supermarkets. The main supermarkets are light years behind proper Asian supermarkets or mini markets. It’s worth seeking one if you haven’t already found one.

My weakness is mutton curry. Mutton is hard to find now but, again, Asian butchers will have it.

There are many recipes for one of my favourites, Railway mutton curry, on YouTube but I have found this one to be very tasty and probably authentic (the cook is Indian, not some sweary British yob).

 
People think I'm mad for making rendang out of perfectly good steak beef.
I did it just this week with chuck eye.
No rice, just ate beef like a mad hatter & then boiled the leftovers in the morning for noodle soup.
 
Thanks for starting a curry thread

We had a Beef Nihari tonight, it didn't exactly go as planned, I was doing most of the cook with sous vide. I prepped the beef shin and fried off with Shan Nihari spices and got the SV on the go, set for 10 hours.
About 8 hours in I passed by and noticed the temp was falling, not at the 72.5C I'd set it to. Short story SV circulator failure. So plan B, finished it all off in a wok, a couple of hours less time than planned.
It was good, but I need to remember Shan spices are a bit fierce and cut back from the instructions.

 
Just started making my own curries, helped along by Latif's and MR on YouTube. Great fun.
Buying spices etc from a proper Asian supermarket is a must imho. Better quality and much cheaper than Tescos and the like.
Pork Vindaloo tomorrow! :)
 

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