Curry Recipes Online
Curry Base Recipes => Curry Sauce, Curry Base , Curry Gravy Recipes, Secret Curry Base => Topic started by: Yousef on January 09, 2007, 01:17 PM
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This is an amalgamation of my knowledge and what I have learned over the years, it works for me and makes the closest to a curry house madras sauce.
Because you dice the onions finely and cook them until they are golden brown they actually dissolve into a liquid when adding the stock and tomatoes?..you?ll see. Blending the sauce is optional. If you do blend just remove whole spices prior to blending with a hand blender.
Whole Spices
? 4 Green Cardomons
? 1 TS black peppercorns
? 1 TS Cumin Seeds
? Bit of a Cinnamon Stick
Ground Spices
? 2 TBSP Ground Coriander
? 2 TBSP Ground Cumin
? 1 TBSP Ground Turmeric
? 1 TS Chilli Powder
? 1 TS any spice mix / massala mix (loads on this site)
? 1 TS Salt
? 1 TS Garlic Paste
? 1 TS Ginger Paste
Other Ingredients
? 100ml of vegetable Oil
? 4 Large Onions Finely Diced (this avoids having to blend anything ? you?ll see)
? 1 Tin Chopped Tomatoes - 400g ? BLENDED
? 1 Small Potato sliced into 4 corners
? 1/2 Finely diced Green Pepper
? 400ml Chicken Stock (I just any old chicken stock cube)
Process
1. Add veg oil to stock pot over high heat
2. when oil hot add whole spices and heat until they crackle
3. Add diced onion and reduce heat to medium
4. Cook onions until they are golden brown (15-20 mins)
5. Add green pepper and potato cook for further 5 mins
6. Add Garlic and Ginger Paste ? cook for 2 minutes
7. Add ground spices & salt, stir and cook for 5 minutes or until spices release their smells/aroma
8. Add the chopped tined tomato you blended earlier cook for 5 minutes until it starts to darken
9. Add 400ml Chicken Stock
10. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 20 minutes
11. Remove Potato
Use the sauce as your base sauce and make the curry you desire in the usual way. I don?t bother blending but you can if you like, just remove the oil first and whole spices then blend and return oil.
If you think the sauce is too thick when using to make a curry, say a madras just add a little water, I am convinced this is what the curry house does anyway?..
This sauce works and I swear it?s the addition of the stock, you wait till you add it in towards the end and watch the colour of the sauce with the oil on top.
This base sauce will probably do you 4 curries.
Pics can be found here http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?topic=1581.0
I would welcome feedback as I think this is pretty close as a base sauce.
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Hey Stew, I like the look of this recipe, easy to follow too.
How did you come up with this one? Is it a smaller version of a larger BIR recipe? ::)
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Its from my own experience plus a little borrowing from others on the site and even from a book i got a while ago....so really its a bit of everything.
Try it out, but you must dice those onions well or you will need to blend the sauce.
Stew
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hi stew what type of spice mix did you use mate?
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You can use this one sir, just add 1/2 TS to the base.
Coriander 8 Parts
Turmeric 7 Parts
Cumin 5 Parts
Curry Powder 4 parts
Paprika 4 Parts (optional)
Thats what i love about this old cooking game you can try anything and see what works, its not an exact science...
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hi stew
just to let you know i done your base sauce yesterday,i made a beef and vegetable mild curry with it for the family and a few friends and they all loved it.cheers mate
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bart09,
Well done for trying it, it does me everytime i have to say, i swear its the 400ml of chicken stock that elevates it up to a better standard.
Stew
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bart09,
Well done for trying it, it does me everytime i have to say, i swear its the 400ml of chicken stock that elevates it up to a better standard.
Stew
Stew, have you tried using the knorr bouillion vegetable stock as a matter of interest or vegetable stock cubes?? I have lots of Veggie pals :-\ ;)
Sent you a PM by the way ;)
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Stew, that sounds good! I like the fact that I usually have all those ingredients on hand. BTW, what size tin of chopped tomatoes do you use? Thanks.
-Mary
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hi merrybaker
i`ve done stews base and i myself used a 400gram tin of chopped tomatoes,and it is a very nice curry base and make a nice curry too.hope this helps you good luck
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Thanks, Bart. That's what I'll use then, unless Stew says otherwise.
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ok mb no problems
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Just use a 400g tin, cheap as you can find from the supermarket.
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Hi - I'm new to this site and guess this is gonna sound like a bit of a daft question, but when you say "make your curry in the usual way" what do you mean - your recipe seems to be a finished product, with the obvious lack of the meat (or vegetables if that's your thing).
Regards
Roundboy
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Hi Roundboy,
This recipe is for a base sauce, when you have made it you can use it to make your curry. Pick a recipe from the recipe group here:
http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?board=3.0 (http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php?board=3.0)
Where it states add your gravy or base sauce.
cK
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Thanks for the heads up.
I'm just about to try my take on the UCB - I'll let ya know how it turns out
Thanks again
Roundboy ;D
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Welcome Roundboy (round as me? ???) Good luck with the UCB. You can either PM if you have a problem (I have an alert on my other emails for PMS) or post here. Just remember it is very mild chilli powder you use in the base. ::)
CP
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I'm planning on making this sauce tonight, so now I'm reading the recipe very carefully. Are your measurements level or rounded or heaping? Do you discard the potato? Thanks for your help.
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Merry who is you question for please?
CP
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Sorry! It refers to Stew's sauce recipe at the beginning of this thread. So I guess the question is for Stew, or Bart, or anyone else who's already tried it. Thanks.
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I'm planning on making this sauce tonight, so now I'm reading the recipe very carefully. Are your measurements level or rounded or heaping? Do you discard the potato? Thanks for your help.
Hi Merrybaker,
I found this after carefully reading: ;)
11. Remove Potato
I think he just discards the potato
Cheers
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Sorry guys, yes remove potato, my measures are usually level.
Make sure you get those onions golden brown.
Stew
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You can use this one sir, just add 1/2 TS to the base....Thats what i love about this old cooking game you can try anything and see what works, its not an exact science...
Stew
But is that the exact same spice mix which you used to get such a good end result? You don't actually confirm it is. With respect, sure we can 'try anything and see what works' but the permutations and combinations mount up and can consume an awful lot of time. It's better and very helpful, I suggest, to have tried and tested recipes with no options and clear fixed quantities as the starting point.
Regards
George
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I think he just discards the potato
NOW you tell me! :) I went ahead and made the sauce before you both answered, and I removed the potato, all right. Then I thought I'd taste one of the pieces. Well, it was delicious, so I thought I'd try a second piece. Before you know it, no more potato!
The final sauce was quite brown and quite flavorful. Very unlike KD's. Similar to Pete's 600 ml oil base sauce from the old in2curry days. I worry that all dishes made with this will taste similar, but I assume that's not the case, is it, Stew?
One thing I noticed, and this sounds odd, but it tasted better before I put it in the blender. I should have followed your advice, because the texture was good enough, and it looked better before blending, too. Live and learn!
Anyhow, since the potato (above) tasted so good, I cut up a few potatoes and cooked them in some of the sauce, along with fried garlic and ginger and some peas, and it was very tasty as a side-dish with Indian leftovers from the freezer.
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hi can you recommend a madras recipe to use with this (stews) base sauce,as i am trying this one out tonight, many thanks Andy
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madrasandy,
I just do the following to make my prawn madras, this makes a curry for 1 person: -
Heat a goodf glug of Oil until smoking
Add pinch cumin seeds and 1 teaspoon spice mix stir for 30 seconds
Add 2 tablespoons of base sauce
Add Prawns, cook prawns for 2 minutes (if it starts to get dry add more base)
Add 1 Teaspoon Pataks Balti Paste (I know cheating eh but it works)
Now add 2.5 ladles of base
Boil and bubble for 5 minutes
add chopped coriander stalk and teaspoon of chopped coriander leaves
Stir and cook further 2 mins
Allow to cool
Serve
I would love to know how you got on, don't forget you can substitute prawns for pre-cooked chicken.
Stew 8)
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Hi Stew,
Well i made your base on sat night, and i was very impressed, my final curry was a vindaloo, cant remember where found it on here but i already had print out of it. My wife absol loved it! I will definately be trying this again soon and will try your prawn madras Stew
Regards Andy
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Hi Stew, ;) I am finally going to give this a try out the weekend. Will have camera at the ready and post my results. Just a couple of questions excuse me if I state the obvious.
TS= teaspoon?
Diced green pepper= bell pepper?
Large onion? How large?
Will be doing this base and experimenting with the finished curry.
Cheers chap.... ;D
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Stew,
You mention spooning off the oil before blending and then adding it back , forgive me if its a daft question but is there a reason for this?
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Hi Bangra,
I would assume the oil is taken out before blending to insure it sepereates from the sauce so it can be spooned off and used as spicy oil for your currys. If you blend it with the oil in it takes a lot longer to seperate if it does at all.
cK
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Hi Mike,
Since you want to make this this weekend, and subject to Stew's confirmtation, I'd say (and would be reasonable certain of) the following:
- Yes, "TS" = teaspoon
- Yes, "green pepper" = capsicum/bell pepper
- Don't worry too much about the onion size, but I'd say "large" = about 10cm diameter (or about 2kg of onions in total)
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With respect to removing the oil before blending (and adding it again after), I presume this is because it will otherwise be difficult to re-separate the oil after blending (without more prolonged heating). Personally, I just blend the lot and find that the oil anyway separates again when cooking the final curry. It seems to me that 100ml may not be a lot of oil to separate in the first place? I would definately blend though, for a better consistency.
Hope this helps Mike, and good luck with the cooking! Don't forget the photos! 8)
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Good luck with it Mike, remember to add in lots of diced corriander stalks to the final curry. I find this always works a treat and really makes a BIR Curry.
Stew 8)
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Hi all, ;) Well Stew I finally got round to doing your base. A good afternoon in the kitchen and an excellent result. I did use a hand blender although at the end of cooking everything had reduced really well. I did notice the end result came out a little on the thickish side but I added some water when doing the curry and it was fine. I don't think my curry lived up to your base thou. Do you have a recipe you use with it? I have been doing a curry using fried and blended onions and a base sauce. I did fry some finely diced onions and added your base but I think your base already has that nice "chutney" texture. Anyway enough chat heres some pictures......
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Hi all, ;). I have today cooked another curry using Stews base because I wasn`t happy with the one I did last night(any excuse for a curry).
Oil in wok....
1tsp garlic paste...
1tsp ginger paste...
1tsp green chili paste...
Fried for 1min...
Added base...
1/2tsp chili powder...
1tsp salt...
Added chicken..
2 sliced tomatoes...
Cooked for 5Min's...
1tsp Garam masala...
1/2tsp Cumin...
Pinch of Fenugreek powder...
Similar to KD`s Chicken Curry................
Ahhhhhhh....thats better. ;D
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Looks good MT,
Did you add the chicken stock i couldn't see it in the photos?
I agree its a little thick, maybe more chicken stock and blending would make it better...tasty though.
Stew
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Hi Stew, ;) yes mate, Stock in the Pyrex measuring jug top right. I did use 4 decent sized onions and fried them for a good 30Min's, maybe thats what took the oil. I must say after I added the spices and the blended tomatoes I could have eaten it straight out of the pan! The smell was spot on.
In the base sauces I have done so far, everything has been boiled and blended, then when I have done a curry I have started off with frying and blending onions to give me that "chutney" texture. Your base already had that so there was no need for me to fry/blend any more onions so the second curry was perfect. I just added a bit of hot water till I got it to the right consistency which made no difference to the taste.
still a big thumbs up for me chap..... ;D ;D
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I thought I'd give this one a go this afternoon. I used 6 medium onions, total weight about 1.25Kg. The other changes were I used more oil (250ml vs 100ml in the original) as it didn't seem much, and I upped the ginger/garlic using about 2 inches of ginger root and a whole garlic bulb, probably about a tablespoon of each after pureeing. I also added 1tsp of ground fenugreek seed to the spice mix.
Having made the base (not yet used it, I'm going to let it stand until this evening) I can see why the KD book says to boil the onion/garlic/ginger rather than fry it. It has the same effect of softening it but avoids the risk of burning - I had to keep the pan on a fairly low heat. However frying avoids the dreadful smell that the KD method results in! Perhaps seperately frying the ginger/garlic would be a good idea too. Anyhow the recipe seems to work well and the result looks and tastes good too!
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Ok so after a few hours I tried a simple chicken jalfrezi using the base. Put about a tablespoon of oil in a pan and heated, then added a pinch of cumin seeds and a tsp of spice mix. after about a minute added a roughly sliced onion and cooked for a couple of minutes until starting to go soft. Added 2 tbsp base, plus a tsp of Veeraswamy madras paste, then added 2 chicken breasts cut into about 1 inch cubes and cooked again until the chicken turned white, about 2 mins, then added half a green pepper, one tomato quartered and 6 green chillis cut lengthways. After another 5 mins added the 2.5 ladles base sauce and cooked for another 5 mins or so.
Results was very tasty but the sauce was too thick - I think it needs more water or chicken stock, rather than 400ml I suspect 600 or even more might be better.
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Hi fumble, ;) have done stews base and found it to be very good ;D . I know what you mean about KD`s boiling ginger/garlic/onion :o what a pong! Sounds like you could be on to something. I think, it doesn't matter too much about base sauce its what you do prior to adding the base that makes the curry. Spice mix/order of adding ingriedients that sort of thing. Keep posting your results...... ;D ;D
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This is an amalgamation of my knowledge and what I have learned over the years, it works for me and makes the closest to a curry house madras sauce.
Because you dice the onions finely and cook them until they are golden brown they actually dissolve into a liquid when adding the stock and tomatoes?..you?ll see. Blending the sauce is optional. If you do blend just remove whole spices prior to blending with a hand blender.
(Snip)
I made this today, I did need to blend it, but bloody hell it is fabulous. I did thinly slice the onions but failed to dice them.
It smelt fabulous once I added the tomatoes. I wanted to dive in there and then.
I shall definately make it again. Thank you so much.