I'll give it another go. Thanks guys , I'll let you know...

This is by far the closest I've come to a genuine BIR curry, but I'm still having a major issue. What I can't get is that fusion where the curry darkens and the oil seperates. This for me is part of the BIR madras as I know it. I've followed this recipe exactly, and have tried to gently fry the sauce but no seperation. I'm wondering whether maybe the problem is that I'm not heating the pan hot enough before adding the first ladle of sauce. Any suggestions?

This is an awesome post. I only started making BIR curry a few weeks ago and I'm really not far off. I found that the hotter the wok when the ingredients are added the better the taste (using CA's madras recipe). The problem is that even if I make a runny paste with the spices, they get close to burning pretty quickly. If using this method, how do you avoid burning spices, or tomato puree considering how hot it has to be? I assume adding water to stop the spices burning will lower the temperature?