Whats the trick to cooking restaurant-standard curries at home?
Firstly, a lot of “restaurant-standard” curries in the UK are not really authentic Indian sub-continent grub. So you will have to be prepared for surprises when you cook at home according to the guidelines I will be setting out below. To get the initial hang of cooking great curries at home, you should start with Balti dishes. Birmingham, UK, is said to be the home of Balti, but this tradition of cooking, I believe, originates in Baluchistan, in the North of the India/Pakistan landmass. You will need a cookbook – Husain and Fernandez is as good as you will get. You will also need at least one wok, a large and small frying pan, and a small saucepan for the rice. The following spices will need to be to hand – Chilli Powder, garlic, turmeric, onion seeds, cumin seeds, mustard seeds, pepper, ginger, asafoetida (hing), coriander, a proprietary garam masala, ground cumin, and as many others as your book suggests. A good supplier of top quality Asian spices, via the Net, is Natco. Use Basmati
