- This article is about the dish. For the curry tree and its leaves, see the foot of this page. You might also be interested
in the logician Haskell Curry and the procedure of currying named for him.
A curry is any of a great variety of distinctively spiced dishes, best-known in
Indian and Thai
cuisine, but found in many other countries.
Curries around the world
The term curry derives from kari, a Tamil word meaning
sauce and referring to various kinds of dishes common in South India made
with vegetables or meat and usually eaten
with rice. The term is used more broadly, especially in the Western Hemisphere, to refer to almost any spiced, sauce-based dishes
cooked in various south and southeast Asian styles, or to anything that one might eat in an Indian restaurant or curry house.
This imprecise umbrella-term is largely an artifact of the British raj. Well-known Indian
dishes include Korma, Madras, Vindaloo, Butter Chicken, and
Rogan Josh. Curry used in this sense is often accompanied by breads like naan, roti, or popadums.
In Tamil cuisine, from which
the word originated, curry refers to any dry preparation involving meat or vegetables shallow-fried with dry spices. Used as a
word in itself, it usually means chicken curry or mutton curry; the dishes made with vegetables are usually referred to with the vegetable as prefix - e.g. Potato curry, Beans curry. Curry is usually eaten with
Rice and Sambar or Rasam.
In other varieties of Indian cuisine, curry is a sauce - sometimes considered a soup - made by stirring
yoghurt into a roux of ghee (a type of clarified butter) and besan (chick pea flour). The spices added vary, but usually include turmeric and
black mustard seed.
In British cuisine, the word curry denotes a sauce-based
dish flavored with curry powder. A dry preparation of meat or vegetables
(especially potatoes) may be served curried, meaning they have been coated with a curry powder preparation then roasted,
shallow-fried, or grilled (broiled) to a dark brownish colour. Additionally curry sauce may be served warm as a condiment
to other dishes such as chips.
The vast majority of British "Indian" restaurants are in fact Bangladeshi,
although the menu will nearly always be influenced by the wider Indian subcontinent (and frequently other neighbouring cuisines such as Persian and Nepalese). They have developed the Curry to such a level
that it has become an integral part of British cuisine, meaning some
Indian food is actually exported from the United Kingdom to India. (There was even an instance of an Englishman asking for a local curry to be sent to
Australia and while resident in London,
a craving made actor Tom Cruise pay hundreds of pounds for his favourite dish
to be flown and delivered to him in Rome). The dominance of Bangladeshi "Indian"
restaurants has led to many others zealously promoting "authenticity" in particular cuisine from either India or a specific area of that country.
It is claimed that the worlds largest concentration of "Indian" restaurants outside the Indian subcontinent can be found on
"the Curry Mile" in Rusholme, Manchester.
British curries are generally arranged by strengths with the most commonly found dishes and menu descriptions being the
following:
- Korma (mild)
- variant dishes (medium)
- Madras (fairly hot)
- Vindaloo (very hot)
- Phaal (very very hot)
Other dishes may be featured with varying strengths, with those of northern Indian Subcontinent origin or influence, such as
Butter-Chicken tending to be mild, and recipies from the south of India being among the
hotter examples.
Britain is in fact the home of two widely familiar "Indian" dishes, Chicken Tikka Massala and Balti (which is a
curry designed to be eaten with a large naan bread).
In the late 1990s, chicken tikka masala was commonly referred to as the "British national dish", being apparently the single
commonest dish in the country, available (albeit in frozen, microwavable form) on intercity rail trains, and even used as a
pizza topping.
Curries are not confined to India and the United Kingdom, British style curry restaurants are common and increasingly popular
in Australia and New Zealand. Other countries have their own varieties of curry, well known examples include:
- Thailand: green, red and yellow curries
- Malaysia & Indonesia: rendangs
- South Africa: Cape malay curries
- Sri Lanka: Rice and
curry meals
Other countries which have their own varieties of curry include: Bangladesh,
Cambodia, Burma, Japan, Pakistan, and Singapore; and curry powder is used as an incidental ingredient in other cuisines, including for example a "curry
sauce" (sauce au curry, sometimes even au cari) variation of the classic French béchamel.
Curry Addiction
A number of studies have claimed that the reaction of pain receptors to the hotter ingredients in curries, even a Korma, leads
to the body's release of endorphins and combined with the complex sensorary
reaction to the variety of spices and flavours, a natural high is achieved that causes subsequent cravings, often followed by
addiction and a desire to move on to hotter curries. Defining this as "an addiction" is contested by other researchers. [1] (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/989256.stm)
Ingredients
Thickeners
Spices
Sour ingredients
Fresh Herbs and Spices
- garlic
- ginger
- coriander (cilantro) leaves
- curry leaves
- bay leaves
- kaffir lime leaves
- green chillies
- onion
Curry powder, also known as Masala Powder, is a spice mixture of
widely varying composition developed by the British during their colonial rule of India as a means of approximating the taste of Indian cuisine at home. Masala refers
to spices, and this is the name given to the thick pasty liquid sauce of combined spices and ghee (clarified butter), butter,
palm oil or coconut milk.
Curry leaves are the young leaves of the curry tree (Chalcas
koenigii), a member of the Rutaceae family that grows wild and in gardens all
over India. They must be used fresh, as they lose their delicate flavor when dried.
External links
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