Mainly About Curries.

For the last two weeks I have been making curries. Four different types, to be exact. It was a unique experience, because honestly I have never had a traditional curry before in my memory.

Stop gaping at me in horror. It's not that unlikely.

Anyway, we made English, Thai, Sri Lankan, and Mattar Paneer curries on the four cooking days of the week. They all tasted good, and it was an interesting look at another culture's recipes, but as my experience with curry is limited to a bit of power sprinkled over chicken, I don't know how I'd tell a good curry from a bad one. So. Enough blibberblabber. Let's get to it.

RECIPE #1: English Curry

So, this week we made an English curry. It was quite good. Really I was much too stressed over getting it done that I did not do a very good job, so it didn’t turn out as well as I would have liked; Still, it tasted decent. The texture was a little odd, as I am not used to having potatoes and rice and the other ingredients all mixed together, but it wasn’t bad. I did like the taste of this curry better than the Thai curry, but mostly because of the lack of chick peas and zucchini. I probably would take this slower and try to be less stressed next time.

RECIPE #2: Thai Curry

Next up is the Thai curry. We struggled through a long, arduous procedure of not having one of our team members there, so me and Bradie had to do everything ourselves. Mrs. Gerber helped (Thanks, Mrs. G) but for the most part we chopped up vegetables and mixed spices on our own. It turned out quite well, I suppose. The taste was quite nice, although I did find it necessary to pick out the zucchini and a large portion of the chick peas. The texture and taste were pretty much the same as the English Curry, as far as I could tell. Next time, if I ever made this again, I would omit the zucchini and use beans instead of chick peas, and maybe add something to make it a bit spicier and a bit less sweet.

RECIPE #3: Sri Lankan Curry

This one was the best of all the recipes, in my opinion. It was fairly quick and simple to make, and I had a lot of fun. The combination of broth from the meat and cashews in the rice was utterly delicious, even though Jenny and I kept snitching the cashews. The only thing I did not like about this recipe was the faux chicken we put it. How one can digest such horrendous fodder, I have no idea- The stuff tasted like burnt rubber soaked in beef broth, and had roughly the consistency of gritty Jell-O. The broth added quite a nice flavour to the rice, but I ended up picking all the chunks of meat out. Next time I made this I would either omit the meat entirely or actually use real meat instead.

RECIPE #4: Mattar Paneer

This one came in a close second in terms of how good it was. Luke's brother came in to help us with the recipe, and gave us many pointers on how to make it as good as possible. It was easy to make and took only about half an hour, though I did overcook the rice a bit. The cheese, though utterly tasteless on it's own, soaked up the juice and spices and became a delicious addition to the mixture. The mixture of exotic spices gave the curry a delicious taste, although it was a little bit too hot. If I ever made this again I would not change anything except maybe add a bit less peas and onions.