Curry is one of my all-time favorite dishes. I simply cannot resist the exotic spices and silky texture. One of the main reasons I love London much is that curry is so ubiquitous there, one rarely has to walk more than 500 feet in any direction in order to get some curried goodness.
Sadly, a lot of Americans don’t eat curry. I think part of the reason might be because they don’t make it at home. I think they’re somehow under the impression that curries are too complex and too time-consuming to make in their own kitchens. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth. Curry is dead simple to make, and once you get the hang of it, you can make any curry in around 20 minutes. And in this post, I’ll show you how to do just that.
But first: a word about curry powder. The word “curry” is a rough translation for an Indian word for “sauce”. And just as there are hundreds of sauces in Western cuisine, there are just as many types of curry. In India, curry powder is usually made in the home. Each household might have their own special mix of spices, just as cooks in the Southern U.S. might have their own special blend of barbeque sauce. So there isn’t one single “type” of curry powder. Your local megamart might carry three of four types of curry powder or paste… so which one should you get? Well, there’s no rule about which powder goes with which meat, but as a general rule, I find that the darker the meat you use, the darker the curry powder you should use. So dark brown and deep red curry powders go well with beef or lamb, while yellow curries go better with chicken, shrimp or fish. If you local megamart only sells one type of curry powder, it’s probably “British style” and works best with beef or lamb.