Indian/Asian Food in the UK

rougaille

That brings back memories... when we went to Nice every year for our holidays we often went to a little restaurant in rue Droite called Planète Créole and I used to love their rougaille saucisse. It's closed now, sadly. It was run by a mixed French/la Réunion couple. (well, la Réunion is French technically but you know what I mean. She was française de souche and he was réunionnais.)

Hubby would live on curry if he could. One of the things he missed most during his years in the States was so many curry options. I am sure in bigger cities they are far more available. The closest one to us was 40 miles away. We were getting quite good at making our own, and tried different recipes all the time. We even adapted one to make a marinade for yummy coconut chicken on the grill and still make it for family cookouts when we are visiting. We don't seem to make as many of our own these days. We'll have to get back to it because we both mention from time to time how we miss making them.

Our two favorite in Blackburn are Montague Curry Corner and Imran's Tandoori Takeaway.

Would love some tips.

Hi everyone!
This is my first post on this website, although I have been a 'lurker' for years!  Several times I have wanted to post, but changed my mind, which is probably for the best as I was just wanting to tell someone off who was being a pompous ass, or was being mean to someone for no good reason!   

I am a real chow-hound, so it makes sense that my first posting would be in the food section!    I eat Asian food several times a week and was taught to cook it by various Pakistani and Bangladeshi friends/significant others, so I have got pretty good at it over the years. 

Bearing in mind that I cook in a Pakistani style, here are my top tips for cooking curries:

Use real proper ghee, rather than oil.
Lots of onions!  For example a 4-serving curry should have around 1.25 pounds of onions in it!  They cook in the ghee for a long time - 30 minutes or so, until they are basically a mush/puree.
Chillies:  Don't just chop them up and chuck them in.  I make a puree out of green chillies and a few spoonfuls of water, and stir that in toward the end of the cooking time.
And finally, don't rush!  A good meat curry should take around 2 hours to cook, in my experience.

Hope these tips help!

Hi Blue Pigeon. Great of you to delurk and add your tips!

One of the girls who shares my office is of Pakistani origin, and she shares your views that proper curries take hours. She is also very heavy handed with both onions and garlic and to be honest, her cooking is amazing!

For me, the thought of spending hours at the stove is intimidating, so I tend to choose recipes that I can do a bit quicker. Maybe in time I will graduate to the longer stuff.

It's not the fanciest of places, but I can't fault the food.

This is a great thread.  I LOVE Indian food, and have always felt too intimidated to try cooking it.  (I'm not a good cook to begin with  )

Aquila- A lot of the better places around here are not much to look at lol! But we go for the food and if that is good, we are happy! Monty's decor is nothing amazing but their Kathmandu Dal is fabulous as is the Paneer Shashlick. Not sure if they are still doing it but if you order delivery they throw in free poppadoms and a free beer, and if you eat in, they offer free after dinner liqueur when you ask for the bill.    If you can get over to the Neasden temple, Shayona is in the parking lot and seriously worth it. All vegetarian but the food is simply beautiful!

I was very intimidated originally but it's so worth trying it.

For me, the thought of spending hours at the stove is intimidating, so I tend to choose recipes that I can do a bit quicker. Maybe in time I will graduate to the longer stuff.

If being there for hours is really scary, try finding things (Indian or otherwise) that take about 10 - 15 minutes longer than what you are currently comfortable with. Once you are okay with that, bump it up again. Another trick is to choose things that are time consuming but relatively simple to make, so you don't feel overwhelmed with a project.

I was fortunate to learn to cook by family members (both mom's side and dad's) who really enjoy being in the kitchen, so I was raised with cooking being fun instead of something that has to be done. A friend who never enjoyed cooking made herself get out of her comfort zone, both timewise and recipe difficulty by using those tips. She kept slowly adding more cooking time or difficulty of recipe and within just a couple years she found she really loved to cook and bake.

Thanks for the welcome. 

You probably understand this already, but I will throw it out there anyway for avoidance of doubt!  You don't really 'stand at the stove for hours'.  You could do it in manageable chunks... do all the chopping, then take a break.  Then cook the onions down to a pulp... around 30 minutes, but obviously you dont have to stand there the whole time... just come in and give it a stir every 10 minutes or so.  Once you've put the lamb in with the onions and spices, it cooks for around 90 minutes (for a kilo of lamb), but its on low heat so you don't need to keep checking/stirring it all that often.   Do the spinach and the green chilli puree 15 minutes or so before you're going to serve it, which could be hours or even days later! 

Ah well. Lamb is out for us as we eat vegetarian most days and fish/seafood only occasionally. 

days later! 

It's always better a day or two later! 

Apparently its National Curry Week

Anyways, here's some brilliant recipes from the food network uk and most of them are vegetarian!

Brilliant! My mouth is watering now.

Monty's - Hanwell

I've been trying to figure out where this is.

Is it on the E3/E2 bus route past Northfield's station?  With a blue lit sign?

I had a hard time finding it too! It's 146-152 Boston Manor Road so you need E8. If you're coming from Boston Manor tube station it will be on your left hand side in a tiny little section of shops inside a hotel! God that sounds dodgy lol! It's not far from the Esso station if you know where that is.

We are seriously crazy about Shayona at the Neasden temple right now. The food is just sublime and the manager talked us into going inside the temple this time. Wow is it beautiful! It's really worth a look if you can get over there. The 112 goes from Ealing Broadway.