I have done a post before on British Indian Restaurant Curry but thought with the amount of people wanting a recipe for a base sauce I’d do a separate recipe.
Make It Your Own Curry Base Sauce!
Remember, you can add what you like, leave out what you don’t have or add more or less of an ingredient to suit your own taste. I see people ask “What’s the best base sauce” well my answer to that is, your own!
So see this as a guide or a starting point and then make it your own.
Don’t Believe The Hype
B.I.R curry has a lot of followers. Some of these people will tell you that so and so’s curry base is the best. Some will tell you that certain ingredients shouldn’t go in a base sauce. If you add something to a recipe and the result is not very nice, then, yes, you probably shouldn’t of added that. On the other hand you might think “that recipe needs this” and you may just happen to create the perfect base sauce.
My advice is start off simple and start building the flavour layers from there.
I’ll let you in to a secret. No two base sauces I make are the same. I don’t follow a recipe and it all depends on what I have in the fridge.
Don’t let all the long winded methods some chef writers use put you off making a base sauce. It can be as simple or as complex as you want. And if all else fails reach for that tin of carrot and coriander soup, water it down and use that. Or alternatively purchase one of my Curry bouillon pouches!
Buy ‘Ome Made Masalas!
You can buy ‘Ome Made Curry Masalas at the ‘Ome Made Online Shop.
Social Media
There are a ton of curry related groups on Facebook. Why not join UK Curry Group for some inspiration. And of course, there is the ‘Ome Made Facebook page where I post curry dishes that I’ve made.
Curry Base Sauce
Ingredients
- 3 Tbsp oil or ghee not olive oil
- 4 Medium sized Onions sliced
- 1 Tsp salt
- 8 Fat Cloves garlic chopped
- 1 inch cubed piece ginger chopped
- 1 green pepper diced
- 1 medium sized carrot peeled and chopped
- 2 heaped teaspoons mild curry masala/powder
- 1 Tbsp tomato puree
- 2 litre hot water
- 1 teaspoon sugar, jaggery or palm sugar
- 1 Tbsp Coriander stalks Cut the stalks off fresh coriander leaving leaves to finish your curry off with.
Instructions
- Gently heat the oil in a large pan.
- Add the onions and salt. Fry on a gentle heat for 10 minutes.
- Add the garlic and ginger to the pan and fry for another 5 minutes.
- Add the chopped pepper and carrots and give a quick stir.
- Add the curry masala/powder and fry gently while stirring for 2 minutes. If the spices are sticking add a splash of water to loosen them.
- Add the tomato puree and stir in for another 30 seconds
- Add the water and give a good stir to make sure it's not sticking at the bottom of the pan. Bring up to the boil.
- Once the sauce has come to the boil turn the heat down so it is just simmering. Add the sugar and the coriander stalks.
- Continue to cook for around 45 minutes.
- After 45 minutes check that the carrots are soft. Once they are, the sauce can be blended using an immersion blender or stick blender. You could use a food processor or jug blender but you would have to do it in batches and let it cool first.
- Once the sauce is blended you can continue to cook it for another 30 minutes to 1 hour. If you are going to be freezing some of the sauce you may want to continue cooking so the sauce is reduced and thicker. It will take up less space in the freezer and you can just thin it down when you want to use it.