Product Description

Curry is Britain's favourite food and in this bible, Pat Chapman brings the much-loved dish to life in a unique an inspiring way - he has chosen to arrange the recipes in menu order, so very familiar at the curry restaurant but new to a cookery book. His method is borne out of a passion for Indian food and the restaurants that serve it - in his extensive research he has selected the finest dishes from over 1000 of the best curry houses in the land. First come 30 starters, then Tandoori and Tikka dishes. Next are the 16 most popular curries, followed by 16 further restaurant curries from Achari to Thai. The recipes continue, as at a restaurant, with "House Specials", vegetable curries, dhal dishes, rice and bread favourites, chutneys and pickles and finally Indian desserts. With step-by-step photograph sequences and an A to Z of spices, nutritional information, a menu glossary and enticing colour photographs of every dish, the author provides a wealth of information, tips and secrets to create the perfect curry at home.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #22880 in Books
• Published on: 2004-03-31
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 368 pages

Customer Reviews

Curry Aficiandos Need Look No Further For Great Food
This book is will be hated or adored because of its content structure. This is not the book to buy if you want to make and serve a curry within an hour of buying the book. The book, and any curries that are cooked from its recipies, benefit from an unhurried approach to making the first curry after purchase. A planning session is needed after a skim through the book to get an insight into how the curries are sometimes dependant on sauces and spice blends that are described elsewhere in the book.

I have 'a feel' for cook books and knew, tempered by previous ownership of one of Pat Chapmand's other Curry Club books, that this book would deliver high quality meals from its recipes. I have yet to be disappointed by the results. Yes, one does need an extensive collection of spices if one wants to cook every dish in the book but it's still possible to make many of the recipes using just a handful of different spices and/or herbs.

Some folk will resent having to flick backwards and forwards to gather the components of a meal together but this resentment can be overcome by deciding to set aside some time to plan the sequence of the cooking of the dishes.

I've been using Pat Chapmand recipes for nigh on 20 years and can recommend their ability to deliver high quality, full flavoured curries without reservation. Your future guests will thank you for the purchase of this book unless, of course, you pass off the dishes as being your own creations :-)

A secondary purpose of the book is education. Many of the dishes, herbs and spices have detailed descriptions of their histories and usa in curries. The histories of the use of the herbs and spices make fascinating reading. Buy the book, learn about, and cook great meals. You'll not be disappointed.

curry heaven
Having made curries for several years now i can honestly say this is the best book by a long way, i have 1 of Pat's other cook books that i thought was good but this is way better. Yes there is a lot of preparation to start with, but thats the same whichever book you look at and some spices may be hard to find but any good local asian grocer will stock them, ive used the book 3 times to do sheek kebab, chicken tikka, prawn pathia and a dhansak and all turned out lovely. I buy most of my spices whole and then roast and grind them myself - last longer and smell lovely, and yes it can be a pain having to roast and grind them but you get out of these recipies what you put in. In short if you want a quick meal have a stir fry, if you want a nice curry then be prepared to put a couple of hours aside and then enjoy the results of your labour.

Excellent!
I'm just amazed someone gave this book a paltry one star! I've had the book for a few weeks now and I'm delighted with the results. But i'll be honest with you, I've only made one curry from the book. I keep going back to it because it's so GOOD! (It's a madras by the way).

As another reviewer here describes, there is quite a lot of preparation involved. If you're looking for an meal prepared in in 30 minutes, don't go for this book, or indian food in general. Go and stir-fry something!

You must spend quite a bit of money on spices. You mix various combinations of these spices into a masala. From the masala you can make a number of masala gravys which act as "base" sauces for your curries. Then you just add various ingredients depending on your curry recipe. I normally make a huge batch of curry masala gravy and freeze it in 1lb. tubs. Very handy.

I did a lot of research on curry books before plumping for this one. I'm very happy with it and looking forward to creating more dishes.