Curry Powder.—(No. 455.)
Put the following ingredients in a cool oven all night, and the next morning pound them in a marble mortar, and rub them through a fine sieve.
d. Coriander-seed, three ounces 3 Turmeric, three ounces 6 Black pepper, mustard, and ginger, one ounce of each 8 Allspice and less cardamoms, half an ounce of each 5 Cumin-seed, a quarter of an ounce 1
Thoroughly pound and mix together, and keep them in a well-stopped bottle.
[288]Those who are fond of curry sauces, may steep three ounces of the powder in a quart of vinegar or white wine for ten days, and will get a liquor impregnated with all the flavour of the powder.
Obs.—This receipt was an attempt to imitate some of the best Indian curry powder, selected for me by a friend at the India house: the flavour approximates to the Indian powder so exactly, the most profound palaticians have pronounced it a perfect copy of the original curry stuff.
The following remark was sent to the editor by an East Indian friend.
“The ingredients which you have selected to form the curry powder, are the same as are used in India, with this difference only, that some of them are in a raw green state, and are mashed together, and afterward dried, powdered, and sifted.” For Curry Sauce, see No. 348.
N.B. Chickens, rabbits, sweetbreads, breasts of veal, veal cutlets, mutton, lamb, or pork chops, lobster, turbot, soles, eels, oysters, &c. are dressed curry fashion, see No. 497; or stew them in No. 329 or No. 348, and flavour with No. 455.
Obs.—The common fault of curry powder is the too great proportion of Cayenne (to the milder aromatics from which its agreeable flavour is derived), preventing a sufficient quantity of the curry powder being used.