Friday, August 15, 2008

Put him in the curry

With the Dr away in the Darkest North at the moment – apparently teasing her Dad about his becoming a Writer – I made tea for a few chums last night.

I learnt my famous curry recipe while in Spain in 1996 visiting my senior brother. I assumed he was working to some carefully ordained plan, but apparently he'd just made it up there and then. I took careful note and when I got to home to Preston (where I was a student) tried to recreate it.

However, there's a translation error in the raw equipment. Preston's fine supermarkets didn't seem to do certain basic Spanish fare such as tins of tomato frito – now so beloved of Delia. So I improvised. And as a result found a magic ingredient.

No, it's not cough syrup ( a clever reference to the Simpsons).

Last night's pore-opening extravaganza also needed to be without meat or mushrooms if it were going to please my guests. So it consisted of: an onion; a small potato; an aubergine (cut up, salted, washed); two courgettes; red pepper; green pepper; broccoli; one tin of kidney beans; one tin of plum tomatoes; garlic; a dash of chilli; garam masala...

And a large tin of Heinz Cream of Tomato Soup. Yes, that's what gives the thing its sumptuous, plush delight. Bwah ha ha, etc.

I was also much complimented on my fluffy rice. The trick is to let it have loads of time, and lots and lots of water. In fact, I have a full kettle on standby to keep topping it up.

M. also brought pudding so we didn't even touch the ice cream. I am now off to hit the machines to work off some of this feasting.

8 comments:

Rob Stradling said...

All kinds of magic works for curry. Soup is a good one. Marmite is another.

As to rice, I've never got fluffy right - but I stick to the Nigel Slater method, which produces boring but reliable results.

Strangely though, curry is about the one thing I won't put broccoli in. I think there's something fundamentally antagonistic about broccoli and tomato; nice chaps alone, but when they meet in my mouth there's always discord.

0tralala said...

The Dr will no doubt comment on some of my odder combinations. But beans on toast with cheese and garlic and maybe mushrooms too is made of AWESOME.

Also, see me and my street lingo, hipcat.

Le Mc said...

You can also put tomato soup in cakes, you know. I've got a good recipe if you want.

0tralala said...

Cake and soup! Yes, tell us!

Le Mc said...

I don't have my Cake Mix Doctor book with me, but I've found the recipe online. Made with great success at the Scribendi Magazine opening in 2003 (6 varieties of pirate cake). Look at my blog; I'll post it there.

Anonymous said...

How lucky your guests were, Otralala. I hope they showed their gratitude? Mmm...

I've got Vincent Price's cookery book, "A Treasury of Great Recipes" and I really should dig it out and do something with it. Dating back to the 1960s I think, it's a veritable breeze-block of a compendium, comparable in size with Dr Who - The Early Years. Within its pages are many monochrome stills which have been hand-tinted, and so are reminiscent of early colour picture postcards. The chapter on British recipes - oh yes, folks, it's representative of all the continents! - is headed up with an image of the dining room at The Ivy and the first recipe, if I remember correctly, is for Lancashire Hotpot. Perhaps I may tempt you with this in due course, General?

0tralala said...

Mmm. Hotpot.

Le Mc said...

Simon H: What's hot pot?