CURRIES
"Thou com'st in such a questionable shape
That I will speak to thee."
Different modes of manufacture--The "native" fraud--"That
man's family"--The French _kari_--A Parsee curry--"The oyster
in the sauce"--Ingredients--Malay curry--Locusts--When to
serve--What to curry--Prawn curry--Dry curry, a champion
recipe--Rice--The Bombay duck.
The poor Indian grinds his coriander seeds, green ginger, and other
ingredients between two large flat stones; taking a whiff at the
family "hubble-bubble" pipe at intervals. The frugal British housewife
purchases (alleged) curry powder in the warehouse of Italy--where it
may have lived on, like Claudian, "through the centuries"--stirs a
spoonful or two into the hashed mutton, surrounds it with a wall of
clammy rice, and calls it BENARES CURRY, made from the recipe of a
very dear uncle who met his death while tiger-shooting. And you will
be in the minority if you do not cut this savoury meat with a knife,
and eat potatoes, and very often cabbage, with it. The far-seeing
eating-house keeper corrals a _Lascar_ or a discharged _Mehtar_ into
the firm, gives him his board, a pound a month, and a clean _puggaree_
and _Kummerbund_ daily, and "stars" him in the bill as an "Indian
_chef_, fresh from the Chowringhee Club, Calcutta." And it is part of
the duties of this Oriental--supposed by the unwary to be at least a
prince in his native land--to hand the portions of curry, which he
may or may not have concocted, to the appreciative guests, who enjoy
the repast all the more from having the scent of the Hooghly brought
across the footlights. I was once sadly and solemnly reproved by the
head waiter of a very "swagger" establishment indeed for sending away,
after one little taste, the (alleged) curry which had been handed me
by an exile from Ind, in snow-white raiment.
"You really ought to have eaten that, sir," said the waiter, "for that
man's family have been celebrated curry-makers for generations."
I smole a broad smile. In the Land of the Moguls the very babies who
roll in the dust know the secret of curry-making. But that "that man"
had had any hand in the horrible concoction placed before me I still
resolutely decline to believe. And how can a man be cook and waiter at
the same time? The "native curry-maker," depend on it, is more or less
of a fraud; and his aid is only invoked as an excuse for overcharging.
At the Oriental Club are served, or used to be served, really
excellent curries, assorted; for as there be more ways than one of
killing a cat, so are there more curries than one. The French turn
out a horrible mixture, with parsley and mushrooms in it, which they
call _kari_; it is called by a still worse name on the Boulevards, and
the children of our lively neighbours are frequently threatened with
it by their nurses.
On the whole, the East Indian method is the best; and the most
philanthropic curry I ever tasted was one which my own _Khitmughar_
had just prepared, with infinite pains, for his own consumption. The
poor heathen had prospected a feast, as it was one of his numerous
"big days"; so, despising the homely _dhal_, on the which, with a
plate of rice and a modicum of rancid butter, he was wont to sustain
existence, he had manufactured a savoury mess of pottage, the looks
of which gratified me. So, at the risk of starting another Mutiny, it
was ordained that the slave should serve the refection at the table of
the "protector of the poor." And a _pukkha_ curry it was, too. Another
dish of native manufacture with which the writer became acquainted was
a
_Parsee Curry_.
The eminent firm of Jehangeer on one occasion presented a petition to
the commanding-officer that they might be allowed to supply a special
curry to the mess one guest-night. The request was probably made as an
inducement to some of the young officers to pay a little on account
of their "owings" to the firm; but it is to be feared that no special
vote of thanks followed the sampling of that special curry. It was
a curry! I tasted it for a week (as the Frenchman did the soup of
Swindon); and the Parsee _chef_ must have upset the entire contents
of the spice-box into it. I never felt more like murder than when the
hotel cook in Manchester put nutmeg in the oyster sauce; but after
that curry, the strangling of the entire firm of Jehangeer would, in
our cantonments, at all events, have been brought in "justifiable
homicide."
"Oyster sauce" recalls a quaint _simile_ I once heard a bookmaker make
use of. He was talking of one of his aristocratic debtors, whom he
described as sure to pay up, if you could only get hold of him. "But
mark you," continued the layer of odds, "he's just about as easy to
get hold of as _the oyster in the sauce_, at one of our moonicipal
banquets!" But return we to our coriander seeds. There is absolutely
no reason why the frugal housewife in this country should not make her
own curry powder from day to day, as it may be required. Here is an
average Indian recipe; but it must be remembered that in the gorgeous
East tastes vary as much as elsewhere, and that Bengal, Bombay, Madras
(including Burmah), Ceylon, and the Straits Settlements, have all
different methods of preparing a curry.
A few coriander and cumin seeds--according to taste--eight
peppercorns, a small piece of turmeric, and one dried chili,
all pounded together.
When making the curry _mixture_, take a piece of the heart
of a cabbage, the size of a hen's egg; chop it fine and add
one sour apple in thin slices the size of a Keswick codlin,
the juice of a medium-sized lemon, a salt-spoonful of black
pepper, and a tablespoonful of the above curry powder. Mix
all well together; then take six medium-sized onions which
have been chopped small and fried a delicate brown, a clove of
garlic, also chopped small, two ounces of fresh butter, two
ounces of flour, and one pint of beef gravy. Boil up this lot
(which commences with the onions), and _when boiling_ stir in
the rest of the mixture. Let it all simmer down, and then add
the solid part of the curry, _i.e._ the meat, cut in portions
not larger than two inches square.
Remember, O frugal housewife, that the turmeric portion of the
entertainment should be added with a niggard hand. "Too much turmeric"
is the fault which is found with most curries made in England. I
remember, when a boy, that there was an idea rooted in my mind that
curries were made with Doctor Gregory's Powder, an unsavoury drug with
which we were periodically regaled by the head nurse; and there was
always a fierce conflict at the dinner-table when the bill-of-fare
included this (as we supposed) physic-al terror. But it was simply the
taste of turmeric to which we took exception.
What is TURMERIC? A plant in cultivation all over India, whose tubers
yield a deep yellow powder of a resinous nature. This resinous powder
is sold in lumps, and is largely used for adulterating mustard; just
as inferior anchovy sauce is principally composed of Armenian Bole,
the deep red powder with which the actor makes up his countenance.
Turmeric is also used medicinally in Hindustan, but not this side of
Suez, although in chemistry it affords an infallible test for the
presence of alkalies. The CORIANDER has become naturalised in parts of
England, but is more used on the Continent. Our confectioners put the
seeds in cakes and buns, also comfits, and in Germany, Norway, Sweden,
and (I fancy) Russia, they figure in household bread. In the south of
England, coriander and caraway seeds are sown side by side, and crops
of each are obtained in alternate years. The coriander seed, too, is
largely used with that of the caraway and the cumin, for making the
liqueur known as KÜMMEL.
CUMIN is mentioned in Scripture as something particularly nice. The
seeds are sweet-savoured, something like those of the caraway, but
more potent. In Germany they put them into bread, and the Dutch use
them to flavour their cheeses. The seeds we get in England come
principally from Sicily and Malta.
And now that my readers know all about the ingredients of
curry-powder--it is assumed that no analysis of the chili, the
ginger-root, or the peppercorn, is needed--let them emulate the pupils
of Mr. Wackford Squeers, and "go and do it."
ANOTHER RECIPE for curry-powder includes fenugreek, cardamoms,
allspice, and cloves; but I verily believe that this was the powder
used in that abominable Parsee hell-broth, above alluded to, so it
should be cautiously approached, if at all. "Fenugreek" sounds evil;
and I should say a curry compounded of the above ingredients would
taste like a "Number One" pick-me-up. Yet another recipe (DOCTOR
KITCHENER'S) specifies six ounces of coriander seed, five ounces of
turmeric (_ower muckle, I'm of opeenion_) two ounces each of black
pepper and mustard seed (_ochone!_), half an ounce of cumin seed,
half an ounce of cinnamon (_donner und blitzen!_), and one ounce of
lesser cardamoms. All these things are to be placed in a cool oven,
kept therein one night, and pounded in a marble mortar next morning,
preparatory to being rubbed through a sieve. "Kitchener" sounds like
a good cooking name; but, with all due respect, I am not going to
recommend his curry-powder.
A MALAY CURRY is made with blanched almonds, which should be fried in
butter till lightly browned. Then pound them to a paste with a sliced
onion and some thin lemon-rind. Curry powder and gravy are added,
and a small quantity of cream. The Malays curry all sorts of fish,
flesh, and fowl, including the young shoots of the bamboo--and nice
tender, succulent morsels they are. At a hotel overlooking the harbour
of Point de Galle, Ceylon, "run," at the time of the writer's visit,
by a most convivial and enterprising Yankee, a canning concocter
of all sorts of "slings" and "cocktails," there used to be quite
a plethora of curries in the bill-of-fare. But for a prawn curry
there is no place like the City of Palaces. And the reason for this
super-excellence is that the prawns--but that story had, perhaps, best
remain untold.
CURRIED LOCUSTS formed one of the most eccentric dishes ever
tasted by the writer. There had come upon us that day a plague of
these all-devouring insects. A few billions called on us, in our
kitchen gardens, in passing; and whilst they ate up every green
thing--including the newly-painted wheelbarrow, and the regimental
standard, which had been incautiously left out of doors--our faithful
blacks managed to capture several _impis_ of the marauding scuts,
in revenge; and the mess-cook made a right savoury _plât_ of their
hind-quarters.
It is criminal to serve curry during the _entrée_ period of dinner.
And it is worse form still to hand it round after gooseberry tart and
cream, and trifle, as I have seen done at one great house. In the land
of its birth, the spicy pottage invariably precedes the sweets. Nubbee
Bux marches solemnly round with the mixture, in a deep dish, and is
succeeded by Ram Lal with the rice. And in the Madras Presidency,
where _dry_ curry is served as well as the other brand, there is a
procession of three brown attendants. Highly-seasoned dishes at the
commencement of a long meal are a mistake; and this is one of the
reasons why I prefer the middle cut of a plain-boiled Tay salmon, or
the tit-bit of a lordly turbot, or a flake or two of a Grimsby cod, to
a _sole Normande_, or a red mullet stewed with garlic, mushrooms, and
inferior claret. I have even met _homard à l'Américaine_, during the
fish course, at the special request of a well-known Duke. The soup,
too, eaten at a large dinner should be as plain as possible; the edge
being fairly taken off the appetite by such concoctions as _bisque_,
_bouillabaisse_, and _mulligatawny_--all savoury and tasty dishes,
but each a meal in itself. Then I maintain that to curry whitebait is
wrong; partly because curry should on no account be served before
roast and boiled, and partly because the flavour of the whitebait
is too delicate for the fish to be clad in spices and onions.
The lesson which all dinner-givers ought to have learnt from the
Ancient Romans--the first people on record who went in for æsthetic
cookery--is that highly-seasoned and well-peppered dishes should
figure at the end, and not the commencement of a banquet. Here follows
a list of some of the productions of Nature which it is allowable to
curry.
_What to Curry._
TURBOT. SOLE. COD.
LOBSTER. CRAYFISH. PRAWNS,--but _not_ the so-called
"DUBLIN PRAWN," which is delicious when eaten plain boiled, but
no good in a curry.
WHELKS.[6] OYSTERS. SCALLOPS.
MUTTON. VEAL. PORK. CALF'S HEAD. OX PALATE. TRIPE.[6]
EGGS. CHICKEN. RABBIT (the "bunny" lends itself better
than anything else to this method of cooking). PEASE. KIDNEY
BEANS.[6] VEGETABLE MARROW. CARROTS. PARSNIPS. BAMBOO SHOOTS.
LOCUST LEGS.
A mistaken notion has prevailed for some time amongst men and women
who write books, that the Indian curry mixture is almost red-hot to
the taste. As a matter of fact it is of a far milder nature than
many I have tasted "on this side." Also the Anglo-Indian does not
sustain life entirely on food flavoured with turmeric and garlic.
In fact, during a stay of seven years in the gorgeous East, the
writer's experience was that not one in ten touched curry at the
dinner table. At second breakfast--otherwise known as "tiffin"--it was
a favoured dish; but the stuff prepared for the meal of the day--or
the bulk thereof--usually went to gratify the voracious appetite of
the "_mehters_," the Hindus who swept out the mess-rooms, and whose
lowness of "caste" allowed them to eat "anything." An eccentric meal
was the _mehter's_ dinner. Into the empty preserved-meat tin which
he brought round to the back door I have seen emptied such assorted
_pabulum_ as mock turtle soup, lobster salad, plum pudding and
custard, curry, and (of course), the surplus _vilolif_; and in a few
seconds he was squatting on his heels, and spading into the mixture
with both hands.
In the Bengal Presidency cocoa-nut is freely used with a curry
dressing; and as some men have as great a horror of this addition, as
of oil in a salad, it is as well to consult the tastes of your guests
beforehand.
A PRAWN CURRY I have seen made in Calcutta as follows, the proportions
of spices, etc., being specially written down by a _munshi_:--
Pound and mix one tablespoonful of coriander seed, one
tablespoonful of poppy seed, a salt-spoonful of turmeric, half
a salt-spoonful of cumin seed, a pinch of ground cinnamon,
a ditto of ground nutmeg, a small lump of ginger, and one
salt-spoonful of salt. Mix this with butter, add two sliced
onions, and fry till lightly browned. Add the prawns, shelled,
and pour in the milk of a cocoa-nut. Simmer for twenty minutes,
and add some lime juice.
But the champion of curries ever sampled by the writer was a dry
curry--a decided improvement on those usually served in the Madras
Presidency--and the recipe (which has been already published in the
_Sporting Times_ and _Lady's Pictorial_), only came into the writer's
possession some years after he had quitted the land of temples.
_Dry Curry._
1 lb. of meat (mutton, fowl, or white fish).
1 lb. of onions.
1 clove of garlic.
2 ounces of butter.
1 dessert-spoonful of curry powder.
1 dessert-spoonful of curry paste.
1 dessert-spoonful of chutnee (or tamarind preserve,
according to taste).
A very little cassareep, which is a condiment (only
obtainable at a few London shops) made from the juice of the
bitter cassava, or manioc root. Cassareep is the basis of that
favourite West Indian dish "Pepper-pot."
Salt to taste.
A good squeeze of lemon juice.
First brown the onions in the butter, and then dry them.
Add the garlic, which must be mashed to a pulp with the blade
of a knife. Then mix the powder, paste, chutnee, and cassareep
into a thin paste with the lemon juice. Mash the dried onions
into this, and let all cook gently till thoroughly mixed. Then
add the meat, cut into small cubes, and let all simmer very
gently for three hours. This sounds a long time, but it must
be remembered that the recipe is for a _dry_ curry; and when
served there should be no liquid about it.
'Tis a troublesome dish to prepare; but, judging from the flattering
communications received by the writer, the lieges would seem to
like it. And the mixture had better be cooked in a _double_ or
porridge-saucepan, to prevent any "catching."
Already, in one of the breakfast chapters, has the subject of the
preparation of rice, to be served with curry, been touched upon; but
there will be no harm done in giving the directions again.
_Rice for Curry_
Soak a sufficiency of rice in cold water until by repeated
strainings all the dirt is separated from it. Then put the
rice into _boiling_ water, and let it "gallop" for nine or ten
minutes--_no longer_. Strain the water off through a colander,
and dash a little _cold_ water over the rice to separate the
grains. Put in a hot dish, and serve immediately.
A simple enough recipe, surely? So let us hear no more complaints of
stodgy, clammy, "puddingy" rice. Most of the cookery books give far
more elaborate directions, but the above is the method usually pursued
by the poor brown heathen himself.
Soyer's recipe resembles the above; but, after draining the water from
the cooked rice, it is replaced in the saucepan, the interior of which
has in the interim been anointed with butter. The saucepan is then
placed either near the fire (not on it), or in a slow oven, for the
rice to swell.
Another way:
After washing the rice, throw it into plenty of boiling
water--in the proportion of six pints of water to one pound
of rice. Boil it for five minutes, and skim it; then add
a wine-glassful of milk for every half pound of rice, and
continue boiling for five minutes longer. Strain the water off
through a colander, and put it dry into the pot, on the corner
of the stove, pouring over the rice a small piece of butter,
which has been melted in a tablespoonful of the hot milk and
water in which the rice was boiled. Add salt, and stir the rice
for five minutes more.
The decayed denizen of the ocean, dried to the consistency of biscuit,
and known in Hindustan as a BOMBAY DUCK, which is frequently eaten
with curry, "over yonder," does not find much favour, this side of
Port Said, although I have met the fowl in certain city restaurants.
The addition is not looked upon with any particular favour by the
writer.
"I have yet to learn" once observed that great and good man, the late
Doctor Joseph Pope,[7] to the writer, in a discussion on "postponed"
game, "that it is a good thing to put corruption into the human
stomach."