Chicken Curry and Beyond - The CurryFocus Blog

Hi, Ray here again.

I love curries with peas so was more than pleased to see a recent recipe on the Curry Focus website for Keema Matta (Ground Lamb with Peas). And so it was an easy decision to test the recipe.

I already had most of the ingredients in the house so only needed to do a small shop for the lamb and fresh cilantro. And the shop cost me less than usual because the store where I buy my meat had ground lamb on special.

This is yet another easy Curry Focus recipe.

I measured and prepared the ingredients so I could add them to the frying pan when they were needed.

It only takes around 25 minutes to make the curry and so I didn’t start to cook the curry until the guests arrived, in case they were late for some reason. The guests arrived at the scheduled time and each grabbed a beer from the fridge while I started the cooking.

As usual, it was a simple curry to make and the only thing that I had to plan was the synchronizing of the cooking of the rice and two naan breads that I had earlier taken out of the freezer.

The curry was served to the diners and it was quickly eaten.

The diners really liked the Keema Mattar which had a lovely taste with a great cilantro flavour.

Overall, the curry received a score of 7 out of 10 with a medium spice/heat rating.

If you like a good lamb curry then you must try out this recipe.

2008 was a brilliant year for the Curry Focus website.

The website has been up and running for exactly 2 years and the traffic is growing on an almost monthly basis – we now get more than double the visitors each month as we did at the end of 2007.

We have a lot more recipes on the website for you to enjoy. The number of recipe pages have doubled in the year and there is sure to be something that you like that you can make yourself. We are working on changing some of the recipe pages to make it easier for you to find a suitable recipe for every occasion.

We try and review at least one recipe each week to let you know how easy (or difficult) it is to make, what it tastes like and how spicy-hot the dish is.

People look at the chicken recipes on the website more than all of the other recipe types put together. About the only time that chicken is edged out the top 5 recipes in each month is in December when turkey recipes are much sought after. There are lots and lots of great recipes that don’t use chicken, or turkey, so why not try one out soon?

The Xmas turkey is as popular as ever. How do we know this? Because hundreds of you visited the Curry Focus website in the week after Xmas and checked out the article on what to do with left over turkey. And some of you must have had enormous turkeys because the article was still being avidly looked at in the New Year!!!

We enjoy all of the emails and suggestions that you send to us. They give us ideas and keep us on our toes so do keep sending them.

One of the things to remember about the Curry Focus website is that it is free to use. You don’t have to register, or pay anything, to use the website. And we will keep it that way.

We enjoy making and eating curries. We think that’s pretty obvious when you look through the website and check out the recipe reviews and other blogs and articles.

But we don’t know everything. In fact, we know only a small part of the curry world. If you have a good recipe, why not tell us? If you have an interesting article on anything to do with curries then why not tell us? We will publish them on the website.

If you have any friends, or relatives, that enjoy curries then tell them about us. Spread the word.

We have had a fantastic two years and look forward to many more.

Thank you.

Latest Articles

Review of the Dhal with Spinach Recipe
Review of the Vegetable Korma Recipe
How To Remove Chilli Skins
Review of the Lamb Rogan Josh Recipe #2
Review of Jims Beef Curry Recipe

Top Recipes

1 Easy Chicken Curry
2 Chicken Curry
3 Leftover Turkey Curry
4 Chicken Curry (Kodi Kura)
5 Naan Bread

Why not tell us the recipes that you like? You can submit a new recipe here and a restaurant here.

Hi, Ray here again.

This week I chose Jim’s Beef Curry from the great range of curries on the Curry Focus website. Jim didn’t submit the recipe but he must be a talented person to have a curry named after him.

There was a special on diced beef at my local supermarket and so I didn’t even need to cut up the beef. All of the fat had also been cut away so all I had to do with the beef was take it out of the pack.

There are more than the average number of ingredients in the recipe but really was an easy recipe to follow.

I prepared and measured all of the ingredients before starting the cooking so all I have to do during the cooking is tip more ingredients into the mix.

I started the cooking the curry some 90 minutes before dinner was scheduled to be ready.

The spices, onion and garlic were soon cooked and then I added the diced beef so the pieces would seal.

Once the beef was ready (it only took about 5 minutes), I added the beef stock and salt and had the beef simmering for 60 minutes.

I partially cooked the potatoes whilst the beef was simmering and relaxed with a beer just as the dinner guests arrived – these guys can smell a curry cooking from miles away.

I added the partially cooked potatoes after the beef had simmered for the 60 minutes and, after a few minutes, got the rice cooking in the microwave.

Soon it was time to add the tomatoes and, before long, everything was ready.

I served Jim’s Beef Curry on the basmati rice and presented it to the hungry diners.

This is a great curry. The beef was really tender and had a great texture with no gristle or fat to chew on. The curry had a great flavor and everything was cooked to perfection.

The diners gave Jim’s Beef Curry an excellent rating of 8 out of 10 with a spice/heat rating of “medium to hot”.

This is the recipe for you if you like a spicy beef curry.

Hi, Ray here again.

A little while ago I, made a Rogan Josh from one of the Curry Focus recipes and was disappointed with the results, as you can see from the recipe review.

Rogan Josh is one of my favourite curries and I promised to try out another Rogan Josh recipe if one appeared in the Curry Focus website. Another Rogan Josh recipe did arrive on the website so I decided it was time to give it a try.

All I had to do was buy the lamb and the fresh cilantro because I already had all the other ingredients.

I marinated the lamb for most of the afternoon, probably about 5 hours in all, before starting the main cooking.

The recipe looks tricky to follow but it really is very easy to make.

The one thing I had to be careful of was keeping the simmer temperature low during the hour long covered cooking so that I didn’t burn the food.

The curry did not need all of the water that was asked for in the recipe. The curry had a lot of liquid and so I did not add the last lot of water. I’ve changed the recipe so that the last addition of water is optional.

I suppose the amount of liquid in a curry depends upon the heat that is being used under the pan. Since cooking is not an exact science, you need to be a bit flexible. I always cook with some boiling water nearby so that I can add some if the curry gets too dry.

I served the Rogan Josh with basmati rice and with the sprinkling of garam masala. I actually served the meal without the garam masala and had to raun into the kitchen to get the garam masala and then sprinkle it over the food when it was already on the table. I’m sure this sort of thing doesn’t happen in a real restaurant.

But the diners didn’t mind the unprofessional serving method. All four of us loved the Rogan Josh. The lamb was very tender and the taste was just yummy. This time there were no complaints from me about the quality of the dish.

The Rogan Josh received a score of 7.5 out of 10 with a spice/heat rating of medium.

Give this recipe a try if you like a good Rogan Josh and you won’t be disappointed.

Sometimes recipes tell you to remove the skin from chillies but usually they don’t tell you how to remove them. The following simple steps show you how easy it is to do this.

Clean the chillies and dry them.

Heat a frying pan over a medium heat. You can heat the chillies in lots of different ways including grilling or roasting in the oven, but using a frying pan is as easy as any other way.

Put the chillies into the frying pan.

Turn the chillies every minute as they blacken.

The chillies should be ready after about 7 minutes when the outside skin should be more than half blackened

Remove the chillies from the frying pan with tongs and place them into a plastic bag.

Close the plastic bag.

Leave the chillies in the plastic bag for 15 minutes whilst they steam and continue to cook in the steam.

Take the chillies from the plastic bag and remove the skins using your fingernails – they should come off easily – remove any stubborn skin with a sharp knife.

Use the chillies straightaway or freeze for later use.