The brown butter provides toastiness, the curry the perfect amount of color & spice, the cherries a kiss of sweetness and pecans the nutty crunch. This savory sweet rice helps your palate experience just the right notes of a wonderful culinary melody; a superb accompaniment to most any main dish, but add diced cooked chicken and you have the perfect culinary song.
Curries…
Did you know that curry powder is actually a pulverized blend of up to 20 spices, herbs and seeds and comes in almost infinite varieties? Each curry powder can have different component spices, in differing amounts–making each curry blend unique.
The distinctive flavor and aroma is achieved by a blend and combination of spices including curry leaves, tamarind, coriander, ginger, garlic, chili, pepper, poppy seeds, mustard seeds, cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, cumin, fennel or anise seeds, fenugreek seeds, nutmeg, coconut, turmeric root or powder, saffron. Premium quality curry powder come in both sweet (mild) and hot varieties. The sweet version is a rich flavor with no heat, suitable for any recipe that calls for curry powder. Hot curry has a nice little kick in the taste buds without being overwhelming.
“Garam Masala” in India is one of the most common styles of curry powder; Garam Masala is not based on turmeric powder but contains main ingredients such as cardamom, coriander, and black pepper along with other spices–generally making the color more brown as opposed to yellow gold.
Most Common Type of Curry Powder in India are Madras Curry & Curry Hot
Curry Madrass (Indian Curry): To the left in the photo
Indian curry powder, also called Madras curry powder, is a blend of several different spices including curry leaves, cumin, cloves, turmeric, coriander, cinnamon, chili pepper, bay leaves, allspice, black pepper and the herb fenugreek. It is traditionally used to enhance the flavor of sauces and foods. Depending on the strength of flavor or spiciness, 1 to 2 tbsp. of curry powder is used for each batch of sauce or food dish.
Curry Hot: In the middle in the photo
Hot Curry Powder gives you the same full flavor as our sweet curry plus the added element of heat, derived from extra cayenne red pepper and spicy ginger.
Traditional Uses of Curry Powder: To the right in the photo
Curry powder is used to flavor soups and stews, and is great for adding a kick to all kinds of sauces and marinades, as well as burgers and tuna, pasta, potato salads and other food recipes.
Brown Butter Curry Rice with Cherries & Toasted Pecans
Ingredients:
1 cup jasmine or basmati rice, dry
2 1/4 cups chicken broth
3 Tbsp butter
2 tsp curry powder…your choice, but I used madrass
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp fresh ground pepper
1/4 cup dried cherries
1/4 cup toasted pecans
Directions:
In a medium saucepan, melt butter over medium heat. Add dry rice, toast until golden. Add curry powder and toast for 2 more minutes. Add broth, salt, pepper and cherries, bring to a boil, turn down heat and simmer, covered, for 20 minutes or until rice is tender. Carefully stir in pecans and adjust salt, to taste. Serve. Makes 4 servings.
Once Upon a Spice 
One thing I learned very quickly in France is that the French (with the exception of chic Parisiens do not understand curry at all and their curry powders are deeply disgusting! Here it is a huge relief to be able to find good indian ingredients as I can in England (where curry is effectively the national food of choice). As ever I loved your factoids and found it very interesting to actually analyse what goes into each blend. Note to self- make sure to take some decent curry powder back to France on ultimate return 🙂
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This must be the reason we don’t hear of French curries then, Osyth! Recently, while researching British fare, I found that the national dish was chicken tikka masala! My vote would have been on fish & chips, but what do I know?? lol! Thanks, hon 🙂
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It should be fish and chips but somewhere along the line the curry took over. Now it can be hard to find a decent chippie or a good English Breakfast – which is why I urge all nations to protect their own culture as well as embracing others 🙂
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They’re best served in newspaper? I heard this, but thought it was out of sheer necessity…the oily black ink & all 🙂 Ahh, the English breakfast; beans, bacon, sausage, eggs, toast–Am I missing something? Tomatoes? Thanks again, hon ♥
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The ink doesn’t run at all as I recall … these days chippies either sell them in plain paper or specially printed fake newspaper (the more upmarket ones that is!) Really – they are just amazing straight from the paper! English breakfast … yup you have it covered. Tomatoes usually and often mushrooms as well … all fried of course though I tend to grill (broil) the bacon and sausage so I can pretend I’m being healthy!
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I love this. I thoroughly enjoy a good curry. We are fortunate to have an Indian food store in one of our local malls who actually has all the spices and blends out and one can mix their own, or you can ask them to mix for you. We like it hot, so I always get them to do a hot one for us. 🙂
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Oh Lynne! That’s wonderful! I miss all of the amazing ethnic stores like this…out here in the dessert there’s slim pickings! Thanks, hon!
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Lovely Lana! Looks like a feast for a holiday!
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Thanks, Sadie! That little Cornish game hen is doing its job then! lol!
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Looks great! Thanks for all the interesting info about curry!
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Thanks, Cynthia! Curry has many faces!
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this is so wonderful Lana! I love curry!
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Thanks, Lynn! Me too! I made beef curry with coconut milk last night & it was SO satisfying! ♥
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yummm
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