About curry powder

Swampy hasn't bought premixed curry powder in a long time. You get better quality if you mix it yourself, and by varying the quantities and (if ambitious) roasting the ingredients, you can easily make a "house flavor" that can't be duplicated.

Basic curry powder is a mix of (proportion):

cinnamon (1/2)
turmeric (1)
cumin (1)
fenugreek (methi) (1/4)
coriander (1)

Sometimes, it also contains:

black pepper
dried ground chilis

Most of the time, these spices are bought in powdered form and so you don't need to grind them. However, for black pepper and chilis, and sometimes for the coriander, cumin, and fenugreek, Swampy will grind them in his spice grinder -- which is nothing but a one cup coffee grinder he keeps within reach.

A very nice variation is to roast the spices. For cumin and coriander seed, you can roast them dry in a skillet and then grind and sift them. Ditto with chilis, if you are using them.

Most commercial curry powder contains too much tumeric. Madras curry contains dried chilis, less tumeric, sometimes a little fennel.

Every family has their own recipes for these mixes, so you'll find something different in every cookbook and brand.

All these spices are easy to find except fenugreek. This is a dried green leaf that smells like maple syrup, you can buy it in an indian grocery store.

[1nana]

Swampy, I found this to be interesting and very helpful.

Although, I couldn't help but think while reading this, why Swampy never posted his recipe for coconut custard pie?

[sk123]

I've always wanted to make my own curry powder. Thank you for this recipe.

I've never heard of fenugreek before. Where do you normally buy this?

[1nana]

You can also find fenugreek at health food stores. I know they have the capsule form, but not sure about the powder.

[swampcritter]

You'll be able to find fenugreek at any Indian grocery store...ask for Methi...it is  a dried leaf.

Some regions of India use a lot of it in their cooking. It goes really well with sweet vegetables -- saute carrots in a little oil, add dried fenufreek, cover until the carrots are soft and the flavor will blow you away.

[gracefromHHP]

You can buy dried fenugreek thru penzey's spices too.  I LOVE penzey's!!!

I live in the middle of nowhere myself and can never find things like that locally. The closest we get to something ethnic is the canned refried beans on the grocery store shelf ;)   As it is I drive 2 hours to philly a few times a year for some of my speciality things ( yeah I could mail order but then I couldn't eat at the cheesecake factory or hit my favorite stores in the mall....he he he )  Last trip we hit an asian grocery that we had a blast at - only because the english name of everything was in so small print we could barely read it so guessing what everything was kept us occupied. yep - I'm very easily entertained...he he he  but hey we got the honey ginger tea granules that we went there for :)

grace

[peekawho]

Well.  No wonder my Moroccan Chicken tastes like curry.  It seems to have most of the ingredients in it!