BACKGROUND - PART ONE
Back in the 70's I lived in Montego Bay Jamaica, or "Mo-Bay Town' in the local parlance. I was the liaison for a car rental company establishing itself in the Caribbean. I covered Jamaica, Ocho-Rios which had a Playboy Club, Negril, famous for it's beaches, Kingston, the capitol, and Montego Bay proper for the cruise boat trade. Fun times.
My entire diet on Jamaica, since I was living in a hotel was culturally boring and I was on per diem, so I went native, and ate a lot cheaper than the hotel and tourist traps. I had two friends I made there, Donald, a native born Jamaican who was my assistant for the company and the other my friend Shackat Daly, owner of a dive boat company. He is Indian. It's a miracle I still have my lower tract after two years of eating with these two guys. Both hot Jamaican and hot Indian food. In part I use this as an intro to Indian cooking which uses several of my favorite condiments and spices.
PART ONE - CURRY
Curry is a generic description used throughout European culture to describe a general variety of side dishes, best known in Indian cuisine. The is also a curry tree. So curry has two meanings. As a style or presentation of food and an actual herb found in the leaves of the curry tree.
The word "Curry" has significance and popularity in Jamaica because of the Indian influence being a former British protectorate.
CURRY IS A STYLE OF FOOD
Like a "soup or stew", there is no particular ingredient that makes something "curry." The Indians do it with selections or side dishes, with blends of spices which is a "curried dish" and understood to mean "gravy" or "sauce" rather than "spices". For example the starter dish we use here may be expanded with small diced potatoes added or pineapple and carrots and it is still a "Curry". Type "Curry dishes in Google", and you get 2.5 million hits.
Curry's popularity in recent decades has spread outward from the Indian subcontinent to figure prominently in international cuisine. Consequently, each culture has adopted spices in its indigenous cooking to suit its own unique tastes and cultural sensibilities. Curry can therefore be called a pan-Asian or global phenomenon with immense popularity in Thai, British, and Japanese cuisines.
CURRY is a TREE and LEAVES
It is also a small tree, growing 4-6 meters tall, with a trunk up to 40cm diameter. The leaves are pinnate, with 11-21 leaflets, each leaflet 2-4 cm long and 1-2 cm broad. They are highly aromatic. The flowers are small, white, and fragrant. The small black shiny berries are edible, but their seeds are highly poisonous.
But the leaves of Murraya Koenigii are also used as a herb in Ayurvedic medicine. In Western medicine, Ayurveda is classified as a system of complementary and alternative medicine that is used to complement, rather than replace, the treatment regimen and relationship that exists between a patient and their existing physician.
Ayurveda is grounded in a metaphysics of the "five great elements" earth, water, fire, air and ether all of which compose the Universe, including the human body. Plasma, blood, flesh, fat, bone, marrow,and semen or female reproductive tissue are held to be the seven primary constituent elements.
The properties claimed include much value as an anti-diabetic, antioxidant, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, hepato-protective, anti-hypercholesterolemic etc. Curry leaves are also known to be good for hair, for keeping it healthy and long. I have been rubbing it on my bald spot to get my hair back but I'm losing too many friends, asking me where I ate lunch. Although most commonly used in curries, leaves from the curry tree can be used in many other dishes to add spice as a plain seasoning.
CURRY MAY CONTAIN
So with Shackat guiding the menu, we ate a lot of Curried dishes served over rice with goat, curry chicken, curry fish and on special occasion I think curried rice curry with spices like "spanish rice". Curry may be made with the following depending on where you live in the world.
Red curry with spices like clove, cinnamon, nutmeg, anise, bay leaf, coriander powder, cumin seeds/powder, black pepper powder, red hot chili peppers/powder, asafoetida, ghee, fenugreek seeds, curry leaves, turmeric, mustard seeds and mustard oil are added to many recipes, as are poppy seeds. Lahori Karahi incorporates garlic, spices and vinegar. Peshawari karahi is a simple dish made with just meat, salt, tomatoes and coriander. Each place we visited had their secret sauce just like Kentucky Fried Chicken brought down by generation.
Our recipe is a fairly common starter with slight variations as twenty people claimed it to be their own. After watching most good Indian cooks for a while, I never saw one measure anything, they cook by taste. These are starters and do come very close to some Thai dishes which in some ways has a similar palate.
SIMPLE CURRIED CHICKEN WITH RICE IN SKILLET
Ingredients
3 tablespoons olive oil *
1 small onion, chopped *
2 cloves garlic, minced *
3 tablespoons curry powder *
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon paprika *
1 bay leaf *
1/2 teaspoon grated fresh ginger root *
1/2 teaspoon white sugar *
salt to taste*
2 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves - cut into bite-size pieces
1 tablespoon tomato paste *
1 cup plain yogurt *
3/4 cup coconut milk *
1/2 lemon, juiced *
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper *
DIRECTIONS
Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium heat. Saute onion until lightly browned. Stir in garlic, curry powder, cinnamon, paprika, bay leaf, ginger, sugar and salt. Continue stirring for 2 minutes. Add chicken pieces, tomato paste, yogurt, and coconut milk. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer for 20 to 25 minutes. Remove bay leaf, and stir in lemon juice and cayenne pepper. Simmer 5 more minutes.
* After you look at these ingredients, you will notice that this basic curry recipe is totally complimentary to western food larders. Nothing strange about these common condiments, just the quantity of some of the spices. Food with little exception for the weird and really strange diets, is relatively common throughout the world, the spices available and local determine the flavorings of the dish.