Indian Restaurant Curry at Home Volume 1: Misty Ricardo's Curry Kitchen

I love Indian food & for years have been using curry recipes found on the internet. Some have been ok, but nothing like the real thing. Then I noticed this book on Amazon & thought, "why not?" It's unlike any other recipe book I've had; head & shoulders above the rest in fact. For a start it's interesting, informative & a proper good read. There's even a bit of humour thrown in. The recipes are all well known dishes, colourfully illustrated & clearly explained with lots of useful tips. After a couple of days preparing the "mix powder", "base gravy" & "pre cooked lamb" I got the cooker going tonight & cooked a Lamb Bhuna with Pilau Rice. It was beautiful. All the taste & amazing flavours you would expect in a decent Indian restaurant, which is exactly what the author claims.

This book is absolutely great. We will never get a curry as nice as we make at home now. It’s beginning to become a bit of an addiction! Firstly, the books are clear, easy to understand and so well organised. It makes cooking a pleasure. Everything has been thought of and explained well for new BIR cooks like me. The first couple of meals I made, there was a slightly bitter taste which I couldn’t work out. I then realised I wasn’t cooking my spices out enough. (Usually the curries are cooked in a similar order... oil, infusion, onions, ginger and garlic paste, then spices). It says in the book, cook them for 30 seconds but I usually cook for slightly longer with a small amount of base gravy to prevent burning. It can seem daunting having to make mix powder and base gravy etc, but once everything is made, the curries come quick and easy. I would recommend freezing base gravy in tubs and watering down just before use. Batch making ginger and garlic paste and freezing in ice cube trays. We also freeze coconut milk to save wasting it. A little electronic coffee grinder has worked very well for us for making the spice mixes. We have an induction hob so bought a 28cm stainless steel pan for cooking. We also have volume two which has a handy up scaling chart. Before we knew about that, we once tried doubling everything up to cook for two and failed due to being too spicy. I also have the Curry Guy book but rate Misty Ricardo books over that. Mainly due to how well explained and laid out everything is in these books. Enjoy.

My parents and many in their generation hate what they perceive to be curry and when asked why, it's because they do not like 'perfumed' or 'spicy' food. What this really means is that when they were younger when they had 'curry' it was essentially excessive cumin, chilli and rubbish food. I did not try my first curry until I was in my twenties as a consequence. It is an experience I remember. It was instant love. The author reaches the same conclusion- curry (or more accurately, British Indian Restaurant curry) is an incredible thing. On the downside I found many of the recipes to be a bit 'samey'. On the plus side, the food is delicious with common underpinning techniques. The YouTube videos help immensely. It's all about the sauce! And the spices. And the cooking temperature. And.....well you'll just have to read and watch it!

The book is a soft cover and I must admit I prefer hard cover .for long life. Although the construction of the book looks decent in comparison to some soft cover books. My main reason for buying this book was to find a really good Indian chicken curry recipe. My main criticism of the book is it reminds me of a politician sitting on the fence because it does not give a specific and direct recipe instead it suggests trying all sorts of different additions which apart from being very expensive to obtain all of these extra ingredients it would take a long time to find my ideal recipe. I didn't want an open-ended solution! So for me it is not the answer to my search but a range of possible answers. I decided to keep the book because there is some good general curry preparation ideas in it. But disappointed I am still looking for a decent directly specified Indian take-away chicken curry recipe.

I want to buy one for every curry loving person I know, because the food in this book is mouthwatering. We’ve made the base gravy (which the kids love as it is) and made 3 curries so far: jalfrezi, korma and the staff curry (so named because it’s the curry that most restaurant staff will make for themselves) and all were excellent, and tasted better than any other jalfrezi, korma and nameless curry we’ve been made before. The base curry does take 2 hours to make, but each of those hours are ‘leave to simmer’ after a couple of minutes prep and adding ingredients, so it’s no hardship. That then makes enough for 16 individual portions. Each portion then takes roughly 10-15 minutes, so curry night in our house is relatively quick to get ready for now! Everything is explained so well, down to where to get ingredients from: it’s like everything was thought of…even if you’re a beginner cook, you will easily be able to follow this book. I’m so chuffed with this recipe book that I’m buying one for Christmas for everyone I know who loves curry. It’s a no-brainer. Get this book if you love curry; you will not be disappointed.

Recommended to me. Cooked fantastic curries - better than takeaways. Worth the prep time.

I love curries, that authentic flavour that you get at a curry house is delicious and addictive, but I struggled for over 30 years to re-create it at home. The usual books, vids and internet recipes are dreadful and you get a generic curry that is poor in texture, tastes only of curry powder and the overcooked meat falls apart and becomes stringy. Even an Indian friend of mine couldn't explain how they go it to taste so good. Misty Ricardo's Curry Kitchen explains how the excellent curry house chefs create a curry so good, that if you cook for your partner or friends, they'll be poking around in your kitchen bin looking for empty foil cartons and other signs that you've nipped to the takeaway to get a restaurant curry and claim it as your own original dish. There's no secret ingredient. It's all in the cooking technique and the Maillard reaction is used to create unbelievable, fantastically flavoured dishes. In every recipe, Misty explains the exact execution of cooking the ingredients in detail and my first curry was on par with the chicken balti, that my local curry house serves. There is some pre-preparation of a few ingredients, but this pre-prep will allow you to cook a 1st-class curry in 10 minutes and at a fraction of a restaurant or takeaway price. Finally, this book has transformed my Indian cooking and will no doubt transform yours too. I've used it exclusively for curry cooking since I bought it and consider it the holy grail of Indian Restaurant Curry cookery.

I have cooked three recioes so far. Everyone turned out perfect. Unlike recipe books by the more famous chefs, these dishes are not that expensive. The instructions are easy to follow and there is also a list of cookware to assist you in creating the perfect meal for you and friends. Brilliant.