Dan Lepard: “Many different countries have a recipe for curry, often inspired by India but tweaked to local tastes. This recipe reminds me of the famous Japanese curry-rice, but with a very British, marmalade twist.
The first British recipe for curry that I know of was printed in 1747, a direct result of the British colonial presence in India and it forms part of a whole culture of Anglo-Indian cuisine that includes dishes such as kedgeree, mulligatawny soup and pish-pash.
You'll find some of these in the Imperial War museums’ archive which contains so many delicious recipes, check them out.
Now to us today this sweet savoury curry from the museum's archive seems like an abomination bearing almost no resemblance to authentic Indian dishes. what it is, arguably is a stew with spices more hot pot than korma, with a tablespoon of curry powder stirred into a flour-thickened roux to enliven it. Its flavour is soft and sweet, a kind of comfort food that calmed rather than stirred the senses. I spoke with award-winning writer Jill Norman who wrote Dorling Kindersley’s Complete Book of Spices and The New Penguin Cookery Book and edited the Imperial War Museum's Make Do and Mend and also in 1969 commissioned Dharamjit Singh's recipes for his now classic Penguin book, Indian Cookery. I asked Jill to help us understand Britain’s somewhat nervous use of spices in cooking.
Jill Norman: “When I started publishing in the 60s there was very little evidence of spices in our food at all. I think it's because, in an earlier time between the wars, people who were quite well to do usually had a cook and their food was very nourishing and well-cooked but there was no great use of spicing as far as I’m aware.
I remember a friend who grew up in that environment once saying to me when I published The New Penguin Cookery Book, “you've got an awful lot of spices in there for what I would call everyday food.” I was rather surprised and said “oh?” and laughed. And then I think it was a lack of awareness here. You know, there was something called curry powder which probably came in a packet with an Indian image on it went into the, whatever was being cooked, the curry, and that was that. And nobody thought to look at the ingredients and it took quite a long time, well into the sixties I would say before this change.”
Dan Lepard: “There were two Indian family-owned spice companies of note supplying British cooks in the 1940s. Both of them on Broadway in what is now Chennai in India. PM Lalah & Sons, today known as Lalahs, with their Lalah-Masala blend, and the earlier more established Vencatachellum, branded in Britain as Vencat, which Sharwood's imported.
British cooks would buy their curry powder and tins, spoon it in hesitantly, and mostly, be oblivious to the combination of spices used or indeed the expertise required to make it. Importing and using spices often combining savoury flavours with sweetness has long been a part of British cooking since at least the 16th century.
By the 1940s many recipes for this dish called ‘curry’ were quite sweet, often containing banana and apple. I talked to chef, author and broadcaster Roopa Gulati, whose father came to Britain from Calcutta about her personal experiences of cross-cultural adaptations of familiar dishes growing up in Cumbria.”
Roopa Gulati: “The first English curry I had was a primary school, I must have been about seven. There was a great excitement because it was curry and rice. And the curry arrived, and it had bananas in it and sultanas, and it was sweet and I got the shock of my life. It was just something that I couldn't even begin to compare with the food we ate at home every night. And I can still picture that shock when I put it in, because essentially all it was, was I think, it was lamb stew with curry powder and what tasted like jam, apricot jam. Am I making this up? I don't know. It, it tasted like that, it was very sweet.
I mean, for kids who are seven/eight years old who don't like anything green and very fussy for some reason it appealed to everybody on my table at least their palette and I was the only one whose eyebrows shut off the face, my face when I tasted.”
Dan Lepard: “As a child I loved it, and part of me still enjoys those sweet spice flavours. and while in Japan over the last few years enjoying Japanese curry rice and curry puffs, I had this ‘ah-ha’ moment wondering ‘where do I know this flavour from?’ It's the sweet curry from my childhood and even when I eat it now, I still enjoy it. This is how to make it.
Finely chop an onion and an apple, fry them in 50 grams of fat or oil until soft, then add 450 grams of cubed beef. I use stewing steak. Cook for a few minutes then scoop out the meat, onion and apple and leave to one side. Add to the pan one and a half tablespoons of curry powder, four tablespoons of flour and quarter of a teaspoon of dry mustard powder. Cook this for a few minutes then gradually add 300ml of stock or water and bring to the boil. Add one teaspoon of sugar, one tablespoon of cider vinegar, one tablespoon of marmalade, one teaspoon of honey or golden syrup, and two teaspoons of salt. Return the meat to the pan and simmer for an hour until tender. I'd serve this with steamed rice. The original recipe suggests pearl barley or if you could find it macaroni. Sweet, spicy and savoury all at once, comfort food at its best.”
