Honey Is The Secret Ingredient To Take Your Curry Up A Notch (2024)

FAQs

Honey Is The Secret Ingredient To Take Your Curry Up A Notch? ›

The thick viscosity of honey adds body to your curry sauce or broth, whether it be thinner or thicker to start with. This can be helpful if you want to make a lighter version of Indian curry that uses less ghee (clarified butter).

It involves heating oil in a small pan, spluttering spices and aromatics, and pouring the mixture over cooked curries, lentils, and rice dishes. The ingredients you use are up to your discretion: Garlic, dried chilis, mustard seeds, cumin seeds, coriander seeds, and even split lentils are customary choices.

The actual sweetness and creaminess of such curries meanwhile, usually comes from fried onions and either cashews and/or dairy products. Instead of (or in addition to) onion, ground coconut may be used. White poppy seeds and/or watermelon seeds are also used in some creamy sauces.

A curry mix has a warm, robust spicy taste as a result of combining roasted and grounded coriander seeds, turmeric, cumin and chili peppers. Other spices commonly found within the blend are fenugreek, clove, mustard, black pepper, nutmeg or ginger.

Whether you may be familiar with the differences between curries from various countries, such as Indian versus Japanese curry, and perhaps even know how to make them at home, there's a special flavor enhancer that you may not have thought to add: honey.

Add more spices: Store-bought curry sauces often lack the depth of flavour that homemade sauces have. To remedy this, you can add more spices like cumin, turmeric, coriander, and garam masala. Use fresh ginger and garlic: Fresh ginger and garlic add a lot of flavour to curries.

A good way to fix the texture and taste of thin curries is by introducing dairy ingredients like milk, yogurt or cream, this adds a rich texture and enhances the taste of curries.

A curry can be sweetened by adding honey, syrup, or sugar. These ingredients add flavour and balance to a sour or bitter curry. Add around one tablespoon of either ingredient to your curry while cooking and taste. Continue to slowly add syrup, honey, or sugar to the dish until a sweet flavour is achieved.

Garlic and ginger are maybe the most-loved ingredients in Indian cuisine. The combination of these two fragrant elements produce an aroma that is an integral part of the many Indian curry sauces, and adds a gorgeous depth and complexity to most of Indian cooking.

How to sweeten curry without sugar? ›

Jaggery is the best option to sweeten curry instead of sugar. You could also use honey, agave or maple syrup. Adding lime juice can to your dish can balance out the sweetness. In case, you don't want too much of tanginess in the dish you can also add vinegar white wine vinegar, red wine vinegar, balsamic vinegar.

Coconut milk and cream are mostly interchangeable in recipes such as curries and soups. If you prefer a richer flavour and texture, try coconut cream or vice versa. However, be careful when substituting coconut milk and cream in baked goods.

If the curry is bitter

The chances are you can rescue your bitter curry by: Add equal parts sugar and salt, a teaspoon at a time, mixing well between each pair of additions and tasting until the curry is no longer bitter. Sugar and salt help to reduce bitterness. You can use any sweetener or salt you like.

The primary ingredient in most Indian curry powders is bright yellow turmeric. Turmeric is earthy, musky, and warm, and delivers great depth to curries with no heat. Indian curry spices are usually a blend of: Kashmiri Chile Powder – this chile has a terrific, rich flavor without much heat.

Fenugreek (Methi)

This Indian spice is what people say "smells like curry." Of all Indian spices, this spice may be the most essential. You may use up to a few tablespoons in a family size dish near the end of the cooking process, but start with a teaspoon.

​​Add spices​

The easiest way to fix a bland and tasteless curry is by adding spices like red chili powder, cumin, coriander, garam masala, curry leaves and turmeric. Just make a quick tempering and pour over the curry to give it a nice punch of spices and herbs.

Most, if not all, curries start with the same base; ginger, garlic, and onion finely chopped. The ratio I use for this mixture is two parts onion to one part ginger and one part garlic (1 medium-sized onion, 4-5 cloves of garlic, a thumb-sized piece of ginger).

Easily accessible seasonings and spices such as cumin, coriander and turmeric are used to create the unique taste. Curry is made in many different ways across the likes of India, Thailand, Malaysia, China and South Africa to names a few. The two most popular categories of curry are Indian and Thai.