Quarantine Dinner #27: Chicken Curry

Curry Is Not What You Think

Curry is not what you think it is…

You probably think, yes I do! It is a yellow powder they got in the supermarket, and sometimes it says Jamaican curry.

Before we get into that, let’s talk about where it comes from.

First, the original name was not curry. It was kuri, which means sauce or relish for rice.

Kuri originated from East Asia and dates back to 2500 BC, but it was only known to us much later, around 1510, when Portuguese traders started trading it for chili peppers.

Aha! Curry was not spicy till the introduction of the chili pepper from America.

Remember 1492 when the Americas were discovered… or so they say. That’s another story for another day.

This is like 18 years later, and even Mr. Christopher Columbus also traded chili peppers and curry when he was not busy with the Tainos.

I wonder if during the trip somehow the chili pepper got mixed in with the curry…

Hey! You got curry in my chili powder!

No, you got chili in my curry!

Hey, this is good!

Curry Travels

At this point, it was just traded loosely around and was all over India, where every city had a different version of a curry dish. Some mild, some made with fish, meat, or vegetables.

That is why in India you have different blends like masala, vindaloo, madras, korma, etc. All curries, but different tastes, all from different areas.

Most of the store-bought curry powder you buy isn’t just curry. It can contain anywhere from 5-20 other spices like star anise, cinnamon, paprika, cumin, mustard, and turmeric, which gives it its yellow color.

The blends will vary from company to company. Find one you like and stick with it.

That’s why you sometimes see Jamaican curry powder. It is not from Jamaica; it is the ingredients that are used in Jamaica.

Wait what? I thought it was India we were talking about, you may ask.

Ok, let’s look at how a trading company called the British East India Company changed the world, or at least introduced a new flavor.

Around the 1700s, the company brought curry back from India to the British Empire. The people of England seemed to like the curry flavor, so it was a big win.

The British trading company would trade spices with other parts of the world, like China and other parts of Asia, where soon it got adopted into their cultures. China making yellow curry, Malaysia making red curry and using coconut milk.

The British trading company bounced from country to country with the curry spice, with every place adopting it practically as their own.

The first known printed recipe was printed in 1758. By around 1805, you could pretty much find curry in most coffee houses in England.

Even today, you will find curry sauce in every chip shop, and believe it or not, one of the national dishes of England today is chicken tikka masala, a curry dish.

Japan was a different story. During the Meiji period, after national self-isolation, they pretty much embraced curry to the extent that the army served it from generals down to conscripts. The navy served it to all its sailors. Every ship had its own recipe that they kept secret. It was curry pride, and they served curry every Friday.

You could find curry all over the country at this time.

What about Jamaica? In those days, it was grouped along with the other West Indies islands like Trinidad, Tobago, and Guyana. And yes, the Brits had the British West Indies trading company too, so you can figure out how curry got to Jamaica and curry goat was born.

Korea got into the curry game late, I would say around the 1940s, so they do not have such a strong curry game.

My Dad’s Midnight Curry

Growing up, my dad seemed to always want to make curry in the middle of the night, like it was some secret experiment he did not want anyone to see.

He would wake me up god knows what time.

“Hey, you want to eat some curry?”

I would get up and eat it, but it was so spicy I would sweat and could not stop eating it.

It was so strong the bowls would stay stained for two days!

It was the best, and unfortunately, I do not have that recipe.

My Cantonese Curry

Now my curry is a Cantonese version with simple ingredients like chicken, stock, madras curry, cayenne, potatoes, and onions.

Once put together, it creates an aromatic blend of different spices: star anise, roasted chicken, and curry.

The chicken looks intact, but it falls right off the bones and is packed with curry flavor.

The same with the potatoes. They have absorbed so much of the curry chicken stock base, they are like potato water balloons full of flavor.

Combine the curry sauce on the rice, and it’s kuri… a relish for rice.