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Mango Curry

A curry made with green mangoes, tamarind, spices, and mustard oil.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 11 ingredients
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Why it works: Tamarind and cumin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 184 recipes. Both carry alpha-pinene, which smells pine, turpentine. The science ↓

Mango Curry

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Grind the dry chillies, turmeric, jeerah, and mathee seeds into a fine powder.

  2. Grind half of the garlic and ginger, and slice the other half.

  3. Mix the sugar and tamarind to make a sherbet.

  4. Peel and slice the green mangoes and soak them in cold water.

Cook the curry

  1. Heat the oil in a pot until bubbling hot, then add a piece of garlic.

  2. When the garlic turns brown, add the mustard seeds and immediately follow with the powdered spices.

  3. Fry briefly, then add the mangoes, sliced ginger, sliced garlic, and the sherbet.

  4. Boil on low heat until the mangoes are tender and the gravy thickens, stirring occasionally to prevent burning.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Tamarind + cumintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together184 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

  2. Garlic + cumintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,082 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  3. Mango + tamarindtop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together27 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  4. Ginger + cumintop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,733 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  5. Tamarind + gingertop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together325 recipes

    Shared aroma: alpha-pinene (pine, turpentine).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Green mangoes
Provide the main body and tartness of the curry, softening as they cook.
Sugar
Balances the sourness of the tamarind and mango and helps build a sweet-sour sauce.
Tamarind
Adds sourness and acidity that defines the curry's tangy flavour.
Dry chillies
Provide heat and colour to the spice powder.
Mustard oil or sweet oil
Carries the spices' flavour and fries the aromatics, adding richness.

The step that matters

Stirring while the gravy thickens. As the sugar-rich sauce reduces on low heat, it can scorch on the bottom of the pot, giving a burnt taste. Stirring occasionally spreads heat evenly and keeps the gravy from sticking.

Swap the mango

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (sugar, tamarind, ginger, garlic, mustard, cumin):

  1. Limefits better
  2. Lemonfits about as well
  3. Mangothe original
  4. Coconutfits about as well

Fit is the average pairing score against sugar, tamarind, ginger, garlic, mustard, cumin. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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