Skip to main content
Main

Curry Powder

A blend of ground coriander, turmeric, fenugreek, mustard, cumin, and cayenne pepper.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Turmeric and cumin match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 1,698 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Curry Powder

Ingredients

Directions

Make the powder

  1. Finely powder the coriander seed, turmeric root, fenugreek seed, mustard seed, and cumin seed.

  2. Mix all the powdered ingredients together.

  3. Add Cayenne pepper to taste.

Store

  1. Store in a sealed container.

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. Turmeric + cumintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,698 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Coriander + cumintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together3,866 recipes

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

  3. Turmeric + fenugreektop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together229 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  4. Fenugreek + cumintop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together178 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  5. Coriander + turmerictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,253 recipes

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

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

What each ingredient does

Coriander seed
Provides the main citrusy, warm body of the blend's flavour.
Turmeric root
Adds earthy flavour and a yellow colour to the powder.
Fenugreek seed
Contributes a bitter, maple-like aroma characteristic of curry blends.
Mustard seed
Adds a sharp, pungent note that mellows when cooked.
Cumin seed
Contributes a warm, earthy aroma that defines the blend.

The step that matters

Finely powder the seeds and root. Grinding releases the volatile aromatic oils that give the spices their flavour. Whole pieces stay flat and gritty, so the blend tastes weak and uneven.

Swap the mustard

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (coriander, turmeric, fenugreek, cumin, pepper):

  1. Spinachfits better
  2. Capsicumfits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Mustardthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against coriander, turmeric, fenugreek, cumin, pepper. 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.

More curry powder recipes

Bengal 13Delhi 3Indian 3Madras 3 See all 102 →

You might also like

Tomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipesMutton BrothMutton Broth292 recipesYorkshire PuddingYorkshire Pudding264 recipes