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Bengal Curry

A curry made with onions, coriander, red pepper, turmeric, butter, curds, coconut, meat, and water.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 10 ingredients
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Why it works: Coriander and turmeric match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,253 recipes. Both carry eucalyptol, which smells eucalyptus, herbal. The science ↓

Bengal Curry

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the spice paste

  1. In a mortar, grind the coriander seeds until smooth.

  2. Add the red pepper and onions, and pound them together until well mixed.

Fry and cook

  1. In a stewpan, melt the butter and slice one onion into it.

  2. Remove the onion once browned, then add the turmeric and fry until the raw flavor disappears.

  3. Mix the curds with the pounded ingredients and add to the pan with the meat and grated coconut.

  4. Stir continuously and sprinkle water to prevent burning while the meat browns.

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

    Shared aroma: eucalyptol (eucalyptus, herbal).

  2. Turmeric + coconuttop 2% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,027 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-heptanol (bitter, floral).

  3. Coriander + coconuttop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together1,039 recipes

    Shared aroma: decanal (soap, orange peel).

  4. Pepper + turmerictop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together4,478 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Pepper + coriandertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together5,949 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

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

What each ingredient does

Onions
Break down into a sweet, savory base that thickens and flavors the curry.
Butter
Carries the heat and fat for frying, adding richness and helping the onion brown.
Curds
Add tang and acidity, and their moisture helps the spices blend into the sauce.
Grated coconut
Adds body, mild sweetness and a rich, creamy texture to the sauce.
Coriander seeds
Provide a warm, citrusy aroma as the main ground spice in the paste.

The step that matters

Remove the onion once browned, then add the turmeric and fry until the raw flavor disappears.. Browning the onion without burning builds sweetness, while frying the turmeric in fat cooks out its raw, dusty taste and releases its color and aroma. Stopping too early leaves the sauce harsh.

Swap the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, coriander, butter, turmeric, meat, coconut):

  1. Capsicumfits better
  2. Sweet potatofits better
  3. Okrafits better
  4. Onionthe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, coriander, butter, turmeric, meat, coconut. 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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