My favourite is Bolst’s mild curry powder. I like it. Balanced flavours. Just tasty all around curry powder. They’ve been around since the 1930s so they must have a following. With one problem. I can’t buy it anymore. Nobody has it in town. Looked it up on-line. With shipping – $25. Twenty-five bucks. For about two bucks of spice. Can’t see doing that. Not even for Bolst’s.
Anyone can make homemade curry powder
So I reverse engineered it. Had the list of ingredients and a clue. Chilies are 6% of the mix. Ingredients are presented in order – highest to lowest. Wasn’t that hard. Tinkered with it a bit and came up with this. Indians will tell you they don’t use curry powder. I’ve never understood that. They say they use masalas. Go to any Indian grocery and you will see boxes and boxes of masalas. Masalas are mixes of spices all ready to go. Curry powder is a mix of spices all ready to go. Confusing. I think the real difference is more philosophic. Curry powder is one size fits all. Masalas are custom to the dish. Tandoori masala. Chaat masala. Chana masala. It does make sense.
So many uses
When I’m cooking Indian I don’t tend to use this curry powder much either. Certainly it’s never front and centre. That would make everything taste the same. But it is useful to have around. Lot’s of non-traditional Indian uses for it. Homemade curry powder is great in soups like curried carrot. Or in Moroccan chicken with chickpeas. Or when you want to whip up a quick chicken curry. Just a great all around spice mix to add to your arsenal. Don’t waste money on pre-fab curry powder. Homemade curry powder. It’s easy. It’s cheap. And it’s delicious. The recipe on the jar isn’t photoshop BTW. My wife got a Cricut crafting gizmo for Christmas. That’s my actual curry powder jar. I won’t be forgetting the recipe any time soon…
