If you do find cooking to be a difficult task to venture into or are scared to attempt Indian curries, you might find the below article to be a little useful. I’ve been cooking Indian curries for a few years and the programmer/coder in me found quite a few similarities in the “procedures” aka recipes, used to make them. For more than a year, I have been making curries without specific recipes. Most of these have been successful. However, there have been a few disasters as well. This blog lists down some of the things that helped me make a “successful” curry.

Big fat disclaimer: What I say does not include all Indian curries. I am pretty sure some of those curries out there require a lot of technique and skill and blah blah blah, but this blog should help you start out, understand and analyze the techniques needed to make indian curries and perhaps help you on your journey to make curries without any recipes!

Before we begin, some of the staples necessary to make an Indian curry are

• Coriander powder
• Chilli powder
• Turmeric
• Garam masala
• Onions
• Tomatos
• Ginger garlic paste

Also, if you are planning to make something with meat or chicken, try and get your hands on “Chicken masala”.

To summarize the entire blog even before I begin, the basic steps needed to make a simple indian curry:

• Sauté onions until it becomes golden brown.
• Add ginger garlic paste and sauté again for another minute.
• Add the tomatoes and masalas and cook it out for a while (the longer the better). Make sure all the masala is completely cooked (this is checked by tasting).
• Add your meat or vegetables at this point and cook it out.

Tada! You now have an indian curry.

Though it is as simple as that, to avoid a complete disaster, you might need to know a few things first.

Ingredients and quantities:

Most of the curries I have made always include both onions and tomatoes. However, you could opt to omit or change the proportions of these to try something different. I would advise you not to avoid the onions though (so much flavor! – also, I have no idea how a curry made without onions would taste).

To start of making your first curry on your own, I would say stick to equal quantities of onions and tomatoes. Eg: If you have one super large onion, add two medium tomatoes. If the onions are smaller, add tomatoes of equal quantities.

Be careful when you buy chilli powders and use them! They tend to vary in mildness and should be added to the curry accordingly. You could substitute the chilli powder with green chillies instead . Make sure you add the chillies along with the onions!

To spice up your curry a lil more, you could also add pureed coriander and mint. Add them in varying quantities to experiment with flavors. Note: this makes your curry turn into a brown color. If you want your curry to be more green than brown, go easy on the tomatoes.

Finally, for the creamy richness experiment with either coconut milk or cream. Go easy on the coconut milk on your first try.

Taste-testing your curry:

Often times you might end up with a curry which is just so blah. Don’t worry, most curries only need a little pick me up. If you can’t figure out what is wrong with your curry, add salt. (Even better, add garlic salt). If it still lacks flavor, squeeze some lime into the curry (done towards the end- don’t cook out the yummy lime tanginess). If it is too spicy, add cream or coconut milk to the curry. You could add yoghurt too, but it does add a different flavor to the curry and I would advise you to proceed with caution. You can also add a little sugar (LITTLE). I’m not a big fan of sweet curries, but there do exist a few good ones.

Hopefully, I’ve given you enough information to prep yourself to make your first curry (without a strict recipe).