To make curry powder, whisk two tablespoons of ground coriander with one tablespoon of turmeric, two teaspoons of ground cumin, one teaspoon each of ground fenugreek, ground ginger, and black pepper, half a teaspoon of chili powder or cayenne, and half a teaspoon of ground mustard. Bloom a spoonful in hot oil before the liquid goes in.
What is curry powder?
Curry powder is a British invention, a shelf-stable approximation of the fresh masalas of South Indian cooking, blended for export and convenience. No Indian kitchen traditionally kept a single all-purpose curry jar, spices there are combined per dish. But the formula the trade settled on, coriander and turmeric leading cumin, fenugreek, ginger, and chili, is genuinely useful, and mixed at home it recovers everything the supermarket jar loses to years on a shelf.
Turmeric gives the color and the earthy base, coriander gives the volume, and fenugreek is the quiet signature, the slightly bitter maple note that makes a blend smell like curry instead of like chili powder. It is a start-of-cooking spice, the opposite of garam masala: the flavors are fat-soluble and want a minute of frying in hot oil with the onions before anything wet arrives.
What goes in curry powder?
- ·2 tbsp ground coriander
- ·1 tbsp ground turmeric
- ·2 tsp ground cumin
- ·1 tsp ground fenugreek
- ·1 tsp ground ginger
- ·1 tsp black pepper
- ·1/2 tsp chili powder or cayenne, to taste
- ·1/2 tsp ground mustard
- ·Optional: 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon and 1/4 tsp ground clove for a madras lean
Two parts coriander to one part turmeric is the spine, everything else stands a step behind. For a hotter madras-style jar, double the chili and add the cinnamon and clove. One tablespoon of blend seasons a curry for four.
How do you make curry powder?
- Whisk all the spices together until the turmeric streaks disappear.
- Jar it sealed, away from heat and light. Best within three months.
- To use: soften onions in fat, add a tablespoon of blend, and fry thirty to sixty seconds until fragrant before adding tomatoes, stock, or coconut milk.
- For roasted vegetables, toss with oil and a tablespoon of blend before the oven.
- For a fast curry mayo or dressing, a teaspoon straight into the jar works, the fat blooms it cold, just slower.
What should you know before making curry powder?
- Bloom it or lose it. Curry powder stirred into simmering liquid tastes raw and dusty, the same spoonful fried in oil first tastes like dinner.
- Turmeric stains everything it meets, wooden spoons, countertops, fingers. Work accordingly.
- A pinch of fenugreek more is the difference between smelling like a curry house and smelling like a spice rack.
Where did curry powder come from?
British cooks and traders began packaging curry powder in the eighteenth century as a shortcut to the flavors of the colonial Indian table, and Hannah Glasse had already printed a recipe for a currey the India way in 1747. The blend is a trade artifact rather than an Indian tradition, but it seeded curry houses, kitchen shelves, and national dishes from Britain to Japan.
What can you make from curry powder?
Common questions.
What is curry powder made of?
Coriander and turmeric in the lead, with cumin, fenugreek, ginger, black pepper, and chili behind them. Madras-style versions add more heat and warm spices like cinnamon and clove.
Is curry powder actually Indian?
The spices are, the jar is not. Indian cooking blends spices per dish, while curry powder is a fixed British convenience formula from the colonial trade era. It has since become a real tradition in its own right, in Britain, Japan, and the Caribbean.
Why does my curry taste like raw spice?
The powder never bloomed. Fry it in hot fat with the aromatics for thirty to sixty seconds before adding liquid, the flavors are fat-soluble and stay locked without that step.