Chicken Curry and Beyond - The CurryFocus Blog

What is Cayenne Pepper?
Cayenne is a hot red fruit that is used to flavour dishes, its name comes from the city Cayenne which is the capital of the french region of French Guiana. The fruit is often pulped into cakes, which are then ground or sifted to form Cayenne Pepper.

Cayenne Pepper helps Blood Circulation
One of the benefits of cayenne is that it prevents stickiness of blood platelets, which certainly can help reduce the tendency to clot and has a resolving action on existent thrombosis. Cayenne Pepper cleans the blood vessels making long term use a rejuvenator of circulation. It is also reported to have a wonderful effect on brain clarity and memory, especially for the elderly by its improving circulation to the brain.  This means that any areas of the body that are deficient in blood supply, such as the brain, will receive fresh vitalising blood to renew and restore. In some cases there have even been reports of gangrene cured by this herb.

Cayenne Pepper for Other Health Issues
Cayenne Pepper has been known to be good for the kidneys, spleen, pancreas, heart and lungs. The actual constitution of Cayenne Pepper is Vitamin A, Vitamin C and Alkaloids known as Capsaicin.

Capsaicin is a common ingredient in many pain killing creams used for Arthritis and pain caused by Diabetes nerve damage. Its also used as anti-oxidant which slows cancer cell growth. Studies have shown the Capsaicin causes cancer cells to die by starving them of oxygen.

Cinnamon is a very widely used spice that comes from the bark of a tree in the Lauraceae family. The tree is native to Sri Lanka and southern India. Indonesia is now the main supplier of cinnamon to the world  

The inner bark of the tree is used to produce cinnamon. The drying process causes the bark to curl into rolls and these are cut into lengths of 5-10 cm for sale. You can buy cinnamon in these short “sticks” or in powdered form.  

There is a similar spice called cassia that is also made from the bark of a tree. It is hard and woody, compared to cinnamon. Whereas cinnamon is fine and crumbly, cassia is coarser and stronger. This difference is easy to spot when buying the “sticks” but is more difficult when buying powdered spice – grinding cinnamon in a coffee grinder is easy but cassia is a lot tougher.  

Cassia is often labelled and sold as cinnamon. 

Why does this matter? Because cassia contains a toxin called coumarin. Coumarin is also contained in cinnamon but in much lower concentrations. Coumarin is known to cause liver and kidney damage when consumed in high concentrations.  

Cinnamon has been credited with helping in the treatment of type II diabetes. But the plant used in the study was actually cassia. There are lots of articles on this study – check out http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn4413 for one that also mentions additional benefits of lowered blood fats and “bad” cholesterol. 

But the main reason we use cinnamon is as a spice. Cinnamon is widely used in cooking and can be used with sweet (such as apple pie) and savoury dishes (such as curries). You can buy cinnamon in lots of grocery stores and most supermarkets. When you next have a cappuccino, ask for cinnamon instead of chocolate as the topping – it tastes great.  

You’ll find lots of recipes that use cinnamon and a well-stocked kitchen usually has cinnamon in either powder or “stick” form.

I was reading an Article on the Britain USA website and it confirmed what I suspected already… yes curry is Britain’s most popular meal. They write..

It may be ordered in an Indian restaurant, bought ready-made from the supermarket, or prepared in the kitchen at home, but however it comes, the most popular dish in the UK today is curry.

Now its interesting to note that Curry became popular amongst the English living in India in the days of the British Empire.

An article on the BBC website hints that some people are actually addicted to curries because they arouse and stimulate the senses.

Professor Stephen Gray from Nottingham Trent University says the whole combination of tastes in a curry stimulate far more taste receptors on the tongue than other commonly eaten British foods.

The article then goes on to state that various parties cannot actually agree whether food can actually be addictive or not - however the general consensus appeared to be that as long as the types of Curries that are eaten are cooked in a healthy fashion not to much harm can come to the person eating the delicious dishes.

Unfortunately the most popular curries that the British eat tend to be the ones with creamy sauces and high fat contents, however if more care is taken over the preparation of healthy curries then it can be an excellent food choice.

The Curry Secret: Indian Restaurant Cookery at Home (Right Way S.)

Saffron is made from the stigmas and style of a crocus (crocus sativus linnaeus). 

Saffron is used in cooking to provide aroma, flavour and colour. It is often referred to as a spice but it is much more than a spice. It is a food in its own right and is a rich source of Riboflavin (vitamin B2). It is used in medicines as well as cosmetics and perfumes. 

Saffron is easily the most expensive spice. Each crocus flower is picked and then the stigma and style are removed from the flower. The stigma is called a “thread” and there are between 150,000 and 1,000,000 threads in a kilogram of saffron. A kilogram of saffron retails for about US$2,000.   
You can buy saffron in supermarkets in jars that contain 0.4 grams of saffron. 

Most saffron is usually bought as threads and thse are infused with water before being used. The threads are soaked in hot water and left for up to a day . The threads expand in size as the water is infused and great care must be taken to not allow the aroma to escape (by covering the container with a lid, saucer or clingfilm). 

Be careful of having turmeric being passed off as saffron. Both dye food yellow but turmeric is vastly inferior to saffron in aroma and taste. Sometimes saffron is adulterated with turmeric and it is often hard to detect that this has happened (until you get home and use the saffron for cooking). 
The main producer of saffron is Spain which produces about 40 tonnes of saffron annually (from 6,400,000,000 crocus flowers) with 90% of this crop coming from the Mancha region. Spain supplies 70% of the world market. 

So what is a “pinch” of saffron? Quite a few recipes call for a pinch of saffron but people’s hands and fingers are different sizes and a pinch from a big container is often larger than a pinch from a small container. One rule of thumb that is often used is that 0.1 gram is a pinch. But this amount is way too small to register on a kitchen scale. The easiest way is to get what you’ve bought and count the threads. If you buy the usual 0.4 gram jar, then you should split the threads up into 4 lots. Each lot will be about 0.1 gram and constitutes a pinch. 
 

Be very careful when going for a curry on a first date. Besides the obvious gaffes of farting, burping and getting drunk, there are more subtle dangers of which you need to be aware. 

Firstly, don’t order a curry that’s too hot. It’s all very well demonstrating that you like hot curries but you can overdo it. If you usually eat a madras then don’t go for a vindaloo just to impress, especially if you haven’t had a vindaloo at the particular restaurant before. It’s not very attractive to be sweating profusely and continually blowing a streaming nose.  

And make sure that you know if your date is a vegetarian before you order. Your vegetarian date will be horrified if you wolf down a lamb rogan josh or a chicken tikka masala as they are tucking into an aubergine curry.  

Avoid wearing white or light coloured clothes so if you do splash yourself with a sauce, your carelessness isn’t standing out like a beacon.  

If a crowd of drunken footballers pour into the restaurant then your romantic evening is over – there will be singing, shouting, swearing and, sometimes, fighting. If they’ve arrived before you’ve ordered then stand up and leave. If you’re eating when they arrive then stand up, leave and run. 

Be careful when you go for the goodnight kiss – most curries have hot sauces that are laden with spices and the taste lingers on the breath.
 

Don’t let any of this put you off going for a curry on your first date. Just think a little.