Secret of Indian Restaurant Style Cookery at Home

The secret to cooking a wide variety of Indian restaurant-styled dishes easily at home is in cooking how they do, with the use of a previously prepared sauce that forms the base of each dish. This example base can be kept 4-5 days in the fridge, or frozen for up to a month, and once prepared will allow you to make a curry up quickly in only about 5-10 minutes!

Ingredients:

• 1kg white thinly sliced onions, 
• 1.5 liters water
• 400g chopped tomatoes, cores discarded
• 10 dried chilies, chopped in half.
• 50g finely chopped garlic
• 50g finely chopped ginger
• 1-2 tsp tomato paste
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 1 tsp paprika
• 1 tsp salt
• 4 -5 tbsp oil

1. Pour enough freshly boiled water to cover the chillies in a bowl, set aside 10 minutes to soak.
2. Pour 4 tbsp oil into deep frypan heat and add ginger & garlic stirring 30 seconds till aromatic before adding the onions. Stir on high heat a couple of minutes, cover and reduce heat to medium. Stir every minute or so for about 10 minutes till browning. Add salt, mixing through well, then reduce heat to lowest setting. Continue cooking another 10 minutes stirring every 2 minutes.
3. Add all of the 1.5 liters of water to the pan & bring to boil. Reduce heat & simmer covered for an extra 10 minutes. Take off heat and leave to cool a while.
4. Pour the soaked chillies with their water into a blender. Blend thoroughly till no chunks of chilli remain obvious. Remove chilli mixture to bowl.
5. Pour in the tomatoes into the blender, blend thoroughly till smoothly processed. Add half of the chilli mixture to blender. Blend through the tomato - chilli mixture until well combined. Remove to large bowl.
6. Add the cooled onion mixture to the blender (working in half amounts if needed). Blend thoroughly for at least 2 minutes until sure it's done smoothly. Remove to large bowl/s and reserve 4-5 tbsp of the onion mixture for preparing the meat in bulk later.
7. Add 1 tbsp oil to clean frypan on medium heat, adding the tomato paste paprika and turmeric. Stir briskly 30 seconds before adding the remaining chilli mixture. Stir another 30 seconds before adding the blended tomato mixture to the pan, bringing to boil. Turn heat down and simmer about 10 minutes.
8. At this stage add the blended onion mixture to the pan, mixing through well and bringing back to boil. Reduce heat again and simmer gently about 15-20 minutes. As it simmers, skim off the froth that rises to the surface as necessary. 
9. Sauce can now be used as needed in recipes as outlined, and can be kept 4-5 days in the fridge, or frozen for up to a month.

Meat preparation for recipes:

• 1 kg of chicken, diced to desired size (from about half to 1 inch wide cubes)
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 5-6 tbsp oil
• the 4-5 tbsp of reserved onion mixture from the base sauce recipe

1. Put the oil in a clean pan on medium heat, adding the turmeric & reserved onion mixture when warmed. Stirring constantly cook till darkens (3-4 min), and add the chicken. Mix through well till covered with the sauce. Turn down the heat, cover, and cook till tender (about 15-20 minutes) while stirring frequently!
2. When chicken is done and tender, remove to a clean container, leaving sauce behind.
3. Use immediately as outlined in further recipes, or cool and refrigerate for up to 4 days (freezes for up-to 2 months) while using as needed.