5 ms·

Too Specific and Too Vague: Curry House Curry

36 points by Thevet 5y ago

mango7283 5y ago
I have a vague recollection of going to a curry restaurant in Tokyo tower and being disappointed that instead of getting actual Japanese style curry I ordered some neither here nor there attempt at an "Indian" curry. It was decent still but there was only so many meals in a day and I wanted to max out my Japanese style food intake. I can eat all the not-japanese style curry I want back home...
zarzavat 5y ago
This to me is a little bit silly. The partition of India was in 1947 (a British idea) and Bangladesh didn’t gain independence from Pakistan until the 70s. Before that, the entire thing was “India” and we still use the term “Indian subcontinent” today to refer to the entire region. The partition didn’t happen along culinary lines, so I don’t see a reason why it would be inappropriate for a restaurant for a restaurant run by Bangladeshis to claim it serves “Indian” cuisine within the general meaning of the word. If you go to a Bangladeshi restaurant in the UK and ask for authentic Bangladeshi food, most often they will be happy to serve it for you.
- no1lives4ever 5y ago
  The problem is when the Bangladeshi Bengali cooks serve food that is mostly alien to them. Mostly what they serve as Indian food is based on north and western Indian cuisine. Stuff that is very different from what Bengalis in Indian Bengal or Bangladesh would cook.
thematrixturtle 5y ago
> When I finally visited Mumbai in 2016, I ate crisp dosas and spongey idli for breakfast and thus engaged in Marathi cultural appropriation of what are clearly Tamil dishes. /s (although many Indians would not think so)
- no1lives4ever 5y ago
  More likely Udupi versions of South Indian food that is popular across south India
labster 5y ago
Larry Wall went to an Indian restaurant during one of the YAPC::Asia conferences in Tokyo. Looking at the bread, he asks the server, “Naan desu ka?” Multilingual puns are the best.
- kingcharles 5y ago
  「はい!!」
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
rendall 5y ago
> ...hearing British people declaring they loved curry could come across as a crass postcolonial misrepresentation When you travel to Japan and go to an Indian restaurant, the food tastes and is presented differently than it is in India. Then if you travel to Greece and find a small Indian restaurant, the Indian food is different there from the other versions. Same in Africa, South America, Europe. All of the Indian food sold in these places are nearly unrecognizable from each other. This variation isn't limited to Indian food. It's the same with Thai food, Chinese food, Indonesian food, Italian food, Mexican food, Greek food, Japanese food. The ways of preparing and presenting these cuisines in foreign lands are as varied as the countries themselves. It's probably a human universal: restaurant owners of ethnic restaurants change recipes to suit local taste and popularity.
- bruce511 5y ago
  Yes, food transplanted is always food adapted to local tastes and ingredients. What I find interesting is the way that strict recipe following culture interacts with interpretive make-it-up-as-you-go culture. Take Italy for example - recipe culture is very strict - you make the dish _exactly_ the way Grandma taught you or it is wrong (and by implication bad). Italy has an incredible food culture, and this strictness has resulted in amazing food being largely unchanged for hundreds of years. Every village member has experienced the exact same lasagne for ever - even if it's just the tiniest bit different to the next village. By contrast countries with little or no food culture simply adopt and fuse everything they come across. The UK is a good example, long lambasted for bland food, there was nothing to lose and everything was assimilated. It promotes experimentation - mixing things never thought of - every day a new adventure. Each influence is named, "Indian", "Chinese", "Thai", all of which would be unrecognisable in those areas. In one sense it is none of those, it is "British" food. Thus an Indian restaurant in London does not pretend to be "authentic" (unless of course it explicitly does) - it wants to offer an amazing meal you will enjoy. An Indian meal in London is different to one in Mumbai is different to one in Beijing is different to one in Washington - and I think the world is richer for that.
  - astrange 5y ago
    I'm not sure why everyone jokes about British food being bland. That's actually Japanese food. British food is all the same color (brown), often some kind of sludge with mystery bits in it, and they want you to try several different gross things all called "pickle", but they have spices. Mustard is a spice.
astrange 5y ago
I thought this was going to be about recreating Curry House, the Japanese restaurant chain that randomly shut down one day in 2020 (pre-covid). Their salad dressing was really good.
deanc 5y ago
For those looking into this more the term used is BIR. British Indian Restaurants. There’s plenty of folks online doing their best to share the secrets of the British curry house. One such is Dan Toombs (The Curry Guy). Essentially the majority of British Indian curries are made using a base gravy and different items are added to differentiate them. Giving each curry house its own distinct flavour that’s present between most dishes on the menu.
JoeAltmaier 5y ago
Silly to say something is or isn't Indian. A country with 100 languages has as many varieties of curry. The author seems blithly unaware of this?

36 points by Thevet 5y ago

I have a vague recollection of going to a curry restaurant in Tokyo tower and being disappointed that instead of getting actual Japanese style curry I ordered some neither here nor there attempt at an "Indian" curry. It was decent still but there was only so many meals in a day and I wanted to max out my Japanese style food intake. I can eat all the not-japanese style curry I want back home...

zarzavat 5y ago

This to me is a little bit silly. The partition of India was in 1947 (a British idea) and Bangladesh didn’t gain independence from Pakistan until the 70s. Before that, the entire thing was “India” and we still use the term “Indian subcontinent” today to refer to the entire region. The partition didn’t happen along culinary lines, so I don’t see a reason why it would be inappropriate for a restaurant for a restaurant run by Bangladeshis to claim it serves “Indian” cuisine within the general meaning of the word. If you go to a Bangladeshi restaurant in the UK and ask for authentic Bangladeshi food, most often they will be happy to serve it for you.

no1lives4ever 5y ago
The problem is when the Bangladeshi Bengali cooks serve food that is mostly alien to them. Mostly what they serve as Indian food is based on north and western Indian cuisine. Stuff that is very different from what Bengalis in Indian Bengal or Bangladesh would cook.

thematrixturtle 5y ago

> When I finally visited Mumbai in 2016, I ate crisp dosas and spongey idli for breakfast and thus engaged in Marathi cultural appropriation of what are clearly Tamil dishes. /s (although many Indians would not think so)

no1lives4ever 5y ago
More likely Udupi versions of South Indian food that is popular across south India

labster 5y ago

Larry Wall went to an Indian restaurant during one of the YAPC::Asia conferences in Tokyo. Looking at the bread, he asks the server, “Naan desu ka?” Multilingual puns are the best.

kingcharles 5y ago
「はい!!」

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

rendall 5y ago

> ...hearing British people declaring they loved curry could come across as a crass postcolonial misrepresentation When you travel to Japan and go to an Indian restaurant, the food tastes and is presented differently than it is in India. Then if you travel to Greece and find a small Indian restaurant, the Indian food is different there from the other versions. Same in Africa, South America, Europe. All of the Indian food sold in these places are nearly unrecognizable from each other. This variation isn't limited to Indian food. It's the same with Thai food, Chinese food, Indonesian food, Italian food, Mexican food, Greek food, Japanese food. The ways of preparing and presenting these cuisines in foreign lands are as varied as the countries themselves. It's probably a human universal: restaurant owners of ethnic restaurants change recipes to suit local taste and popularity.

bruce511 5y ago
Yes, food transplanted is always food adapted to local tastes and ingredients. What I find interesting is the way that strict recipe following culture interacts with interpretive make-it-up-as-you-go culture. Take Italy for example - recipe culture is very strict - you make the dish _exactly_ the way Grandma taught you or it is wrong (and by implication bad). Italy has an incredible food culture, and this strictness has resulted in amazing food being largely unchanged for hundreds of years. Every village member has experienced the exact same lasagne for ever - even if it's just the tiniest bit different to the next village. By contrast countries with little or no food culture simply adopt and fuse everything they come across. The UK is a good example, long lambasted for bland food, there was nothing to lose and everything was assimilated. It promotes experimentation - mixing things never thought of - every day a new adventure. Each influence is named, "Indian", "Chinese", "Thai", all of which would be unrecognisable in those areas. In one sense it is none of those, it is "British" food. Thus an Indian restaurant in London does not pretend to be "authentic" (unless of course it explicitly does) - it wants to offer an amazing meal you will enjoy. An Indian meal in London is different to one in Mumbai is different to one in Beijing is different to one in Washington - and I think the world is richer for that.
- astrange 5y ago
  I'm not sure why everyone jokes about British food being bland. That's actually Japanese food. British food is all the same color (brown), often some kind of sludge with mystery bits in it, and they want you to try several different gross things all called "pickle", but they have spices. Mustard is a spice.

astrange 5y ago

I thought this was going to be about recreating Curry House, the Japanese restaurant chain that randomly shut down one day in 2020 (pre-covid). Their salad dressing was really good.

deanc 5y ago

For those looking into this more the term used is BIR. British Indian Restaurants. There’s plenty of folks online doing their best to share the secrets of the British curry house. One such is Dan Toombs (The Curry Guy). Essentially the majority of British Indian curries are made using a base gravy and different items are added to differentiate them. Giving each curry house its own distinct flavour that’s present between most dishes on the menu.

JoeAltmaier 5y ago

Silly to say something is or isn't Indian. A country with 100 languages has as many varieties of curry. The author seems blithly unaware of this?