Indian Curry: Frying spices vs marinating the meat in them

I'm on a bit of a quest to make a great lamb vindaloo, and through my research I've seen two pieces of advice (often given together) that I can't quite reconcile. First is to marinate the meat in the spices for up to a day beforehand.

The second is that when making any curry, you should toast the spices separately first and then add the meat afterwards to brown it. It seems impossible to do both!

Any recommendations? My current thought is to toast and grind the whole spices, then marinate the meat with the powder. Then fry the onions and brown the meat from there.

Many thanks

indian-cuisine curry

Best Answer

For Vindaloo, it is not customary (nor necessary) to fry the spices before marinating.

Curries vary quite a bit within and across parts of India. Many do not require the roasting of spices before addition.

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Should you fry curry spices?

Because the spices are added raw, the paste needs to be fried in hot oil when it is used. The moisture stops the spices from burning until all the water has evaporated out and the oil separates. Once this happens, the liquid base and the main ingredients can be added, just like cooking a curry from scratch.

Does curry powder need to be fried?

Most spices in curry powder are oil soluable, not just in oil, but oil that you are actively heating, ie: frying. the trick is not to burn your spices. You will need to place your curry powder in with your browned onions, on a slightly lowered heat, ensuring that you have sufficient oil for the job in hand.

What does frying spices do?

Why Fry Spices? Frying spices in oil gives them a completely different flavor than dry-roasting. When dry-roasted, a spice's flavor changes in fundamental ways: volatile aromatics begin to cook off, while compounds in the spice recombine to form new flavors that are often deeper, roasted, and earthier.

Should you fry your spices?

Frying spices is the fastest, richest way to build flavor. Next time you start cooking, quickly fry your spices in oil. No amount of simmering will extract as much flavor from them as a spice-infused oil will.

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