currypuff

Curry Puff was the last thing my Mum wanted to make before her operation; when she was still conscious. That was what she promised the wonderful nurses at her ward at Mt Elizabeth. She never fulfilled that promise. Not that she could. Making curry puffs may sound like a lot of work for most. And having tried it, I can tell you it is not for the lazy. But it seemed like my Mum loved making it, even when her own health was failing. And it never failed to please. Family, friends, church members and even clergymen had been amazed by her packets of pastry encrusted curried potato with bits of chicken and a slice of hard-boiled egg. A snack it may be but it was always difficult to stop at just one or two. When you had downed your third, you knew that you have had your meal. It has taken me a while. I finally got round to making her curry puff. So, how did it go? Did we nail it? We did press it, roll it, fill it, fry it. My gifted niece with her nimble hands worked at the pastry. There is a simple but interesting art in making the spiral design using two types of dough. Since Old Chang Kee crust is plain and simple - and it looks like thousands here love it - the bother to do the pastry this way was not so much to please the palate but to honor my Mum's tradition. If I am to call it "Auntie Ruby's Curry Puff", it better be. Her curry puff raised the bar very high. And this is one reason why I will hesitate to claim that we have arrived just after 2 tries. No, it is going to take us a many more rounds to perfect it. In fact the first batch I made tasted so different that my dear called it a "Curry Poof." We were dismayed with it. We were amazed by it (version 1.2). But did we nail it? My Mum's recipe Let's just say that the filling was spot on but mastering the crust - texture, design, size, consistency - will need some further rounds of puffing. Her written recipe for the pastry seemed amiss and it was either her mistake or more likely, her scribe's. After all, it was written that the inner pastry needed 500 kg of flour. Wow. I can imagine Terry Wonka and his Curry Puff Factory as he dives and disappears into giant heaps of flour. This written recipe is certainly not inerrant though her original recipe must be almost flawless by the time she had made her hundredth batch (and each batch is usually >100 pieces). This written recipe was an important guide but we had to trace the errors to get closer to her original version. And I think we are getting very close. Some pieces looked and tasted exactly like hers only to have the next few cracking up or inconsistent. But they all tasted very nice...poof, puff, puff, poof again... but more puffs than poofs, we are getting there. I will first describe her curry puff and why I think it was so good and popular. And then, you get her "true" recipe. The Filling It is not rocket science to do the filling well but I still wonder why so many versions I have tasted did not get this right. I think one reason is the effort put into making the pastry sometimes overshadows the need to do the filling well. Firstly, her potatoes are cut into half a cm squares. They are not chunky like Old Chang Kee's. And there is no mashing here. It is all hand-cut. Then the diced potato cubes are fried separately first. This ensures separation and subsequent coating with the dry curry spices. For convenience, my Mum used curry powder. Curry powder is basically powder of spices like coriander, aniseed, cloves etc along with chilli powder and turmeric powder. If the powder is fresh, by all means use it. Then she blends the shallots, yellow ginger and dried chilis. She also added curry leaves. There is the usual chicken meat. But she always added prawn meat for the sweetness and some variety to the texture. Adding a piece of boiled egg was a later addition at my request as the famous local versions all have it (and I love especially the old Old Chang Kee which used to be sold very near the old site of Trinity Theological College). All this is done in the wok. In a sense, the filling wasn't difficult to do. Just put in some effort and the steps are not unlike those needed to make good curry chicken. Done right (don't over cook the potato), the filling is very very good. We used to love eating it with white bread whenever she had leftover filling. At this point I will say that the written recipe seems to have gotten the meat-potato proportion wrong. The 1:5 ratio can be improved on to about 1:4 or even 1:3 if you, like me, love more chicken in your puff. The Pastry It is important to note that her version does not use the western puff pastry. It is closer to Old Chang Kee's. The flakiness is introduced through the way the dough is rolled our and prepared. Apart from making the puff pretty, spiraling the puff with two types of dough (outer water dough, inner oily dough) introduces interesting variation in the texture. It enhances the eating experience. If you like this is not a "stereo-type" puff of just crust and filling. As you sink your teeth into it, the music seems to come from multiple directions as you crunch into the varying textures in the crust and filling along with the exploding flavours of every bite. Ironically, her written recipe had some significant errors. That is understandable as Mum made her version from experience and hand-feel. Maybe the scribe was hard of hearing on the fateful day when my Mum rattled off her recipe. Maybe my Mum just estimated and got her sums wrong. The written ratio of a glass of water to 1 kg of flour was definitely off. I suppose this is what this blog is about. I could have just copied her recipe and pasted it here. Without sight nor taste to guide you, the recipe is as helpful as giving you a song's lyrics and asking you to sing it when you have not even heard the music or song before. A score will be slightly more helpful ( and most good cookbooks help us that way) but still, unless you have tasted it yourself, you will never be sure. In any case, here is what I believe a written recipe of my Mum's famous curry puff should look like. Bear in mind that my Mum was always on a quest for the best. Don't let the work involved put you off, especially her two-dough spiral approach. You can easily modify it to something simpler i.e just use the outer pastry and your guests will still be speechless! (after all, how can anyone speak when his mouth is full of the puffy goodness? :)) ------------------------ Auntie Ruby's Curry Puff's Recipe by Aunty Ruby Wong and son, aka The Food Canon To serve 40 pieces Filling Chicken – 200 g Prawn Meat– 300 g cut into small pieces/ cubes Big onion 1 bulb (or shallots) – cut into small pieces Potatoes – 0.5 kg Remove skin Cut into small cubes of half a cm Fry in some of oil Remove fried potatoes Use oil to fry paste Paste Dried chillies – 10 pieces, soak in hotwater and blend Lemon grass – 3 sticks Shallots – 15 pieces Buah keras – 5 pieces Yellow ginger – ½ thumb Blend into paste Curry powder – 2 Tbsp Cooking the filling Using some oil, fry paste till fragrant. Add curry powder Add curry leaves – 20 leaves Add salt – 2 teaspoon Add sugar – 4 teaspoon Add chicken, prawns, diced onion, potatoes Add ½ bowl of water for smooth texture Hard boil 5 eggs. Cut each egg length-wise into 8 pieces. Curry puff pastry (outside) Plain flour – 500 gm Margarine - 100 g Salt – 1 teaspoon Cold water – 1 cup (about 200 ml) Mix, knead flour Separate into 3 balls Curry puff pastry (inside) Plain flour – 250 gm Margarine - 150 g Mix, knead flour Separate into 3 balls Making the curry puff (Check the visuals below) Flatten outside pastry Wrap around inside pastry ball Flatten both Roll up and flatten - 3 times Cut roll into 3 mm width Flatten individual pastry into puff toplace ingredients Close pastry over ingredients and create the side "flower". Ready for deep frying For storage: These puffs are suitable for freezing and to be fried just before serving. Place puffs on plastic sheets. Set each piece separately. Place in freezer To Cook To deep-fry immediately after removing from freezer. Don’t thaw. Fry it in low heat. The oil must be gently bubbling. When it is light brown and the bubbling has stopped, remove it. If you leave it in there for too long, it will absorb the oil. Best eaten about half an hour later when the puff is warm but not hot. So, how healthy is this snack? I can tell you that you cannot enjoy it and hope to have a healthy option. It is carbo heavy (pastry, potato) and the deep frying will impart some oil, though with good technique, you can minimise that. But it is not unlike other types of fried snacks. Just eat it in moderation.It can be lunch in itself. Summary I will make a video at some point as I think that is the best way to show you how to make the spiral pastry. Meanwhile, the photos below may be helpful if you already have some experience in making pastry. Even if you do not two-dough the pastry or make the spiral, it will still be a great curry puff using parts of her recipe. You can use the recipe for the outside pastry. That will work well too. Even store-bought pastry will taste better with her filling. This post won't be the last on her curry puffs. As with all her classic recipes, they just deserve more attention to details so that you can enjoy some of the tastes which I was so blessed to grow up with. I will work at better ways of helping you to replicate her recipes. Stay tuned.