The roots of Japan's Indian curry • Hacker News Board

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#31

Post by dole » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:17 PM UTC

rjh29 wrote: post #8

BozeWolf wrote: post #6

Ahh, I absolutely love this. I frequently prepare this for dinner. This is how you do it: https://youtu.be/QhsrBz9Cceg (nope, see edit.) Fun thing is, my mom sort of makes this… she learned from my grandma. Almost the same recipe, except for the spring onion and other topings. When i saw this in a japanese cookbook and then the video from Kenji, i was totally amazed. Like if my grandma learned this from Kenji. But we…

Two different types of curry. The article/image are about Indian restaurants in Japan, which tend to have a large naan and a few small metal bowls of curry. The one you're talking about is usually known as 'curry rice' (カレーライス) or 'Japanese curry' and has its roots in English beef stew, but with spice powder added. It is eaten over regular sticky white rice, often with a pork or chicken cutlet on top. I personally lo…

S&B Golden Curry (Mild, orange box) is what I grew up on as “curry rice.”

Onions, potatoes, carrots, beef stew meat, super easy.

https://www.sbfoods-worldwide.com/lp/us/golden-curry/

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#32

Post by JumpCrisscross » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:31 PM UTC

riffraff wrote: post #30

I see your curry imported by British, and I raise you Spaghetti Naporitan[0], pasta with ketchup and american bacon invented by a Japanese who was inspired by US army rations. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naporitan

And “carbonara is an American recipe” [1]. (Budae-jjigae is closer to your example [2].)

[1] https://www.ft.com/content/6ac009d5-dbfd-4a86-839e-28bb44b2b...

[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budae-jjigae

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#33

Post by sowbug » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:32 PM UTC

rjh29 wrote: post #8

BozeWolf wrote: post #6

Ahh, I absolutely love this. I frequently prepare this for dinner. This is how you do it: https://youtu.be/QhsrBz9Cceg (nope, see edit.) Fun thing is, my mom sort of makes this… she learned from my grandma. Almost the same recipe, except for the spring onion and other topings. When i saw this in a japanese cookbook and then the video from Kenji, i was totally amazed. Like if my grandma learned this from Kenji. But we…

Two different types of curry. The article/image are about Indian restaurants in Japan, which tend to have a large naan and a few small metal bowls of curry. The one you're talking about is usually known as 'curry rice' (カレーライス) or 'Japanese curry' and has its roots in English beef stew, but with spice powder added. It is eaten over regular sticky white rice, often with a pork or chicken cutlet on top. I personally lo…

Co Co Curry in Japan is my favorite of the second kind. It's easy to come close at home, as dole says, but the restaurant lets you pick the exact spice level, and they always get the rice just right: sticky enough to carve out with a spoon, but still porous enough that it absorbs the curry sauce.

Go Go Curry is also worth a visit, and their US franchises are reasonably authentic. But it's a slightly different style: darker sauce that's more tangy than umami.

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#34

Post by sampo » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:38 PM UTC

dagmx wrote: post #18

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #3

Interesting! I take issue with the common claim that 'curry' isn't a thing in a 'real' Indian restaurant. I did a quick survey online and could not find a single solitary Indian restaurant menu without curry on it. From the fanciest to the common takeout joint. There are even chains like 'Curry House'. Let's tone down the virtue signaling in food reviews. It's silly. There are 150 languages in India; there are as man…

The point is that “curry” is a British generalization. Indian restaurants were historically called curry houses as a pejorative. India has many dishes that one might consider a curry, but we have no dish called curry. The only use of the word curry in restaurants is to appeal to British nationals (and anyone they spread their culture to). It’s an artifact of colonialism. I also don’t understand why you think it’s vir…

> Now, there is a word “Kari” in several South Indian languages but it’s used to mean spicy sauce or “kadipoda” which means spice mix, both derived from “black” in reference to the use of black peppercorns.

Is this the same word as "kara", black, in Turkic languages?

Apparently, speculatively, yes: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Japonic/...

Also Japanese "kuro".

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#35

Post by rayiner » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:40 PM UTC

Brajeshwar wrote: post #28

I'm not much into food. I'm kinda the "I eat because I have to." My disclaimer is that I'm not an expert but here are a few interesting stories that might be relevant to this story. I come from a place where there is a huge influence of the Japanese and grew up in folklores punctuated with Japanese stories. I got to know a tad more, when one of my school-friend took a keen interest in digging up British and Japanese…

> Also, most Indian Restaurants in India, if not owned, are pretty much run (cooks, etc.) by Nepalese. And most "Chinese" restaurants by Bengalis. Of course, the "Chinese" food in India are, well, very very Indian-ised.

A great many Indian restaurants in the US are also owned by Bengalis. I visited a Bangladeshi restaurant in Atlanta that was advertised as such. The owner mentioned that most of the Indian restaurants in the city were owned by Bengalis, so he decided to be open about it when he started his own.

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#36

Post by j45 » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:40 PM UTC

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #3

Interesting! I take issue with the common claim that 'curry' isn't a thing in a 'real' Indian restaurant. I did a quick survey online and could not find a single solitary Indian restaurant menu without curry on it. From the fanciest to the common takeout joint. There are even chains like 'Curry House'. Let's tone down the virtue signaling in food reviews. It's silly. There are 150 languages in India; there are as man…

Handy field reference guide:

- Is it possible Indian restaurants like other cuisine were packaged for a non-Indian audience as much as an Indian audience?

- Too many people faint at the sight of having to read and pronounce an Indian name, how might it go with something that isn’t short like naan, cha? Even with naan (which means bread), bread is added on to hear people say bread bread. Cha/chai is tea, and Indians live to hear people say tea tea.

- In this way curry might be a common word added to dishes.

- Next time, at an Indian restaurant, see if you can over hear any Indian guests who exclude the word curry from their sentence when ordering.

- Maybe it’s worth asking Indian mothers if the word curry was used by them.

- The etymology of curry is readily available. At most it’s a style of cooking (like bbq).

- There’s actually over 500 languages in India, but they might have been all the same to the British, so let’s just call it all a curry.

The only dish I can think is kadhi which is made with cooked yogurt. It’s not spelled or pronounced like curry.

I hope that helps with the offence :)

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#37

Post by franciscop » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:42 PM UTC

dagmx wrote: post #22

throw0101c wrote: post #17

Tempura also has foreign origins: > Tempura (天ぷら or 天麩羅, tenpura, [tempɯɾa]) is a typical Japanese dish usually consisting of seafood, meat and vegetables that have been battered and deep fried. The dish was introduced by the Portuguese in Nagasaki through fritter-cooking techniques in the 16th century. The word tempura comes from the Latin word tempora, a term referring to times of fasting when the church dictated t…

A lot of Japanese dishes that are popular today have foreign origins. Tempura, curry, ramen, and salmon for sushi. It’s why I find it hilarious when some people obsess over the authenticity of Japanese food and deride fusion cuisine. It (much like most great cuisines) is the result of intermixing and interpretations of dishes. Many Indian dishes too wouldn’t have existed without foreign interaction. Potato dishes obv…

Salmon for sushi seems not to be the famous story that was going around. Like, it has all the tenets of a nice fake story, talking about Japan and how a foreign more familiar power outsmarted them, but apparently salmon was popular way before Norway theoretically started marketing it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1k4x9FrD5k4

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#38

Post by n1b0m » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:42 PM UTC

Brajeshwar wrote: post #28

I'm not much into food. I'm kinda the "I eat because I have to." My disclaimer is that I'm not an expert but here are a few interesting stories that might be relevant to this story. I come from a place where there is a huge influence of the Japanese and grew up in folklores punctuated with Japanese stories. I got to know a tad more, when one of my school-friend took a keen interest in digging up British and Japanese…

Interestingly, most “Indian” restaurants in the UK are run by Bengalis

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#39

Post by MichaelZuo » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:45 PM UTC

Brajeshwar wrote: post #28

I'm not much into food. I'm kinda the "I eat because I have to." My disclaimer is that I'm not an expert but here are a few interesting stories that might be relevant to this story. I come from a place where there is a huge influence of the Japanese and grew up in folklores punctuated with Japanese stories. I got to know a tad more, when one of my school-friend took a keen interest in digging up British and Japanese…

> Also, most Indian Restaurants in India, if not owned, are pretty much run (cooks, etc.) by Nepalese.

Really? There must be some odd social dynamics behind that because it sounds so implausible going from demographics alone.

Re: The roots of Japan's Indian curry

#40

Post by unmole » Sat, Apr 01, 2023, 4:48 PM UTC

dagmx wrote: post #18

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #3

Interesting! I take issue with the common claim that 'curry' isn't a thing in a 'real' Indian restaurant. I did a quick survey online and could not find a single solitary Indian restaurant menu without curry on it. From the fanciest to the common takeout joint. There are even chains like 'Curry House'. Let's tone down the virtue signaling in food reviews. It's silly. There are 150 languages in India; there are as man…

The point is that “curry” is a British generalization. Indian restaurants were historically called curry houses as a pejorative. India has many dishes that one might consider a curry, but we have no dish called curry. The only use of the word curry in restaurants is to appeal to British nationals (and anyone they spread their culture to). It’s an artifact of colonialism. I also don’t understand why you think it’s vir…

> The only use of the word curry in restaurants is to appeal to British nationals (and anyone they spread their culture to).

So, the Curry Points that dot Hyderabad are artefacts of British colonialism?

> The generalization into “curry” was one of colonial misinterpretation.

Yeah, no. The Telugu kura which is obviously cognate with kari is used to mean, well curry. How about you tone down the misinterpretation and false generalization?