Curry of Rice
Curry of rice is appropriate with any kind of fish or meat that has been prepared with a sauce. For a family of six persons allow one cup of rice; two and one-half cups of boiling water; two tablespoons of butter; two teaspoons of salt; two teaspoons of curry powder; one-fourth teaspoon of pepper; one teaspoon of minced onion. Wash the rice well, and soak it for two hours in fresh water; then drain. Place the butter and onion in a stewpan and cook them until the onion is yellow; add the rice and stir the whole over a hot fire for five minutes. Draw the pan out of the heat, season with the powder, salt and pepper. stir well and pour in the boiling water. Cover the stewpan and boil rapidly for ten minutes, after which set in a very slow heat to cook for forty minutes, when the curry is ready to serve. CHAUD-FROID OF EGGS (Cold) -Hard boil a half dozen eggs and cut in halves lengthwise. Remove yolks and mash to a paste with a little melted butter, pepper, salt, paprika, and chopped olives or pickles. Mask in Chaud-Froid Sauce. (See chapter on Sauces for Fish, Meats, Poultry and Game.) Garnish each with a star cut from a truffle or from a green or red pepper. These should be served at luncheon or supper.
This is a pilaf method rather than a curry: rice fried in butter with curry powder, then steamed. Note that the page also runs straight into a second, unrelated recipe for chaud-froid of eggs, which is how the original book set it.
- The timing is the problemTen minutes at a hard boil plus forty minutes more will turn modern long-grain rice to paste. With 1 cup rice and 2½ cups water, bring to a boil, cover, and hold on the lowest heat 15-18 minutes, then rest off the heat 10 minutes.
- Skip the soakThe two-hour soak may have suited the rice available when the book was written; today a rinse until the water runs clear is enough. If you do soak basmati, cut the water to about 1½ cups, since soaked grains absorb less.
- Blooming the powderDrawing the pan off the heat before adding the curry powder is the instruction that matters. Curry powder scorches in seconds over a hot fire, and burnt turmeric and coriander turn acrid; the residual heat is enough to open the spices up.
- SaltTwo teaspoons for one cup of rice is heavy by current taste, especially if this accompanies a sauced dish that is already seasoned. Half that is a better starting point.
- StewpanA stewpan here is simply a straight-sided saucepan with a lid. Use the heaviest one you have, or a small Dutch oven, so the bottom layer does not catch during the long low simmer.
- "Very slow heat"On a range of the period this would likely have meant the cooler part of the stovetop. The modern equivalent is the lowest flame, with a heat diffuser if you have one.
- YieldThe book says six, which is right for a side dish: about three cups cooked. As a base under a saucy stew, count on four servings.
- On the egg recipe that followsChaud-froid sauce is a velouté or béchamel set with gelatin and used cold to coat and glaze. It must be applied when just beginning to thicken, and the finished eggs need to go back to the refrigerator promptly.
Butterick's cook book appeared in the era when curry powder was generally a fixture of the Anglo-American store cupboard rather than an Indian ingredient: a pre-blended commercial mix, usually turmeric-heavy, sold by grocers and used sparingly as a flavouring for rice, soups and warmed-over meat. The dish here is arguably closer to the pilau that is often said to have entered British cookery through the East India trade than to any curry proper, and it reads as an accompaniment, something to put under a sauced fish or a fricassee rather than a dish in its own right. The instruction to soak rice for hours and then boil it hard before finishing it slowly reflects a period when rice was expected to be cooked until every grain was thoroughly soft.