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Quote:

It's also got a few things going for it that make it a good, if not ideal, camping food. First, it's very hard to screw up.

Someone didn't tell that Chie and Yukiko from Persona 4 that.

SilverTalon01 wrote:

"Very hot" is apparently far more subjective than you might think.

Black pepper is enough to make me sweat, and the server who told me Jamaican Chicken wasn't that hot was a Jerk.

Vaisaga wrote:

Yeah, I have lots of spice lovers in my family and when they're all "Try this, it's not spicy at all!" and when I do I find it to be quite spicy. Maybe I'll just wait until I'm in a situation where a friend orders curry and I'll ask to try a bite.

Your standard Japanese curry is very, very mild. Now whether that would hold true in what is likely to be more of an Asian fusion place in North America, I think you're rolling the dice (not that it would likely be really spicy, but sounds like maybe more than you'd prefer). You could order some S&B mild curry from amazon or some other seller and make a batch. Not even pepperoni hot.

BadNewsBlues wrote:

Someone didn't tell that Chie and Yukiko from Persona 4 that.

I think the idea behind the joke there is that they're such bad chefs, they manage to screw up making curry. It's the equivalent to depictions in western media of assembling a sandwich and setting the kitchen on fire.

Shiroi Hane wrote:

SilverTalon01 wrote:

"Very hot" is apparently far more subjective than you might think.

Black pepper is enough to make me sweat, and the server who told me Jamaican Chicken wasn't that hot was a Jerk.

Anyone who tells you any Jamaican food isn't that spicy is either messing with you or has built up a serious resistance. They're obsessed with the Scotch Bonnet pepper, whose Scoville rating is 100,000 to 350,000 (or, as Alton Brown puts it, eating one "is like dipping your tongue in molten iron") which winds up in almost anything that isn't a dessert. Jamaican food also has some pretty innocuous names too, like Mannish water, a goat soup way spicier than how I like my curry.

If I ever get a chance to try out curry, I'll stick to the mild flavors.

Quote:

Check your local Asian supermarket for a brick of pre-made curry mix (several Japanese moms have told me that it tastes better than trying to make your own).

Can confirm this through personal experience. I took a liking to curry when I visited Japan last year (had it as part of breakfast most mornings) so I tried a few times to make it from scratch. It decidedly came out as something other than curry. Then I tried S&B brand Golden Curry mix and voila! Easy perfection, and in about a third of the time that it takes to make from scratch. Works just fine with chicken or pork for the meat, too.

The one caution? Curry can stain plastic implements like few other foods can.

Vaisaga wrote:

Yeah, I have lots of spice lovers in my family and when they're all "Try this, it's not spicy at all!" and when I do I find it to be quite spicy. Maybe I'll just wait until I'm in a situation where a friend orders curry and I'll ask to try a bite.

I have a pretty low tolerance for spicy heat (mild buffalo sauce is my upper limit) and I find Japanese curry to be very mild - so much so that when I'm using the mild version of the above I usually add in extra curry powder just to get even a little zing in it.

leafy sea dragon wrote:

Ehtiopian and Sri Lankan food can be quite merciless in spiciness. While it's not a hard and fast rule, something I've noticed is that the warmer the climate, the more likely something will be very spicy.

This comes as little surprise. Before electrical refrigeration was widespread, the need to prevent food spoilage was at its most drastic in warm climates. The introduction of chilli peppers to temperate areas provided a convenient solution, given their preservative properties.

Shiroi Hane wrote:

SilverTalon01 wrote:

"Very hot" is apparently far more subjective than you might think.

Black pepper is enough to make me sweat, and the server who told me Jamaican Chicken wasn't that hot was a Jerk.

How horrid! Does this mean you are a persona non grata at your local balti house? Woe that anyone should be so deprived.

Key wrote:

The one caution? Curry can stain plastic implements like few other foods can.

Turmeric's healthful qualities come at a cost!

leafy sea dragon wrote:

Japanese cuisine is rarely ever above "incredibly gentle" in terms of spiciness*, and it seems most of the population has not built up that high of a tolerance. (I remember seeing mabo tofu played up as incredibly spicy in Assassination Classroom and Food Wars! Shokugeki no Soma, and when I tried it myself, I could barely even feel it.)

The Chinese Mapo Tofu I've had is spicy, so I'd say that's a result of whoever cooked it for you. I'm also a chili head that uses habaneros for curry, so I think we're at least in the same ballpark.

wikipedia wrote:

Authentic Mapo doufu is powerfully spicy with both conventional "heat" spiciness and the characteristic "mala" (numbing spiciness) flavor of Sichuan cuisine. The feel of the particular dish is often described by cooks using seven specific Chinese adjectives: 麻 (numbing), 辣 (spicy hot), 烫 (hot temperature), 鲜 (fresh), 嫩 (tender and soft), 香 (aromatic), and 酥 (flaky).

Key wrote:

The one caution? Curry can stain plastic implements like few other foods can.

Indeed, turmeric has been used to dye clothes, such as saris and Buddhist monks's robes.

While i do enjoy Japanese Curry, the spiciness is rather mild hence i prefer actual South Asian and South East Asian Curry since it's spicy and taste great thanks to ingredients like turmeric, coconut milk, chili peppers and garlic which if i think Japanese Curry lacks.

My favorite Curries i enjoy are Curry Chicken with potatoes, Chicken Masala, Green Thai Curry and Beef Rendang.

I had katsukare once. It was delicious, and very mild (I'm a supertaster, so spiciness is my enemy), but it was so heavy I couldn't digest it well. Damn shame that the restaurant I had it in closed earlier this year. It was my favorite restaurant.

Vaisaga wrote:

How spicy is Japanese curry? I've always kinda wanted to try curry but I can't handle spicy foods.

I've ordered this "medium hot" curry from Amazon several times (it is really good). But it isn't even remotely hot, that this is from a someone who can only handle the mild of spice hotness. I've also had katsu curry from 7-11 in Japan and again not hot spicy at all.

When I was teaching overseas in 2009, I made curry for dinner one time. I think it was a brand from India, and it turned out pretty spicy. It wasn't five-alarm, but it was a bit of a mouth roaster. XD

I wonder what are the best vegetables that would offset some of the spiciness of some curry, if any?

noriah wrote:

The Chinese Mapo Tofu I've had is spicy, so I'd say that's a result of whoever cooked it for you. I'm also a chili head that uses habaneros for curry, so I think we're at least in the same ballpark.

wikipedia wrote:

Authentic Mapo doufu is powerfully spicy with both conventional "heat" spiciness and the characteristic "mala" (numbing spiciness) flavor of Sichuan cuisine. The feel of the particular dish is often described by cooks using seven specific Chinese adjectives: 麻 (numbing), 辣 (spicy hot), 烫 (hot temperature), 鲜 (fresh), 嫩 (tender and soft), 香 (aromatic), and 酥 (flaky).

Thanks. I'll have to keep looking then, and go for distinctly non-Japanese restaurants or non-Japanese groceries. I do know even Chinese restaurants will typically tone down their spiciness though.

Lactobacillus yogurti wrote:

I had katsukare once. It was delicious, and very mild (I'm a supertaster, so spiciness is my enemy), but it was so heavy I couldn't digest it well. Damn shame that the restaurant I had it in closed earlier this year. It was my favorite restaurant.

Does being a supertaster really affect how well you can tolerate spiciness? I thought it wasn't actually a taste despite also being perceived on the tongue. When I was little, even mint gum was too much for me, but I gradually increased my tolerance over the years until, well, now I'm putting habaneros into my Japanese curry.

Food historians also largely believe that the increase in sales of hot sauce is due to the Baby Boomers' aging, which causes them to become less sensitive to flavors overall--but spiciness tolerance/resistance does not change with age. Hence, they turn to hot sauces to provide the zing to their foods when everything else is waning.

Mr. Oshawott wrote:

I wonder what are the best vegetables that would offset some of the spiciness of some curry, if any?

Coconut, if you consider it a vegetable. It will drastically affect the flavor though.

Capsaicin directly bonds to pain receptors, so the best way to reduce the spiciness is to chemically change it to something else. The very act of cooking destroys some of the capsaicin (which is why raw peppers are so much spicier than when cooked). Milk also contains some substances that chemically react to capsaicin, even when bonded to pain receptors, which is why it's so widely consumed as a complement to very spicy foods. Coconut is the only thing that comes from a plant I can think of that will also react to capsaicin.

leafy sea dragon wrote:

BadNewsBlues wrote:

Someone didn't tell that Chie and Yukiko from Persona 4 that.

I think the idea behind the joke there is that they're such bad chefs, they manage to screw up making curry. It's the equivalent to depictions in western media of assembling a sandwich and setting the kitchen on fire.

This, as well as the anime trope that schoolgirls learning to cook for the first time usually cook curry (probably because the curry blocks are so easy and available), and something always goes wrong when they try to improvise on the recipe.
And watching Chie and Yukiko's new improvisations for ingredients at the grocery store was already warning flags for the guys.

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