Tuesday, June 3, 2008

I lost my curry-ginity

At the meetup I was asked if I'd ever had a curry. Everyone around was horrified to hear the answer was a definitive "no". The looks on their faces was priceless. You'd think I'd said I've never heard of pizza.

Mark (see below) set out to rectify the situation and invited Protium, Thump and I over for a chicken curry and papadum last night. I loved it! No wonder it is about the only thing Lister will eat, although his preferred curry was chicken vindaloo.

I'm really looking forward to having curry again sometime, it was fabulous!

Mark, Paul, Protium

15 comments:

Xavier Onassis said...

Are you sure that's Protium? 'Cause I think it's me!

Fiery said...

He will be quite flattered that you have said so.

Joe said...

The Ramones mention Chicken Vindaloo, but I can't remember which song they do it in. Gaaaaaah, age sucks.

Fiery said...

Joe- Google says it's Ramones "I Just Want to Have Something to do".

Hanging out of Second Avenue
Eating chicken vindaloo
I just want to be with you
I just want to have something to do
Tonight, tonight, tonight, tonight, tonight,tonight
Well allright.

Anonymous said...

I can not believe you've never had curry!! How backward is America :lol:

Nothing beats a nice hot Vindaloo.
We just about keep our local Indian restaurant in business.

A great quote from Lister:
"You're born, and you die. The bit in the middle's called life"

Poodles said...

I would rather have tandori chicken. The smell of curry makes me ill, I can't get past that. The Hulk loves curry though, so I make it sometimes.

Richard said...

My British maternal grandmother spent a good part of her life in India, married to Lieutenant Colonel Norman Taylor of the British Army. She introduced me to Indian food when I was about nine years old. The rest of my family did not like it very much, so once a month she would cook up a true Indian meal, just for the two of us.

That influenced me when I became President of Graduate Students Society of the MacDonald Campus of McGill University

Seeing the cultural diversity of our grad students I arranged a cultural potluck-evening with fun skits. I will never forget the Ultimate Spicy Chicken Vindaloo brought by an Indian couple (it was the wife who was pursuing a PhD). They ate it with all the panache of someone enjoying French Fries. I was in great pain eating it, but they were such a fine couple, I refused to allow the spice to stop me, largely because I really really wanted to acknowledge their contribution.

We were friends for the rest of my years at McGill.

I had another interesting cultural experience in that role. A very beautiful student, of Arabic origin, came to me to complain that she was being harassed by some of the foreign male Arabic graduate students.

Both she and her parents had been born and raised in Canada and were no longer Muslims.

The foreign, male, Arabic students believed that her dress (typical of the time, but licentious to them) was an open invitation to their sexual advances.

I had to bring six of them into my room on campus and, in strong but respectful terms, explain to them that she was not soliciting sex. I kept the discussion to terms of cultural differences, emphasizing that in Canada their behavior was more despicable than failing to pray to Allah for months at a time, or to return home having failed to obtain the degree for which they had come to obtain.

Since they were all funded with 100's of thousands of dollars they quickly grasped that harassing her would garner them enormous scorn 'back home'.

Whew!!!

Richard said...

Quick Fiery, fill a sink, and then pull the plug!!
...
Fiery, Protium, Johnny, OzA, which way does the water spiral on the way down the drain?!!

Here, up on top ;-) it is counter-clockwise.

My lifelong understanding of Coriolis Force, an Apparent Force, is that the water should spin clockwise in drains that are South of the Equator.

However, I recently read an Internet post that rejected that bit of science. I rather doubt the post. So, what does happen??

Fiery said...

OzA- You are definitely not alone in that reaction. In fact, Mark's roommate Tony was also appalled I'd never had a curry. I really quite like them and am looking forward to having another. YUM!

Poodles- Tandori chicken is on my list, now I've underlined it on your recommendation. :D

Richard- Will have to see if there is a sink that would actually reveal the direction it swirls. The toilets are completely different so there's no go on that score.

T T Eyes said...

Ha..I just filled the basin and let the water go and its going counter clockwise, take that myth busters...

The curry night was a hit! and the curry was enhanced by all the delicious side dishes of banana chutney, hot mango and lime pickle, cucumber riata and pappadams yuuummmmmmy :-D

Richard said...

Omigosh, TTEyes,

Now you've 'got me going!
I am flummoxed.

How many repetitions,in the interest of sample size, did you do?

I realize that bowl shape can effect the direction of spin. Does everyone down under have a counterclockwise spin??

If that is so, why? & how? What force is at work?

If all bowls produce the same direction, I will have to, have to, believe in God. It would mean that even science is a lie.
I'd have to kill myself.

Nah, I love my two girls. But what gives?

It's time for spin wars! Who's next??

T T Eyes said...

ok I tried it again, same basin, same result...when I get time I'll try other basins....

I'm flummoxed as well, I'll let you know how the rest of experiments turn out later, work is calling me :)

Protium the Heathen said...

XO: Admit it, we're a couple of hot looking dudes. If you saw the video I made here, you will see I gave you credit for use of the XO style beard :)

Ricardo: I have considered this conundrum for a long time but have never been to the northern hemisphere to experiment. IMHO with extensive testing I have observed most tests conclude water in Australia exits a drain clockwise.

Oz: We're filling her life with new and interesting things ;-)

Joe: Ramones... tsk... tsk ;-)

Thump: Not so much lemon juice in the socks love :-D

SouthLoopScot said...

Curry is good stuff! We have a nice Indian population here in Chicago, so I head up to Devon Avenue once in a while for it!

Richard said...

Right (clockwise) or Left (counter-clockwise), it seems the Aussie 'spin' has not been decided! Protium seems to have an element of first hand certainty, so I thought I would check mine more thoroughly.

I just tested two sinks, letting the water in each lie still first. When I pulled the plug, both eventually went counter clockwise, as per the wiki on Coriolis force (linked to above).

I think we do have opposite spin in our drains, now supported by first hand evidence from opposite sides of the Earth (we're 12 hrs apart), and ~75* of latitude apart --at 31*57' South vs. 43*40' North.

Et tu?

I also checked a satellite photo of Hurricane Susan in the South Pacific, and Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico. If you open them in separate, browser windows, side by side, their opposite spin direction is immediately evident. And its only because our Earth turns, and is round!

If we stop the Earth from turning, will hurricanes and tornadoes end? Of course, if Earth did not turn we would have days and nights that are each 6 months long... and some very freaky winters when nightime and the normal winters (caused by the earth's axis tilt) coincide! Similarly, summer in daytime would surely fry eggs in the shade.

All that suggests how unique our Earth is, but not that God made it.