Chicken curry
 |
Curry chicken (also referred to as chicken curry) is a common delicacy in South Asia (specifically India and Pakistan), East Asia, as well as in the UK and Caribbean. A typical curry consists of chicken in an onion and tomato-based sauce, flavoured with ginger, garlic, chillies and a variety of spices, often including cumin, cinnamon, cardamom, and so on (depending on cookery style). Chicken curry is sometimes made with a pre-made spice mixture known as curry powder.
Naming
In most places the terms "chicken curry" and "curry chicken" are interchangeable. However, in some regions there is a considered difference between the two terms, even though both dishes include curry and chicken.
One such distinction is concerned with the order of preparation: In adding a curry mixture to chicken meat, the act of "currying the chicken", the name generally is derived from the action. Thus "curried chicken" or the derivative term "curry chicken". If however a curry flavoured sauce is prepared and then chicken pieces added, most commonly done to form a kind of stew, the term "chicken curry" is often used to describe this.
When all is said, depending on the regional difference many cultures call any dish consisting primarily of chicken and curry either, curry chicken or chicken curry. This difference of naming is purely what has developed culturally.
Cultural history
North American history
Behind the name, Country Captain Chicken, the chicken curry dish in North America have become quite popular. The Hobson-Jobson Dictionary states the following:
- "COUNTRY-CAPTAIN. This is in Bengal the name of a peculiar dry kind of curry, often served as a breakfast dish. We can only conjecture that it was a favourite dish at the table of the skippers of ‘country ships,’ who were themselves called ‘country captains,’ as in our first quotation. In Madras the term is applied to a spatchcock dressed with onions and curry stuff, which is probably the original form. [Riddell says: “Country-captain.—Cut a fowl in pieces; shred an onion small and fry it brown in butter; sprinkle the fowl with fine salt and curry powder and fry it brown; then put it into a stewpan with a pint of soup; stew it slowly down to a half and serve it with rice” (Ind. Dom. Econ. 176).]"
- 1792.—"But now, Sir, a Country Captain is not to be known from an ordinary man, or a Christian, by any certain mark whatever." —Madras Courier, April 26.
- c. 1825.—"The local name for their business was the 'Country Trade,' the ships were 'Country Ships,' and the masters of them 'Country Captains.' Some of my readers may recall a dish which was often placed before us when dining on board these vessels at Whampoa, viz. ‘Country Captain.'"—The Fankwae at Canton (1882), p. 33.[1]
This dish has been dated back to the early 1800s. A British Sea Captain stationed in Bengal, India, shared the recipe for this dish with some friends at the then major shipping port in Savannah, Georgia. They then nicknamed this dish "Country Captains" for the officers in India.
In 1940 Mrs. W.L. Bullard from Warm Springs, Georgia is reputed to have served this dish under the name "Country Captain" to Franklin D. Roosevelt (the 32nd president of the United States of America) and to General George S. Patton (a distinguished U.S. Army General). Their warm praise and keen liking and love of this dish were factors in reforging the Southern U.S.A classic status. Roosevelt was so fond of Warm Springs, Georgia, that he built his only self-owned home in Warm Springs. It was a medium sized, six room cottage, that he liked to call "The Little White House", in which he used it for relaxing.[2]
Trinidad and Tobago history
This dish was introduced to the islands by indentured workers who had immigrated from South Asia. At that time, the dish was very similar to the chicken curry dish of South Asia, comprising mostly of curry with few chicken pieces. However, poultry in Trinidad and Tobago was so readily available the dish began consisting of mainly chicken, spiced with curry powder (British). As Trinidadians continued to find their own identity in the world, new curry chicken type dishes began forming. Curry goat and curry duck have become widely popular. Curry chicken and its derivatives are also popular in Jamaica, Grenada, and other Caribbean territories, as well as Guyana in South America.
See also
References
- ^ The Hobson-Jobson Anglo-Indian dictionary: A glossary of colloquial Anglo-Indian words and phrases, and of kindred terms, etymological, historical, geographical and discursive. COUNTRY-CAPTAIN to COWLE. Bibliomania.com Ltd.
- ^ Bunning Stevens, Patricia (October 1998). Rare Bits: Unusual Origins of Popular Recipes. Athens, Ohio, USA: Ohio University Press. ISBN 08-2141-232-9.