Tasty ready made curry's - just boil in the pack.

[Skender]

Hi everyone,

I've just discoverd a VERY yummy "ready to serve" curry range and wanted to share. At 285g it's not at all light weight but it's damn good and would do fine for dinner on a shorter overnight hike or the first night of a multi-day hike.

Today I had the Chickpeas Curry with some lebanese bread and it was delicious.

You can microwave (obviously at home) or just drop the pouch in boiling water for 3-5 minutes and enjoy. I love indian food and must say this would have to be just as good (if not better) than you'd get at the "Curry Bowl" style take aways. And at $1.99 per packet it's a bargain! As a bonus it's "All natural, no preservatives and gluten free!" No I don't work for them

Check out the range here. The one I ate today came from IGA but not sure if it's available at Coles/Woolworths etc.

http://www.pattu.com.au/ready-to-eat.htm

Cheers,
Skender.

[FatCanyoner]

My local Woolies sells them (well, the same concept, if not the same brand). You can also get much better selections from an Indian grocery store. While they are very tasty, they are far too heavy for serious walks. I'd suggest about 60% of the pack is water, which is a lot of wasted effort to carry on a multi-day trip. If you want something quick, easy and delicious for an overnight walk they'd definitely fit the bill (unless, like my wife, you insist on having meat in every meal!!!)

[justacouch]

As Phatty says, these are good for overnighters. So so tasty, and you can avoid all washing up... like this:

- Boil up about 600ml of water (depends on your pot shape)
- Pour some of the boiling water into your freezer bag that has cous cous, olive oil and salt in it. Twist it up and leave it aside.
- Now, throw your boil-in-a-bag indian into your pot as usual.
- When it's done, open the boil-in-a-bag bag up and add the cous cous to the top, mix it through and mung it down from the bag - that's right - FROM THE FLIPPIN' BAG! Deliciously lazy. Mmmm.

They are a bit heavy for long walks though, has anyone tried dehydrating them?

[Skender]

"deliciously lazy"....

Like the sound of the easy cous cous side dish... how much cous cous, olive oil, salt?

[justacouch]

Skender - laziness in this case can joyfully extend beyond the eating of the meal through to the preparation. The last time I mixed cous cous for this was two weeks ago in the carpark of an IGA. Guestimation gets results, and I reckon it's about half a schooner of cous cous, a pinch of salt and a slop of oil for two people.

Adding the right amount of water when you cook it can be tricky though, I usually just cover the cous cous with water and it works alright.

[Orion]

While they are very tasty, they are far too heavy for serious walks.

Try dehydrating them.

I used to carry retort pouch (aka canned) Indian food from two different brands for the first night out. Then I tried dehydrating them and found that they rehydrate fairly well. They don't taste any worse this way. They don't taste any better either, unfortunately, and I eventually got tired of the brown, amorphous gloppiness of them. I still dehydrate and carry the Thai curries that come in these pouches even though making a Thai curry myself isn't really that difficult. Laziness.

[dancier]

This is what my local Safeway has Tastybites and I use them on occasions, very convenient but at 285 grams, the weight stack up after a few days. I might tray and dry them as someone suggested.

http://www.tastybite.com.au/

[Skender]

Hi dancier - are they any good? My local Coles sells these too but at $4 per pack I doubt it would be twice as good as the Pattu.... which I can't find anywhere around here!!

Good to hear they can be dehydrated.

[wildernesswanderer]

Has anyone tried to dehydrate the Pattu packets, I took one on a overnighter with my wife and I and we had that and some rice. They do weigh a bit but they are tasty. We did't cook it the way the packet said, we cooked our rice and then just added the packet to that and heated it until hot. At $2.20 a packet from our local Indian store cheap as well

[Skender]

...... At $2.20 a packet from our local Indian store cheap as well

Hey - which Indian store do you go to?

On my recent overnigher I had the Chickpea one with the Pattu Rice as well.... heated them both in the pot with boiling water and came up really nice.

[wildernesswanderer]

I'm in Tullamarine and the Gladstone Park shopping centre has a little Indian Store. I was expecting them to be around the $4 mark and when I asked he said all the brands they have are $2.20, I bought a couple of packs incase he stuffed up

[Son of a Beach]

Skender - laziness in this case can joyfully extend beyond the eating of the meal through to the preparation. The last time I mixed cous cous for this was two weeks ago in the carpark of an IGA. Guestimation gets results, and I reckon it's about half a schooner of cous cous, a pinch of salt and a slop of oil for two people.

Adding the right amount of water when you cook it can be tricky though, I usually just cover the cous cous with water and it works alright.

Is that a metric 'slop'?

I so a similar thing with cous cous. Just add some cous cous, powdered stock and dried veges (either home-dried or shop bought 'surprise' style) to a bag. Out bush, just add boiling water and let it sit for a few minutes.