spicy

Our next Heston recipe is going to be chicken tikka masala.
I say 'our', but things do not look good when even Husband admits this one looks like the most complicated and time consuming Heston recipe yet - and that really is saying something. I have already told him that the faff of the preparation is likely to send me over the edge; I just want to eat it - although I will probably end up helping him anyway.

However, we both went to the supermarket this evening to get the spices we didn't already have at home.
This was the first step towards the edge.

The recipe requires coriander seeds, green cardamom pods, black cardamom pods, cinnamon sticks, black peppercorns, cloves, cumin seeds, mace, bay leaves, Kashmiri chilli powder, ground fenugreek leaves and turmeric.

20g coriander seeds: £1.53*
amount required: 100g

49g black peppercorns: £1.66
amount required: 75g

13g cinnamon sticks: £1.47
amount required: 100g

Can you see where this is going? We ended up spending over £30 on spices - and we hadn't found all we'd needed.

Got home. Looked online for the other spices. Found them. Out of curiosity, I looked for the spices we'd just bought.

100g coriander seeds: 55p

100g black peppercorns: 85p

100g cinnamon sticks: £1.00

All the spices we needed: £8.85

Am returning the supermarket spices.

Still, we got the school vouchers.
Thinking about it, that could be a good way to get back at the supermarkets; buy something expensive, get the school vouchers, return expensive thing, keep vouchers.
Bob's your school's uncle.

Will keep you updated on the cooking progress.

* US readers: double those prices for a near-enough $ equivalent