The word Balti literally means ‘bucket’. Rather than a dish or single recipe, Balti is more a way of preparing food in a round-bottomed pan similar to a wok, also known as a karahi. It has been said that the style comes from an area between Pakistan and China called Baltiyul, Baltisatan or Little Tibet. Balti started out in Birmingham around the 70’s, becoming increasingly popular in the 90’s.

It is a self-contained meal served with naan and/or rice. It features a good number of peppers and coriander leaves, quickly cooked over a high heat with meat off the bone or vegetables in a sauce.

Bhuna is a method of cooking, hence the western world has adopted the name, which originating from the Bengal area of India and Bangladesh. The process is key to this dish. To start wioth the oil is be heated to a high temperature, then all the spices are added and fried, bringing the mix to a paste. As a result a strong fragrance will likely fill your kitchen. The dish itself is a mild to medium with regards to heat and its usually quite dry with very little thick sauce present.

Chaat is a term describing savory snacks, typically served at road-side tracks from stalls in India. It has become immensely popular in the rest of South Asia.

There are common elements among the chaat variants including yogurt, onions and coriander. Other ingredients include Sev (small dried yellow salty noodles); and chaat masala which typically consists of amchoor (dried mango powder), cumin, Kala Namak (rock salt), coriander, dried ginger, black pepper, and red pepper. The ingredients are combined and served on a small metal plate or a banana leaf, dried and then served in a bowl.

This is a Parsi dish, combining elements of Gujarati cuisine as well. It’s

traditionally a hot, sweet and sour dish made with mutton, lentils and vegetables which are mixed together and served with rice. Commonly the lentils are red split lentils [masoor] or pigeon peas although some restaurants will use chana daal.

Jalfrezi is an Indo-Chinese method of cooking. Some say it was a dish designed to use up leftovers. In the Hindu world this was not really done so one  would assume that it is more of a British myth. Stir-fried in a hot pan, this dish would include onions, green peppers, fresh tomatoes and fresh green chilli. The flavours would explode with the hot pan and seep into the meat or fish, giving a pungent, hot carnival of flavour. Nowadays the meat or fish is freshly marinated, eliminating any leftovers. However, it’s a good dish to choose for your Christmas left-overs.

The dish karahi takes its name from the pan that it is cooked in. A karahi is similar to a wok, but with steeper sides. The dish itself is similar to a Balti, but is more stew-like in its consistency and requires plenty of time to prepare. There are many variations to this dish [as with the spelling] depending on which region of India it comes from. Some of the most common versions feature a green chilli and tomato base reduced down to a relative thick sauce which has a medium-hot flavour.

The word ‘korma’ is derived from Urdu ḳormā or ḳormah, meaning ‘braise’, derived in turn from Turkish kavurma, literally meaning ‘cooked meat’.

The dish is cooked over a low heat with a combination of spices which mainly  consist of cumin, coriander seeds, onions ginger and garlic. Marinated in yoghurt , kormas are slow cooked in their own juices so that the yoghurt sauce does not split. Some use saffron to flavour and colour the dish although this technique is seldom used in any restaurant.

The Madras dish takes its name from the city of Madras. The name for the dish is not used in India and is in fact a British invention which originated in its restaurants. This dish has a sour sweet fruity flavoured sauce, made from tamarind especially for this purpose. It is often laden with red chilli powder or paprika for the red colour, depending on the heat required for the dish.

There is no particular style of moghlai cuisine.  Like its language, Moghlai cuisine was adapted by the Turks and Persians during the middle ages and evolved into some of most aromatic dishes prepared by Indian chefs.

Dishes include various Kebabs, Kofta (meatballs), Nihari, Pulao (a.k.a. Pilaf in Central Asia), and Biryani. Paneer is used for preparing vegetarian dishes to suit vegetarian dietary requirements. A dish with the name ‘Shahi’ (Royal) is an indicator of its mughlai origins.

Rogan Josh is the signature dish of Kashmir, brought over by the Moghuls and adapted by the Persians. Traditionally this is not a hot dish, as the chillies used are called ‘Kashmiri’ - this dish has become a staple of the British restaurant.

There are variations where some regions or sects will not use onions and garlic. It consists of braised lamb chunks cooked with a gravy based on browned onions or shallots, yogurt, garlic, ginger and aromatic spices, cloves, bay leaves, cardamom and cinnamon.

Saag is a classic spinach dish with a number of variations. The most notable include ‘sarson ka saag’ and the regular saag you will get in a restaurant. Sarson ka saag is a classic Punjabi recipe which you will not find in any restaurant. Its preparation requires a lengthy cooking process which takes several hours and is purely vegetarian, featuring a selection of palak, mustard leaves and Bathua (chenopodium album weed). Saag is generally made from palak which is mature fully grown spinach leaves. Today restaurants will offer saag mixed with some protein i.e. Chicken, lamb or paneer. The restaurant style is usually fried or made in the bhuna method and is of a mild heat but spicy.

The Vindaloo was originally a Portuguese dish which took its name from the two main ingredients: ‘vinho’ (wine/wine vinegar), and ‘alhos’ (garlic). Over time it was spiced up and altered by the indigenous peoples of the ex-Portuguese colony of Goa. Not many restaurants produce an authentic Goan vindaloo not least because the pork used by Christian Goans in their recipe would not be acceptable to Muslim chefs. In some restaurants the vindaloo is just a pumped-up madras i.e. the same recipe but with a lot more chilli powder. Other restaurants have interpreted the ‘aloo’ part of the name as meaning potato and introduced diced potato to a hot standard curry with added lemon juice for tartness and black pepper for extra pungency. Very hot.