Baba's

Baba's is a spice and food mix label known for curry powders in the South Indian style, made for Tamil and South Indian cooking. Its range runs from ground spices and blends for meat curries to ready mixes for breakfast dishes and sweets.

From Baba's we carry curry powder for meat in a standard and a hot and spicy version, plain chilli powder and a sambar mix. For breakfast there is an uppuma mix under upma and vada mix, and for sweets, kesari and payasam mixes under kheer and payasam mix.

Meat curry powder is fried in oil with onions, curry leaves and a little fennel before the chicken or mutton goes in, and the hot version suits Chettinad style curries and anyone who wants more heat. Sambar mix is stirred into toor dal with tamarind water and drumstick, okra or shallots. The uppuma mix becomes a quick breakfast with a tempering of mustard seeds, and the kesari and payasam mixes turn out sweets for a pooja or a birthday in minutes. Chilli powder goes into everything from fish fry marinades to the tadka for a dry potato curry, so it is the tin most families finish first.

Ground blends keep their punch longest in a closed jar, away from the heat and steam of the hob. To compare, see our Madras curry powder and the dessert mixes from Alagappa's.