Der Feuervogel aufersteht.

It's getting cooler out, and I love a nice curry in fall. A friend shared a link to a recipe for homemade curry roux, and we tried the basic recipe once. It was fine, but I thought about the various other flavors of curry I've gotten in the boxes at the Japanese grocery store, and I decided to try something a little different.

3 Tbsp butter
1/4 c flour
1.5 Tbsp garam masala
0.5 Tbsp hot curry powder (or to taste; should add up to 2 Tbsp) [I use Sharwood's Hot.]
1 Tbsp cinnamon
1 tsp pureedpowdered ginger
1 Tbsp molasses
1 Tbsp tonkatsu sauce or ketchup

1. Melt the butter over medium low heat.
2. Mix the flour, garam masala, ginger, and cinnamon in and stir until they form a thick paste.
3. Stir in the ginger, molasses, and tonkatsu sauce, and cook until it starts to crumble. (This takes 5-10 minutes, so don't fret.) Set aside.
4. Add roux to curry as directed in the original recipe.
5. Don't forget to add some damn salt to the pot at some point.

(Edited 10/29/13)
--cook's notes: 5 cups water is too much for this amount of flour to thicken properly, but 4 cups doesn't cover the potatoes enough. May need to scale?

As I promised acari. This is a family recipe; I don't know where it originated. US to metric conversions done either using math (1 lb butter= 2 cups; 1 lb= 2.2 kg; 5 ml= 1 tsp; 3 tsp= 1 Tbsp) or here.

3/4c (170 g) shortening (I use butter for chewy cookies; shortening will give you a crispier cookie)
1 cup (200 g) sugar
1 egg
5 Tbsp (75 mL) molasses (or black treacle)
2 cups (250 g) flour
2 tsp (10 mL) baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp powdered ginger
1 tsp cinnamon

a. Preheat oven to 375F/190C.
1. Mix dry ingredients in a bowl.
2. Cream butter and sugar together. Add egg and molasses.
3. Gradually add dry ingredients to wet.
4. Chill dough.
5. Form into balls and roll in sugar. Place on cookie sheet and press flat with bottom of glass dipped in sugar.
6. Bake for 10 minutes. Cool completely on a rack.

These are also delicious if you put lemon curd between them as sandwich cookies. (You'll want to refrigerate them if you do that so the lemon curd doesn't spoil. You'll also want to make the cookies about 1" in diameter rather than 2".)

(I should point out that the version of the recipe I have just lists the ingredients and says "chill dough." then the part I have as step five up until the parenthesis. You're welcome.)