Vindaloo

Vindaloo is a curry dish known globally in its British form as a staple of curry houses and Indian restaurants, specifically a fiery, spicy dish that can be made with a choice of meats. Vindaloo's name derives from the Portuguese Goan dish carne de vinha d'alhos (meat with garlic vinegar) or vindalho, made with pork.^[1][2]

Starting in the 19th century, the Portuguese dish was transformed into the British vindaloo curry. When the British took over Goa, they took over the colony's cooks, and Anglo-Indian cuisine acquired "Portuguese curry". This was then applied to meats including beef and duck. In the 20th century, some recipes called for lemon juice in place of wine vinegar, possibly because British Muslim chefs intentionally omitted it. As a postwar British restaurant dish, vindaloo became popular as the curry to eat after pub closing time. The drunken clientele then demonstrated its machismo by ordering a specially hot curry. Potatoes are sometimes added through confusion with Hindi aloo.

A standard element of Goan cuisine derived from the Portuguese carne de vinha d'alhos (meat in wine and garlic marinade; literally "meat of wine of garlic"^[3]), vindalho or vindaloo is a dish of pork marinated in vinegar and garlic.^[4][5] This was adapted by the local Goan cooks with the substitution of palm vinegar for the wine, and the addition of spices.^[6]

According to the food writer Raghavan Iyer, cooks in Goa were free to use pork, a meat avoided by Hindus and Muslims in India, because they had been converted to Christianity by the Portuguese.^[7] The historian of food Lizzie Collingham writes that formerly high-caste Goans made a point of eating pork and beef as they had acquired outcaste status by becoming Christians, and accordingly had to emphasize their closeness to the Portuguese, such as by eating vindalho.^[8] Collingham writes that the Goans did not have vinegar, so the Portuguese there used sour tamarind, or made vinegar from coconut palm toddy. In addition, she states that the Portuguese liked their food extremely spicy-hot, with up to 20 chili peppers in a recipe.^[8]

Traditional Goan vindalho does not include potatoes; some Indian versions add them due to the confusion with the Hindi आलू aloo, "potato".^[9][10]

• Pork vindalho, served in Lisbon, Portugal, in a Goan-style Indian restaurant, 2011

When the British took over Goa from the Portuguese, they took over the colony's cooks. As a result, Anglo-Indian cuisine in the 19th century took on vindaloo or "Portuguese curry". Its method of preparation was then used for other kinds of meat, including especially duck.^[11] W. H. Dawe's 1888 cookery book, The Wife's Help to Indian Cookery, gave a recipe for "Vindaloo or Bindaloo—A Portuguese Kárhí", suggesting beef, pork, or duck as the meat.^[12] London's Veeraswamy restaurant, opened in 1926, served the same sort of British Raj food, including duck vindaloo in its early years.^[13] Vindaloo became widespread in Britain with the creation of more Indian restaurants in the 1970s.^[14]

The food writer Glyn Hughes suggests that at that time, British Muslim chefs intentionally omitted the pork and the wine vinegar called for by the Portuguese recipe, substituting chicken or beef as the meat and lemon juice for the vinegar.^[15] Iyer on the other hand gives a recipe for "British Curry House Vindaloo" which uses both vinegar and pork, along with both mild spices and "potent-hot" chili.^[16] A variant theory, from the food writer Pat Chapman, is that vindaloo served in British restaurants is not based on the Portuguese dish, but simply a version of the standard medium spicy (Madras) restaurant curry with the addition of vinegar, potatoes and plenty of chili peppers.^[17] Felicity Cloake however writes that the dish is Sweet and sour rather than hot, and that the "tangy gravy works best with rich meats like duck or pork".^[18]

The name "vindaloo" was effectively redefined in postwar British usage to mean simply an extremely hot curry, contrasting with a mild korma.^[19] Vindaloo has indeed featured in "challenge" competitions to see who can eat such a hot curry.^[20] Collingham writes that the habit of British Indian restaurants of the period of staying open late, after pub closing time, allowed working class Britons to discover "that a good hot vindaloo went down particularly well on a stomach full of beer", and people became accustomed to have a curry after an evening's drinking.^[21] This was accompanied by the "lager-loutish tradition of rolling, uproariously drunk, into an Indian restaurant and proving one's machismo by ordering the hottest vindaloo or phaal possible".^[22] Vindaloo was introduced to Hong Kong when it was a British colony. In 2020 the food and beverage manager of the region's Aberdeen Boat Club described it as one of its most commonly ordered dishes.^[14]

• Prawn vindaloo with rice, Germany, 2021
• Lamb vindaloo served in Helsinki, Finland, 2011

The 1998 Fat Les song "Vindaloo" is named for the curry.^[23] The actor and songwriter Keith Allen stated that the dish was appropriate for the sort of song that a "right-wing lout" would like.^[24]

• Chapman, Pat (2004). The New Curry Bible. London, UK: Metro Publishing. ISBN 978-1-84358-087-4.
• Collingham, Elizabeth M. (2006). Curry: A Tale of Cooks and Conquerors. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-517241-8.
• Iyer, Raghavan (2022). On the Curry Trail: Chasing the Flavor That Seduced the World. New York: Workman Publishing. ISBN 978-1523511211. OCLC 1374192575.