Hi GS, while I'm sure there are restaurants that use dashi in their curry, I'd say this is probably the exception rather than the rule. Curry came here from Europe (the British brought it from India, but it also has French influences) and is considered a form of Yōshoku(Western food). While these Western dishes are adapted to the Japanese palette it's fairly uncommon to use dashi in these types of dishes (beef stew, hayashi rice, hamburg steak, are a few other examples). If you look the ingredients on a pack of curry roux you'll also see that there's no dashi. The only exception is Curry udon. This is a dish that was created by a Japanese noodle shop to compete with trendy Western restaurants at the time, so dashi is used as the base for this type of curry (you can see my recipe here: https://norecipes.com/curry-udon-recipe/) I hope this helps!

Great recipe! I have been cooking and scouring the internet for the past year and half trying to come up with the ultimate Japanese Curry. I have watched hours of YouTube videos in which restaurants make curry and any hint from others recipes to duplicate a high restaurant quality curry. It seems that the best Japanese curries usually use dashi. Some of these Japanese restaurants dashi also incorporate the dried fish (flying, herring sardines) and two kinds of bonito, and possible matcha. Why doesn’t your recipe use dashi or a combination of chicken stock and dashi?
Many Thanks,
GS

Hi Anna, I'm so happy to hear you enjoyed this! Great idea adding some cheese on top. Doria is a popular casserole dish here in Japan that's kinda like a rice gratin. It's made by layering rice with some kind of sauce (like bolognese, bechamel, curry, etc) and topping with cheese before baking.

Yum! I have been looking for a curry rice recipe that hits all the right notes, and I think this is it! Less fussy than others, and fewer ingredients as well! I even made your curry powder recipe too (only had 18 of the 20 spices, but it worked!). I did add 1/2 tbsp of Garam Masala to add a little more “zestiness” but that’s about it! I did follow the lead of a curry rice restaurant in my area (Portland, OR) and put some cheese on top, and stuck it under the broiler for a moment. I believe they call it “curry doria.” Yum!!

Hi Naomi, I'm happy to hear you've been enjoying this! Thanks for taking the time to let me know 😃

Thank you Marc for this recipe, which I’ve made several times, and always with impressive results. The flavors are complex and far superior to the boxed roux. I make it with beef (chuck roast). It’s been a hit with guests and family every time. Thank you!

That's a good idea. You might need to experiment a little, but I think you'll have more control over the bitterness if you do it yourself. The varieties of mandarin we get in Japan have very thin skin and they're not all that bitter (even with the pith) so I usually just scrub them very well and peel them in wide strips. Then cut them into thin strips before sun-drying (if you dry them whole they not only take longer, they're harder to grind into a powder). Alternatively you could also try zesting fresh mandarins and then drying the zest, but this is going to require a TON to get enough zest and you might find that it makes the citrus flavor too intense.

It was store bought. Next time I will try to make my own removing all the pith. I read you can remove bitterness from dried store bought ones through a soaking process, and then I guess dry them again to put in curry powder

Yikes, sorry to hear that! did you use store bought dried mandarin peels or did you dry them yourself?

Don't use too much or the mandarin peel in the curry powder it's super bitter. Now I have a heap of extra bitter powder I don't know how to fix. Curry was nice even though too bitter