I am always a bit sceptical when someone contacts us and says they’ve created a curry kit that allows you to make a meal at home that tastes just like a restaurant dish. Surely it can’t be that easy I think. I make a lot of curries at home and those that come from a kit or jar are generally not that great.

So when Bang sent me a pack of their kits to try I set my expectations to medium. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised. This weekend I made their dhal and a beef madras with their very simple kits and I was very happy with both. The dhal in particular was excellent.

Here’s my review and some (poor) photos of the process.

Bang Dahl

So I started with the Dahl. This actually has the longest cooking time, 25 minutes according to their instructions, which includes soaking time. You can see from the photos what you get in the pack, a portion of lentils and a spice mix. To that you need to add an onion and a clove of garlic and they suggest chopped tomatoes as an option too. As this is a dahl you can pretty much add whatever you like, some chopped nuts? throw them in.

It’s a very simple meal to prepare, soak the lentils in a pan for 10 minutes or so, then bring them to the boil and simmer. I didn’t add salt and I don’t think it needs any. Meanwhile chop your onion and garlic and fry these in oil or ghee until they’re nice and brown. This gives them a good caramelised flavour but don’t go crazy and burn them unless you like that burned flavour.

Once your lentils have thickened to a porridge-like consistency, mix in the ingredients and serve. You can fry some chopped tomatoes (2) with the onions for a few minutes before mixing if you wish and then garnish with fresh coriander. I ate mine with some chapatis (and forgot to take a photo!)

Overall I loved it. Really good flavour, very easy to make and plenty of scope for adding different options in the future. I will definitely buy it again.

Bang Madras

In many ways the Madras is even easier than the Dhal to make. Again you get two pouches and this time as well as the spice mix, you get a pouch of dried onions, ginger and garlic. You add a little water to the spices to make a paste and then add some water and a splash of oil to the onion mix and fry. I also added ½ can of chopped tomatoes to make the sauce a bit thicker.

You then combine the two and add a bit more water and your meat or veg of choice and simmer away until it is cooked. All very simple.

There’s a really bad photo of the end product below which I ate with plain rice but the flavour and consistency were good. It was reasonably spicy and certainly tasted like a madras. There’ s scope once again for varying this dish, you could certainly add your own fried onions and other veg, it really depends on how you like madras.

Both dishes did pretty much what was promised and were simple to prepare so well worth giving a try. Prices vary depending on how many packs you order but they’re around £2.50 each and they can be purchased online here or in Waitrose.

Going to try the Bahjis next with a Jalfrezi so will let you know how I get on.