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Madhur Jaffrey's recipe for mushroom and black eyed peas/beans similarly improves over a few hours after cooking finished. That is not the point.
The heavy components of flavour, such as chilli, cardamom etc will remain for some time, and you may find, as often observed with casserole that you prefer this matured flavour.
Lighter notes which give the dish the more nuanced spice flavours are not long lasting: the volatile aromatic oils which carry them are quickly lost. Ginger, especially.
Of course, this only applies where the original dish contained such fresh ingredients, if they were not there to begin with, then they aint there to be lost.
So I guess that ultimately, it all comes down to how you make your curry.
It applies not only to curries. When I make a pizza, I often add quite a bit of oregano. This is an intensive flavour which almost completely disappears from cold and reheated left over pizza. Although in this instance it is simple to add some more oregano before reheating.
That does not work for ginger/curry. Obviously you can ginger flavour your reheated curry, but if does not incorporate the flavour in the way that Indian culinary techniques attain.
ps I would never/ have never, make a curry using so called 'curry powder'. Once in 1960's, I complained about a meal in work's canteen. I got told yes it is a curry because it had curry powder added to it! I guess that put me off for life. Later in life, I had a colleague who was Indian, and she was a fantastic cook. We were a department who often socialised and invited the others to dine with us. Since she was a single lady, and cooking for more than a dozed ant that easy, I used to offer to go round a few hours early and help her with the prep. So I got to learn Indian Cooking as done in the home. (Very different to Indian Restaurant style)
Replied: 30th Nov 2022 at 13:09