Vadouvan (occasionally spelled vaudouvan) is a ready-to-use blend of spices that is a French derivative of a masala known as vadavam, vadagam, or vadakam. It is an Indian

curry A curry is a dish with a sauce seasoned with spices, mainly associated with South Asian cuisine. In southern India, leaves from the curry tree may be included. There are many varieties of curry. The choice of spices for each dish in trad ...

blend with added aromatics such as shallots and garlic. The spice blend is thought to have originated from

French colonial French colonial architecture includes several styles of architecture used by the French during colonization. Many former French colonies, especially those in Southeast Asia, have previously been reluctant to promote their colonial architectur ...

influence in the

Puducherry Puducherry or Pondicherry may refer to: * Puducherry (union territory), a union territory of India ** Pondicherry, capital of the union territory of Puducherry ** Puducherry district, a district of the union territory of Puducherry ** Puducherry t ...

region of

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

Indian recipes for vadouvan blends vary but, at a minimum, must contain pounded

onion An onion (''Allium cepa'' L., from Latin ''cepa'' meaning "onion"), also known as the bulb onion or common onion, is a vegetable that is the most widely cultivated species of the genus ''Allium''. The shallot is a botanical variety of the onio ...

, garlic, cumin seeds, mustard seeds and fenugreek. The mixture is dried in the sun and then crushed, mixed with

castor oil Castor oil is a vegetable oil pressed from castor beans. It is a colourless or pale yellow liquid with a distinct taste and odor. Its boiling point is and its density is 0.961 g/cm3. It includes a mixture of triglycerides in which about ...

, which has preservative properties, and rolled into balls, which are then dried for several more days. Similarly, Western recipes for vadouvan use onions, garlic, spices and oil, but the drying is done using an oven."Vadouvan (Indian Spice Blend)"
(Sep. 2008) ''Gourmet''

References

See also