Curry Leaves (करी पत्ता)

The curry leaf tree, Murraya koenigii, belongs to India and Sri Lanka, and grows wild in the forests and foothills of the south and along the lower Himalaya. The leaf marks the tempering (tadka; chhaunk in the north, thalippu in Tamil and Malayalam, oggarane in Kannada) that begins the cooking of Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh and the Konkan coast, and Sri Lankan cooks likewise fry it in fat at the start of a dish. Ayurvedic tradition counts the leaf among its aromatic plants, and household custom uses it beyond the pot. The cook's own reason for it is perfume, and the practice is kept by home kitchens, where a tree often stands by the door and the leaves are picked as the pan heats.

Curry leaves (Murraya koenigii; kadi patta in Hindi, करी पत्ता) are the small, glossy, pinnate leaves of a tree of the citrus family, sold on the stem. Added to hot oil, coconut oil or ghee, they give up a citrus-resinous aroma, rich in linalool, with a sharp crackle, and the scent passes into the whole of the cooking fat. The fresh leaf and the dried leaf are far apart: the fresh is bright and complex, the dried is dusty and gives almost nothing. In the tempering the leaves follow the mustard seeds and precede the other ingredients, and the sizzle must settle before the next addition.

Curry leaves sizzling in hot oil is the smell that opens a South Indian kitchen, and it announces the dishes that follow: sambar, rasam, coconut chutney, poriyal, thoran, upma and curd rice, each begun or finished with a tempering. The leaf suits these because its resinous citrus note sits over the sweetness of coconut, the sourness of tamarind and the earthiness of lentils without competing with them. The scent set into the fat then runs through the whole dish, and the aroma is established in the first moments at the stove.