(Balti)
Birmingham balti is a curry variety prepared with chicken or lamb (although, some may use vegetables or fish), served in a traditional steel bowl in which it was cooked. It is usually paired with naan bread on the side. Although it falls under the category of Indian curries, it is very probable that balti was created in the United Kingdom, more specifically in Birmingham, as the name suggests.
The city has a large Pakistani population, who probably invented balti according to their authentic culinary traditions. In the 1970s, they started opening restaurants in Birmingham, serving the popular, slow-cooked curries. Their choice of spices included commercially available curry pastes and dried herbs since the fresh produce was not yet available.
The dish gained its modern form when the traditional way of slow cooking was not sufficient or fast enough to adequately serve the customers. Read more
The restaurant owners then included the now famous balti, the thin steel bowl with two handles, which allowed the dish to be prepared much faster. One unsupported theory says that the origin of the dish might be Baltistan, the mountainous area of northern Pakistan, but it is more probable it was associated with the traditional bowl.
Birmingham balti is an atypical version of a traditional curry since it uses dry herbs, and the traditional ghee is replaced with vegetable oil. In Birmingham, the restaurants serving balti were popularly called balti houses, and in the 1990s, they spread to other British cities.
To this day, Birmingham balti remains one of the favorite British curries.
