Email
It was a scenario to strike fear into a food writer's heart. Standing at a wedding reception, tucking into the canapes, a tipsy argument broke out over the nature of the meat on those cute little sticks. As the professional, I was called upon to adjudicate. The sauce was spicy, I'd had three glasses of prosecco and no lunch. "Beef," I said, confidently. Everyone accepted my verdict happily, and when I later discovered they were lamb, I kept my trap shut. Fortunately no qualifications are required for this job – I've seen chefs swooning over meltingly tender beef steak which turned out to be rare pork – even those of us who cook and taste for a living can be shockingly bad at identifying what we're putting in our mouths.
Unfortunately, as the nation discovered during last year's horsemeat scandal, you can't always trust the label either – and now a new survey from Which? reveals that, even if you've never bought a frozen lasagne in your life, you may still have been the victim of food fraud. The consumer organisation tested 60 takeaway lamb curries purchased in London and Birmingham – only to find the meat in 24 of the samples was adulterated, with seven containing no lamb whatsoever. Instead, cheaper chicken and beef had been substituted. Perhaps more worryingly, five contained meat that could not be identified full stop. It's a serious business; as Which? observes: "Regardless of whether or not they can taste the difference, some people – for religious or other reasons – will have chosen not to eat these meats and don't expect them to be secretly hidden in their dinner."
I actively steer clear of chicken and pork in restaurants where I doubt their sourcing policy, choosing lamb instead – but can your average diner tell one from another when they're concealed beneath a rich or spicy sauce? To find out, I challenged a crack team of Guardian curry fans to a blind tasting: Steve and Bob claim they "can usually tell the white stuff from the red stuff", Bim, who doesn't eat pork, is hyper vigilant for bits of pig, and Ranj reckons his meat identification skills are "excellent" – though he then admits he once mistook chicken for eggs. At least they're the same species I suppose. As for myself, I'm working on the perfect chicken tikka masala, have a fridge full of marinating chicken, and got up at 6am to start Madhur Jaffrey's curry sauce. So at the moment, my curry skills are razor sharp. Or so I thought ...
The curries
From top left: beef rendang, what's left of the duck rezala, chicken curry, mutton curry. Photograph: Graham Turner for the Guardian
The panel
Bob Granleese, food editor, Weekend magazine, the Guardian
Eats Indian, Pakistani or Bangladeshi food about once a fortnight, normally keema peas, chicken curry (at home) or nihari (out). He's "reasonably confident – I know lamb from chicken" he says, with conviction.
Result: Bob thought the mutton was beef, correctly identified the chicken, guessed the beef was either beef or pork, and mistook the duck for … lamb.
1.5/4
Ranjit Dhaliwal, arts picture editor, the Guardian
Best described as a food obsessive, Ranj recently admitted stalking a group of men leaving a mosque "to find out where they went for lunch". His dish of choice is normally a dry punjabi goat curry. He was the most confident going into the competition, rating his meat identification skills as EXCELLENT (his caps).
Result: Ranj started off well, correctly identifying the mutton curry, ploughing through the chicken without a flicker of doubt. By the time the beef came around, he faltered, opting for mutton and scribbling something about the "sweet coconut sauce". By the time the duck came, he'd lost it. "Meat. Dunno. Mutton? Jalfrezi?"
2/4
Felicity Cloake, food writer, the Guardian and others
Felicity will usually opt for a lamb dhansak or saag, "always lamb, on the basis that I suspect the sheep in question might have led a happier life than the chicken tikka".
Result: Felicity thought the mutton was beef, knew her chicken, and like Bob, mistook the beef for pork and the duck for lamb.
1/4
Bim Adewunmi, freelance features writer, the Guardian and others
Bim normally favours a chicken pathia but can deviate with a biryani, or a lamb dhansak. "I can usually differentiate goat, but struggle to tell lamb and beef apart," she says.
Results: Bim scored top points on the mutton and chicken. She wavered at the beef rendang, thinking it was lamb, "cooked very tenderly in this really delicious sauce" before adding, in a moment of clarity "but perhaps it's beef?" The duck confounded her.
2.5/4 WINNER!
Steve Chamberlain, deputy editor, Family section, the Guardian
Steve is very fond of a lamb tikka chilli masala, won't be drawn on how often he has one, and cheerfully claims to have no clue on species identification.
Results: Steve wavered between lamb and mutton for the mutton curry. Not bad. Chicken didn't prove a problem, thanks to its "rubbery texture and tasteless quality". The beef said pork to him and he was baffled by the duck.
2/4
;