Large supermarkets stock somewhere in the region of 32,000 product lines, Asda has 735 different types of milk, Waitrose has over 900 types of nuts. And yet, you won’t find a single supermarket that has Akhni stock on its shelves, which is peculiar given that a significant part of British culture is built on it.
There is something like eighteen thousand curry restaurants in the UK, it’s practically Britain’s national dish. Two million people (one in thirty) have a curry each week. it’s versatile and tasty and caters for all palettes. It can bind generations together in a way that other dishes can’t because it feels like both a sophisticated treat, with its blend of spices, and wholesome and familiar. Whether you’ve got broad tastes or are a bit fussy, chances are there’s a curry dish for you.
Unlike most restaurant food, it crosses the threshold into your home. Ingeniously, the restaurants have mastered the parallel running of a takeaway and eat-in service, making it a fundamental component of both a night in and a night out.
And yet, despite its vast cultural footprint, premises can be small, rents low and prices reasonable, its influence isn’t overbearing, no Indian restaurant has gutted a High Street like an out-of-town supermarket. It democratises the dining experience by making it accessible to all.
It’s convenient, affordable and consistent, you can be in a town and amongst strangers and visit a curry house knowing what you’ll get. It reaches across cultural boundaries, whatever your stance on immigration, we set aside any prejudices and positively embrace what migrant people offer us. Judging people for what they are and offer and not what they might be.
To be so influential you’d think you need a complex strategy and ingenious technology to make it work. But, at the heart of it all is base gravy, a curry soup with over twenty ingredients on which almost every recipe on a typical Indian restaurant menu is based. From this, additional spices and other ingredients are combined to make everything from a mild Korma to a volcanic Phaal. It means the restaurant can maintain a broad menu, cooked to order and ready in minutes. I make litres of it and it changes the game.
Base gravy is easy to make but what really elevates it is the Akhni stock, a simple broth of bay leaves, cardamom pods, star anise, cumin and coriander seeds which gives depth to the flavour.
It’s been a torrid week at Oxford United, the humbling experience at Coventry and for me and seemingly others, the negativity in the stands. Then there was loan-a-geddon, where we lost Kyle Edwards, Stan Mills and James Beadle on the same day, which not only stripped us of three players, but made us feel very small and insignificant. Admittedly, neither Edwards nor Mills are likely to play again this season, so it stands to reason that they were returned, Beadle’s move really stung, although the impact so far is that he hasn’t played a game for two weeks and was given the pleasure of watching his new team being pumped 4-0 by Southampton from the Sheffield Wednesday bench.
CEO Tim Williams then issued a hastily prepared statement which read more like a first draft or a quiet affirmation he might write to himself when he’s feeling a bit blue. It was like Holly Willoughby’s infamous post-Schofield ‘are you OK’ speech.
This preceded being knocked out of the EFL Trophy by Wimbledon, which is like getting a Christmas present from your elderly neighbour which you know is going to be underwhelming, but it still manages to be a disappointment when you unwrap an out of date Turkish Delight from the local shop.
And that was only Tuesday. There was talk about problems with the new stadium as well as ongoing discussions about the atmosphere around the club and the threadbare nature of the squad.
But, as this all happened, plans began to crystallise, Greg Leigh returned, Tyler Burey signed, mitigating the loss of Mills, Jamie Cumming signed, five years older and a hundred games more experienced than Beadle. When the side for Carlisle was announced, we looked like a team in the play-offs with options on the bench.
What fuels the news cycles, blogs, podcasts and general fan chat is the superficial variations of the week to week, day to day workings of the club. It is the combination of spices that differentiates a Pathia from a Rogan Josh.
What drives the club is the culture, the base gravy, the soup of experiences, values, intentions and ambitions. This week was the fortieth anniversary of Peter Rhoades-Brown signing for Oxford. That’s a significant proportion of my life, he’s so omnipresent it’s easy to forget his influence. Brighton, no doubt, want James Beadle to develop as a player by sending him to Sheffield Wednesday, but what it illustrates is that he is not so much a person as a playing unit to be traded and operationalised, a product of Brighton’s own data-driven base gravy.
What elevates the culture are performances like the one against Carlisle, it’s the Akhni stock added to the base gravy. The endeavour of the fans, despite everything that’s happened in the last week, to mobilise and travel over 500 miles to support the team. The willingness of the players to regroup despite two defeats and the loss of three important players. The infectious enthusiasm of Tyler Goodrham, who probably won’t understand the impact he has on the spirit of those around him. The ability of the club to into integrate Cummings into the team and for him to respond with a reassuring display. And the perseverance of Mark Harris who, despite a barren run in front of goal, is still on track to be a 20-goal-a-season striker. The goals win games, but the persistence sets a standard for others to match.
Carlisle are in a wretched state, but we’ve played teams like that before and been turned over because despite appearing to have superior ingredients, we don’t have our base gravy right. This time, it felt different, even though the club is being buffeted by the world around it, it’s still in a solid state. The one person you feel really benefitted from that is Des Buckingham, who finally seems to have his hand on the wheel. He’s probably been wondered what he’s walked into, yesterday at Carlisle hopefully reassured him that at its heart, things are OK.
The Oxblogger Podcast – Pilot Episode – Loans
If you’ve got this far, you might be interested in listening to the Oxgblogger Podcast, in which we ramble on about loans past, present and future and a range of other stuff.
Available on:
And all good podcasting platforms (probably).
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