Tonight's dinner included a vegetarian, so I decided to pick up some of those curry bars to make a curry. The local stores didn't have them, so instead I picked up a jar of Patak's Mild Curry. Here's what I did.

Ingredients

• One large russet potato
• One large carrot
• One large bell pepper, chopped very large
• One big handful of frozen peas
• One 400 ml bottle of Patak's Original Mild Curry
• One quarter cup of TVP rehydrated with one quarter cup of boiling water.

Procedure

1. Peel the potato and carrot. Cut large. Simmer in water till fork tender. Remove from water. Drain.
2. Pour some olive oil in a pan. Briefly stir fry bell pepper and peas.
3. Add carrots, potato, TVP and curry sauce to the pan.
4. Heat till warm and serve.

Tasty stuff, though not my favorite curry of all time. There were people at the table with Celiac disease, so we tested the curry sauce for gluten with a gluten testing kit. Turned out to be gluten free, despite the fact that it is no longer listed so on the company's website. The three people with Celiac ate the curry and enjoyed it.

Tepines or chiltepines are the smallest member of the chile (capsicum annum) family. They are probably the original from which all the other chile cultivars are descended, including bell peppers, jalapenos, poblanos, etc. Here's a picture of them next to a quarter teaspoon measure:
	They are extremely hot. Four tepines can spice up a gallon and a half of soup for people who are not chile heads. You can easily find them in the Mexican food section of any store in Phoenix in packages like the one pictured here.

I adore tepines. I'll crush three or four of them and throw them into scrambled eggs. They add heat to any curried dish that is not based on chile paste. Once in a blue moon I'll make a huge pot of hamburger soup and throw in half a teaspon of chiltepines, which makes a nice burn.