The indelible seasons of Curryosity

For better or worse, its curious spice blends stand out

By Ian Anderson, April 19, 2019

Given a healthy appreciation for good puns, South Asian cuisine, and proximity, I was more than curious when Indian restaurant Curryosity opened close to home in South Park last fall. It gave a good look to an intermittently vacant restaurant space that needed it. The dark storefront received a bright white paint job, with saturated splashes of pink and gold and a sign that declared Curryosity would be, “spicing up the neighborhood.”

Visions of Indian takeout danced through my head, of fresh naan and lots of aromatic leftovers rotating through my refrigerator. Then I saw the vibrant interior, elegantly furnished, with colorful artwork and stained glass pendant lamps, and realized the space offered a sort of dine-in experience the entire east side of Balboa Park has been craving. A large, open window counter and patio dining open the bar area to the sidewalk along Juniper Street, effectively settling the matter: it looks every bit a boon to the community.

The seed needs to be soaked in an inspiration shower (patent pending). I hunt the interwebs for cool UI patterns and archive them in a massive Photoshop file. For example, when working on YouTube TV I grabbed hundreds of examples of future UI from futurists like Jayse Hansen and Neil Huxley.

Tiny women carry amazingly large bags, twice their eighty-pound weight. Some of the women carry babies in slings around the front. A good adult picker can harvest over two hundred pounds of cherries and earn $8 a day, more than twice the Guatemalan minimum daily wage.

Compel your audience. Capture the moment. Light with purpose. If a picture is worth a thousand words, what’s a talking picture worth?

While I’m not the best photographer you’ll bump into, my images are worth something. It’s hard to put a monetary value on some shots, but those photos sell, and those photos arouse emotions. And beyond that, those are one-in-a-lifetime experiences that I documented through my photo trips. And beyond that, those are one-in-a-lifetime experiences that I documented through my photo trips. I have to applaud the distinction. Truth is, I’ve encountered too much homogeny among dishes at Indian restaurants in San Diego and elsewhere, that suggest prevalent use of common spice blends or curry pastes. Many different places and times, I’ve had the same tikka masala, the same tandoori rub, the same chickpea batter seasoning in a litany of fried vegetable pakoras. However, despite the sameness, these ubiquitous spice profiles happen to be pretty darn satisfying. In a warm, viscous sauce, their densely packed flavors hit every corner of your palate, and consume your senses in a way few global cuisines can match