Learn how to make Japanese Curry Roux from scratch. Only five ingredients! This easy recipe will help you cook up many delicious pots of Japanese curry.
Japanese curry (also known as Curry Rice/Kare Raisu/カレーライス) is the ultimate comfort dish. It is the staple meal for many Japanese households because it’s so easy to make at home.
The convenience comes from the readily made Japanese Curry Sauce Mix or curry roux (カレールー), which allows you to cook up the stew-like curry consisting of meat & vegetables in the shortest time.
What is Japanese Curry Roux?
The curry roux in block form was first introduced by S&B Foods in 1956. It refers to a solidified mixture of sauce, made with fat, flour, and curry spices as the base flavor.
These days we can even find many varieties of instant Japanese curry roux in the Asian aisle at American supermarkets.
The boxed curry roux often comes in a distinctive block that resembles a thick chocolate bar, where you break off individual cubes for the portion you need to make. Some of the common brands include S&B’s Golden Curry, House’s Vermont Curry, Java Curry, and Torokeru Curry.
Homemade Japanese Curry Roux
Although the boxed stuff may spare you some time in the kitchen, you’ll be surprised at how easy it is to make your own Japanese Curry Roux at home. And just like all curries, curry roux is best made from scratch. The other good reasons for homemade roux?
- No chemical seasonings, preservatives, artificial flavors, and other food additives, which are commonly found in boxed mixes.
- You can customize the flavor, spice level, and thickness to your preferred taste each time you make it.
How to Make Japanese Curry Roux
Ingredients You’ll Need
My recipe for Japanese curry roux requires only five ingredients that you will have in the pantry. They are:
- Unsalted butter
- All-purpose/plain flour
- S&B Japanese curry powder
- Garam masala
- Cayenne pepper (optional for spice)
You can use salted butter for making the curry roux. If you do, adjust the amount of salt in the curry recipe you’re making. I use unsalted butter and add salt to taste as I cook.
Why Do We Combine Curry Powder and Garam Masala?
I have made homemade curry roux with just the S&B Japanese curry powder in the past, and it works great.
However, I wanted to make my own curry roux blend without having to buy all kinds of spices that I won’t necessarily use for my daily cooking. One day in my pantry, I found a bag of garam masala I purchased from my local Indian grocery store and I just mixed that into my curry roux. Garam masala added a wonderful fragrance and depth to the roux!
Since then (for the past 10 years), I’ve been using these two spice blends as my base for my curry roux. You can play around with the spices I listed on my pantry page for Japanese curry powder. Make your own blend for fun!
You’re probably wondering about the curry powder and garam masala, so I’ll cover these topics later in the post.
Overview: Cooking Steps
The roux is made with butter and flour that helps to thicken the broth. For the curry roux, we start by cooking the butter and flour mixture for a long time until it turns brown, somewhat chocolate color, for about 25-30 minutes.
When you add the curry powder, garam masala, and cayenne pepper to the roux, you’ll get delicious homemade curry roux.
The butter gives a rich sweet flavor and the toasted flour brings nuttiness. Feel free to modify the amount of the spices to your preference.
How to Store Homemade Japanese Curry Roux
The roux can be made ahead and stored in the refrigerator for a month or in the freezer for 3-4 months. I recommend cutting the block of roux into cubes. Then, you can add pieces as you need in your curry recipe.
Japanese Curry Powder
The most notable Japanese curry powder is the S&B brand that comes in a tiny red can. It has a slightly sweet and rounded flavor, and it is the most common curry powder that many Japanese homes and restaurants use in making their curry dishes.
You can use other brands of curry powder. However, to achieve the authentic Japanese flavor, I strongly recommend using S&B Curry Powder for making the homemade curry roux. These days you can buy the S&B Curry Powder on Amazon.
Can’t find S&B Curry Powder?
To learn how to make your own Homemade Japanese Curry Powder, visit this pantry page.
What is Garam Masala?
Garam masala is a warming spice with a sharp and pungent flavor and this spice blend is used to add flavor and color to dishes. Depending on spice shops or home recipes, the blend varies. It typically contains:
- Cardamom
- Cinnamon
- Clove
- Coriander
- Cumin – nice to add more for curry
- Mace
- Mustard seeds
- Nutmeg
- Peppercorns
- Red chili pepper
Some of the spices overlap with Japanese curry powder and that’s okay. You can always tweak your own homemade curry powder blend as you like through trial and error.
What to Make with Japanese Curry Roux
With the homemade curry roux, you will be eager to start cooking a myriad of Japanese curry dishes at any time. Here are some delicious recipes you can make with homemade curry roux:
- Japanese Chicken Curry
- Instant Pot Japanese Curry
- Soup Curry
- Japanese Beef Curry
- Katsu Curry
- Curry Udon
- Japanese Seafood Curry
- Cold Curry Udon
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How to Make Japanese Curry Roux
Video
Ingredients
- 3.5 oz unsalted butter (7 Tbsp)
- 3.5 oz all-purpose flour (plain flour) (about ¾ cup; weigh your flour or use the “fluff and sprinkle“ method and level it off; use GF flour or rice flour for gluten-free)
- 4 Tbsp Japanese curry powder (I recommend S&B Curry Powder; available on Amazon)
- 1 Tbsp garam masala
- ½ tsp cayenne pepper (optional)
Instructions
- Before You Start: I highly encourage you to weigh your flour and butter using a kitchen scale. If you don‘t have a kitchen scale, please use this “fluff and sprinkle“ method to measure the flour: Fluff your flour with a spoon, sprinkle it into your measuring cup, and level it off. Otherwise, you may end up scooping more flour than you need.
- Gather all the ingredients.
To Make a Brown Roux
- In a small saucepan, melt 3.5 oz unsalted butter over low to medium-low heat (you can cut the butter into small pieces first).
- When the butter is completely melted, add 3.5 oz all-purpose flour (plain flour). With a blunt-end wooden spatula, stir to combine the butter and flour.
- Soon, the butter and flour will fuse and swell. Cook for 20–25 minutes over low heat. Stir constantly because the roux burns easily. If the roux starts separating, switch to a whisk and mix vigorously.
- The roux will turn golden brown. You can even go for a bit darker color (watch my video).
To Make the Curry Roux
- Add 4 Tbsp Japanese curry powder, 1 Tbsp garam masala, and ½ tsp cayenne pepper (optional) to the roux. Tip: If you can‘t find garam masala, you can add more curry powder in its place or try adding the other spices that I suggest in the blog post.
- Cook and stir for 30 seconds and remove from the heat. You can use the roux immediately if you‘d like (see the instructions below).
To Mold into a Block (overnight)
- Transfer the roux to a glass or metal container lined with parchment paper. Let it cool completely on the kitchen counter, then refrigerate to solidify overnight.
- On the following day, take out the curry block from the container. If the curry block gets stuck to the container, release it with a butter knife or an offset spatula.
- With a sharp knife, cut the block into 1- x 1-inch (2.5- x 2.5-cm) squares. I cut my single block into 8 pieces. Transfer the curry roux squares to a glass container.
To Store
- Store in the refrigerator for 1 month or in the freezer for 3–4 months. Use them soon before they lose their flavor and aroma.
To Use in a Curry Recipe
- Very important! Please season your final dish with more salt, as the homemade roux is unsalted. I usually add 2–4 tsp salt per block to the broth, on the recipe. Store-bought roux is quite salty, so you may want to add more salt to your homemade Japanese Curry Roux to achieve a similar taste.
- Add the curry roux mixture (before it solidifies) or the roux cubes to the broth of your curry recipe. Follow the recipe instructions on when to add the roux. Try it in recipes like my Chicken Curry, Instant Pot Curry, Vegetarian Curry, Beef Curry, Keema Curry, and Curry Udon.
- How much roux or how many cubes should we use? Roughly 6–7 cubes of this recipe are equivalent to one box of store-bought curry roux (that requires 4 cups or 1L of broth/water). Simmer over low heat for 5–10 minutes. Heat will thicken the roux.
- If the curry flavor is lacking or the curry does not thicken, add more roux. When you add meat and/or veggies, they release more moisture to the broth; therefore, you will need to adjust the amount of roux you use according to what you’re cooking.
Nutrition
Editor’s Note: The post was originally published on March 18, 2013. The video and new images were added in August 2018. The recipe was revised and the post was updated with new images and blog content in October 2021.
Hello! Noticed the recipe has changed from this:
3 Tbsp unsalted butter
4 Tbsp all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp curry powder
1 Tbsp garam masala
¼ tsp cayenne pepper
To this:
3.5 oz unsalted butter (7 Tbsp)
3.5 oz all-purpose flour (plain flour) (¾ cup)
4 Tbsp Japanese curry powder
1 Tbsp garam masala
½ tsp cayenne pepper
Just wondering, why the change? Also, the new recipe seems to make much more roux – is that correct?
Appreciate your great recipe!
Hi Adam! Yes! I’ll be publishing the updated (new) video this Wednesday and will add the new video to the recipe card soon (sorry it’s not the same recipe at the moment).
I have finally revised the recipe after going through readers’ feedback (since 2013) and re-testing multiple times. I will never change my recipe unless I believe it’s a good change, and I’m extremely happy with this updated and improved version as it works so much nicer and more comparable to the store-bought curry roux. The flavor and texture we’re looking for in Japanese curry. Also, it’s almost 1:1 substitution for store-bought curry, which makes it so much easier for readers who decide to choose a store-bought or homemade roux.
So that’s why. It’s been bothering me for the past 2 years, and I finally got it done!
Confession: I make curry about every 6 weeks, using this recipe. I make the roux the night before, so when I started cooking the other night and the recipe had changed, I found myself in a tsukemono: stay with the tried and true or test the new recipe. I’m a creature of habit, but this time I went rouxgue (rolling my eyes at myself). I tried the new version.
Verdict: The new recipe was an instant winner with me and my family. Maybe it’s not too surprising I liked it because it tracks the modifications I make to the original roux and curry recipes, including reducing the garam masala relative to the other ingredients and reducing the chicken stock (to better match the amount of roux for a thickness level close to what we like in our house). With the new recipe, the modifications are unnecessary. I’d take this recipe over the boxed curry blocks any day.
Hi Adam! Thank you for your kind feedback and I’m so glad to hear this new version worked out great! Thank you so much for letting me know. You’ve made my day! 🤗
Is there a particular brand of garam masala that you like for making Japanese curry? It seems like there are a lot of mixes out there that are quite different from one another.
Hi Dan! Thank you for trying Nami’s recipe!
There are no particular brands for the spice. Nami buys Garam masala from an Indian grocery store, and it comes in a bag.
Looking forward to trying this out — just wanted to say that the fear of MSG has been proven to have no scientific basis and was basically created out of racism towards Asians, so I hope in the future this specific site can stay away from using “No MSG” as a selling point for recipes. MSG occurs naturally in many foods, such as tomatoes and cheeses. Thanks!
Hi Keiko! What I meant to say was that we can avoid 化学調味料 (chemical seasonings), preservatives, and artificial additives that are in those packages. Yes, you can get umami naturally from the foods, and we can make the curry roux without the storebought roux filled with all those chemicals (there is a long list on the package).
On the side note, if anyone is wondering, I do use the boxed roux occasionally (even in JOC recipes), as it’s convenient and it’s something we grew up eating. However, it’s easy to make the roux from scratch and it’s good to know how to make the roux from scratch when you have time. 🙂
Any suggestions on the best substitute for butter? My son has a dairy allergy…but really want to give this a shot!
Hi Onelioness, Thank you for reading Nami’s post and trying her recipe!
It would not become a hard roux, but you can replace the butter with water. And add the slurry to the curry.
We hope this helps!
Dear Nami, thank you for posting this recipe. I have attempted to make it mostly following the steps, but the roux did not brown very much. I have tried other recipes in the past and also found the same problem even if spending longer cooking it. Would it have much of an impact on the taste or is it not a big deal?
Hi William! Thank you very much for trying Nami’s recipe!
The trick to making this roux darker color is to brown the roux in Step 4. Keep string the roux, and please use lower heat and cook it for a little longer next time.
The flavor will be much better than the lighter colors because it will have a more browned smokey flavor.😉
We hope this helps!
Unfortunately for me this did not really work.
First, I followed the recipe to make your own Curry powder, which I followed to the T when it comes to the basic ingredients that should have been included in the curry. That went well enough for me to enjoy the scent of my curry powder, but when it came to making the curry roux blocks, it was quite the opposite, frankly, I hate the result.
Disclaimer: I did not have enough butter in the pantry, so I did 50-50 with sunflower seed oil!
But my roux came out bland, oily with that front and after taste of unpleasant “butterness” which I really dislike. The colour was much much brighter and more yellow once mixed in with the food I prepared (despite the curry blend being very dark brown!) and honestly the depth of flavour was lacking… Once cooled off the roux blocks were still much oilier than the ones in the images and/or the ones you buy, leaving a yellow mess in my hands, and did not carry a nice scent, but rather quite the long stench of warm butter.
I won’t be leaving a rating because I didn’t follow the recipe perfectly, but I really don t know what I could ahve done differently, any suggestions? I really want to make this work for my healthier curry roux. I love S&B but their choice of oil is quite unhealthy. Perhaps I should buy Premade Curry powder and add the missing ingredients to match the one from S&B? (S&B powder is not available where i live) should I only use butter?
Hi Fra! Thank you very much for trying Nami’s recipe!
We highly recommend using unsalted butter instead of sunflower seed oil for flavor and texture. Nami’s curry roux would not taste unpleasant bitterness taste.😉
As for the color, if you add more red color spices like Paprika, Red pepper, etc for extra spicy curry, it will give you more red color in the roux. To add more yellow, You can use more Turmeric if you would like.
We hope this helps!
It stains your pan and spatula a yellowish brown color
Hi, Thank you very much for trying Nami’s recipe!
We recommend using a whisk after you add the spices, so your spatula won’t stain.
As for the saucepan, what material is your saucepan?
Hi Nami, thank you for sharing this recipe. Can I substitute the all-purpose flour with corn starch? Thank you!
Hi Liu, Thank you very much for reading Nami’s post and trying her recipe!
You can use corn starch to thicken it, but the roux won’t harden like the recipe.
We hope this helps!
Hi! That was my question as well. My mom’s gluten-free.
What exactly do you mean it won’t harden? Like you can’t freeze it in batches?
Hello there, Shelbi. If you use cornstarch, we do not recommend freezing. Because the starch molecules break down during the freezing process, the roux will not have the same texture when it thaws. Making this roux with just butter and spices is the best way to make gluten-free curry. Use it in the curry, and if necessary, thicken it with a cornstarch slurry. Some people add yogurt as well.
https://www.justonecookbook.com/how-to-thicken-sauce-soup-cornstarch-slurry/
We hope this helps!
is it possible to omit flour or lessen flour? If yes, then how much do I need to increase other ingredients?
Hi Jos! Thank you very much for reading Nami’s post and trying her recipe!
If you reduce the amount of flour in this recipe, the Curry Roux won’t get hard and won’t be thicking your curry. If you don’t mind having soupy curry, you can simply reduce the flour.
We hope this helps!
My sister in law is Indian, and i was always intrigued with Indian method of making curry using mortar and pestle. The taste of crushing is way different that blending in a mixer.
I always love to try new cuisine using traditional method of cooking. Will definitely try this Japanese curry roux tonight
Hi Ashley, Thank you very much for reading Nami’s post and trying her recipe!
Yes! Freshly grounded spices are the best! We hope you enjoy this recipe using the spices.😊
Hello! I’ve been using several of your curry recipe as base for a gluten free curry roux I was sent from Japan (the instructions on the package are just so wrong! they give a ‘packaged curry’ style with like one piece of meat and one piece of each vegetable per person 😂). I have an unopened red can of Japanese curry powder so I thought I’d use it before asking for more, however it says ‘spicy curry powder’ Is it the same as the oriental curry powder in the amazon link you gave? And ‘oriental curry powder’ is just the export name for the same product? When I was living in Japan I had this one from S&B too but it didn’t say spicy https://www.yodobashi.com/product/100000001005226478/ 辛いものが弱いのでちょっと緊張しています😅 Thanks in advance!
Hi Oriane! Thank you very much for reading Nami’s post and trying her recipe!
We have never used this curry powder and are unsure how the taste. It looks like they have similar spices in it, but can’t tell the spice level…🤔
Hi Namiko!
Two questions. Our favorite roux blocks are the Apple & Honey Vermont blocks. How do I replicate them? Also could I make this in the crockpot and let it cook for a bit? Thank you so much.
Hi Tamara! Thank you very much for reading Nami’s post and trying her recipe!
We recommend following this recipe for curry roux and adding fresh apples and Honey into the curry (instead of adding them to this homemade roux). You can also add secret ingredients listed in this post:https://www.justonecookbook.com/simple-chicken-curry/
As for the cooking method, we have never tested it before with a crockpot, and we are not sure. But it might not be the right tool because this has to be stirred constantly.
We hope this helps!
Can I substitute this with almond flour? Thank you!
Hi Keneki! Thank you very much for reading Nami’s post!
We have not tried this with Almond Flour and are not sure how the outcome will be. However, some readers try with rice flour and said it worked, so it might work.
Let us know how it goes!
In the recipe card, it says these curry cubes keep in the refrigerator for 1 month and in the freezer for 3-4 months, but in your blog post, it’s 1 week in the fridge and 3-4 weeks in the freezer. Which one is correct? Weeks or months?
Also, when I went to make the recipe, I needed to add a lot more butter than your recipe called for because otherwise, it’s just a ball of dough in the pan. I’m not sure the update for the butter amount is correct. The ratio of butter to flour decreased a lot in the update.
Thanks for trying this recipe. I hope you used a kitchen scale to measure your flour. When you use a measuring cup, you tend to overpack the flour and it’s more than the needed amount. Just in case you used a measuring cup, here’s how you should be measuring your flour correctly.
https://www.justonecookbook.com/how-to-measure-flour/
When you add too much flour, it doesn’t have enough liquid so it becomes a ball of dough. As you see in my step-by-step images or video, the correct amount of flour should have enough liquid. Please try again. I measure my ingredients with a kitchen scale, every time for testing multiple times, photoshooting, and videotaping, and I never encountered to have a ball of dough. So I know the recipe should work. Good luck!
I also ended up with a dough ball when using a kitchen scale to measure 350 g of each butter and flour. I set the dough ball aside and retried-this time using an additional tablespoon of butter and a shallower saucepan with a larger base and it worked perfectly.
I used the dough ball from my first attempt to make cookies so, win win?
Hi Jenn!
Most roux recipes (both in Japanese or English) call for equal weights of fat and flour. The only reason I can think of is that you might have spent more time melting butter than I did, which might have caused more evaporation from the butter (butter contains water). This may result in less liquid left in the saucepan for flour.
As we both measure the weight of our ingredients, and I’ve made this recipe many times without having any issue, it seems like this is the only reason I can think of at this time. If you are going to melt the butter the same way (the same stove’s heat, the same saucepan, the same brand of butter, etc.), you may want to increase the amount of butter from the beginning, instead of adjusting later on.
Hope this helps!
Hi Jenny, thanks for catching my typo! I’ve updated the content inside the blog. It should be “keep in the refrigerator for 1 month and in the freezer for 3-4 months.”
Hi, just wanted to let you know that whatever update you did in October broke this recipe. There’s another comment below mentioning it too.
If you compare the previous version with the current version of the recipe, there’s way more butter.
When I made it (using the switch to metric it gave me 100g butter 100g flour, which seems to match the 3.5oz written in imperial too), adding the 100g flour to the butter instantly gave me a solid ball of dough. I had to add butter and basically double the butter to match the expected consistency. If this was intentional then the instructions should be updated to match it.
I think whoever scaled down this recipe did it wrong and now the recipe has almost twice as much flour as it’s supposed to. Either that or the instructions don’t match the changes
Hi Liana! We’re sorry we completely missed your comment for some reason. I can assure you that we manually updated the recipe in October 2021 and didn’t break anything. 🙂
I measure the weight of flour and butter with a kitchen scale, so what you see in the step-by-step images or in my video is the actual recipe I make. I’m not sure why you got a solid ball of dough. Was the butter completely melted when you added flour? The ball of dough implies that you have more flour than liquid. But I haven’t encountered the same situation before although I’ve made this many times. It seems like you measure your flour with a scale too. This kind of thing happens for cup measurement users as they tend to pack flour into a cup, which ends up with more flour than needed.
Before I publish this revised recipe, I have to go through multiple testing to finalize the recipe, a photoshoot, and a videoshoot. Since this has been a very popular recipe, the revised version must be 100% better and improved; therefore, I know it will work after I’ve worked on this. Please let me know how I can assist you further.
I had the same issue as Liana. Mine turned out more like dough and not liquid at all. I used 200g of each. I am currently making the roux and have been stirring for half an hour now. It hasn’t changed colour at all.
Also I noticed a mistake in the video (or recipe?):
The video says 7oz / 100g butter & 3.5oz / 100g flour
The recipe says 3.5oz butter & 3.5oz / 100g flour
Edit: 10 minutes later and it’s finally turning golden. I had added more butter, about 1/2 stick
Hi Josephine! Thank you very much for trying Nami’s recipe and watching her video.
It depends on the butter brand/type, the fat contents are a bit different, and water/moister in the butter is also different. European-Style Butter is one of them that has more fat content than American’s. If it wasn’t the case, the moisture might escape from the roux too much during the process (longer cook time than recipe), and it became a dough texture.
As for the video’s butter amount, it shows 7 Tbsp and not 7 oz. So if you use 7 oz butter, it will result in a different texture.
We hope this helps!
Just wanted to jump into this “discussion” real quick because I just tried it again after a few years (last time was with the old recipe) and I’m from Europe.
I only had about 60g unsalted butter left in the fridge so I adjusted the recipe accordingly (60g flour and less spices).
It worked perfectly with 1:1 ratio of butter to flour. It did become a bit dry after adding the spices but I think I didn’t adjust that amount properly. Before that it had a very smooth texture in the pot.
The only thing I can imagine, and a different post wrote something similar that ended in the same described result, they used salted/unsalted butter that was mixed with Rapeseed oil or other oil for easier spreading on bread. The additional oil probably changes the mixture too much.
Hi Namiko!
I was planning to make this tomorrow, can you use the unsolidified curry roux in curry immediately or is solidification in the fridge necessary?
Thank you so much!!
Hi Jordan! Thank you very much for reading Nami’s post and trying her recipe!
Yes, you can use unsolidified curry roux in the curry recipe. However, if you are making Nami’s Chicken curry, 80% of the curry roux mixture should be enough for the amount of broth in her recipe. This curry roux has a bit extra for adjusting the thickness of curry, so please feel free to adjust for your taste.
We hope this helps!