Naki:

Thanks for the info!

YES, the roasting of the spices DOES make a big difference. I have a mortar and pestle which I use to grind the coriander when we buy it unground, and then put the ground spice in a pan and place it over the stove heat as I keep the pan in motion {learned the hard way...left alone the spice on the bottom burns before the top gets roasted}.

As for the fruits and bear curry, that comes from the natural affinity bear meat seems to have for fruit even without curry. Indeed, a bear roast is delicious when served with apple/mint jelly, apricot or raspberry, strawberry, etc jam. I really do not know the traditional ways of eating curry, just know what tastes good to me and us, so it is interesting to here anything you have to say there. We cook what tastes good to us, and experiment all the time. And fruit curry just plain tastes good!

{...one of our favorite meat sauces is 1/4 part "A-ONE" sauce mixed with 3/4 parts apricot jam...}

Jabali: for many years, bear in various parts of the country and in particular, here, were considered varmints like coyotes, and after being shot were skinned out, the meat being left in the woods. Some years ago, the game department here changed the law and banned the wastage of bear meat. Now, of all the game considered "Big Game", only lion meat can be left in the woods, tho lots of folks eat that now, too.

Yet bear is hamstrung by a reputation for being bad-tasting. Yet EVERY SINGLE PERSON {quite a few cityslickers and non-hunters, too} I have served bear to loves it, the roasts being indistinguishable from fine aged beef. It is the tenderest meat in the woods. And the fat is absolutely delicious. I've read that many years ago it was considered the finest pastry shortening available, and I do not doubt it.

Why this paradox?

Not sure, but I believe it has to do with the common and quite erroneous belief that all meat must be "hung" and the weather in which bear are commonly shot, at least here in the West. During both bear seasons the weather can be and often is very warm. I've shot bear in very hot weather, temperatures that DEMAND fast skinning and quick butchering. MANY guys around here take their time, and I believe this results in much bear meat going "off" to some degree before it is served. Add a few days or a week of hanging and the result is unpleasant to say the least, unhealthful probably. Sometimes a hunter does not not do the butchering himself, and, naturally, waiting a week for the butcher to schedule the thing in adds up to the same result.

Anyway, bear is delicious, both spring and berry-fed fall bear. I've shot a number of them in both seasons in all weather common to those seasons and never had a bad tasting one. But we hustle FAST to get the critter home, cut, wrapped and in the freezer. I believe this is the reason folks find ours so tasty while claiming some others are inedible.