Yes I see how that works.
The recipes I’ve seen use cayenne pepper for the heat, so presumably you can cut the amount you use to make it mild enough for the children.
While I like mine hot, vindaloo does (or should) have a very distinctive flavor from the other “typical Indian menu” options, and it’s not the heat (or at least not just the heat.) It’s got a sour component from the vinegar used that distinguishes it. Also, fenugreek seeds are a significant component of the paste.
Anyhow, the answer to the OP is I like it all but, when I can find it, or when I make it myself, it’s pork vindaloo.
I go to Asian food stores to find it.
Mexican places around here will often carry goat, too. And I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it in some Middle Eastern markets as well.
I got chicken phal a couple of times in New York and it was like a descent into hell. So, so hot. But amazingly good. Dhaba, 28th and Lex, highly recommend.
Ugh, I looked up a phal recipe and my stomach hurts just looking at it. I remember an incident from my childhood where my parents accidentally made a bhaji from habanero peppers we brought back up to BFE Quebec from Montreal, (we had to go down every 2 months with our friends the Turks for the four of them to survive being away from their ethnic groceries). My memory is indelibly etched with my dad taking one bite and then screaming for my mom to not let me or my sister even touch our plates and the two of them knocking the plates to the ground in a frenzy so my sister and I wouldn’t even take a bite. They didn’t even know what habanero peppers were…my parents are from Mumbai and lived all over India so I’m thinking this phal stuff might be a British invention.
According to Wikipedia and indiacurry.com, phall (at least that form of phall) is indeed a UK Indian invention.
It was a phall from grace?
An American Doper posted that he’d only heard the term Tindaloo in the U.K.
Further down thread someone says that they enjoy the milder curries.
Totally with that, although my favourite is Jal Fraisi, I love a Biriyani or a Balti.
Missed this thread when it was first posted. I’ve only ever had chicken and lamb. I really don’t like lamb in general (the restaurant was out of chicken 
), but I thought it tasted pretty good in a vindaloo. Still like chicken vindaloo better. Never had beef (my stomach doesn’t deal with beef very well), curious to try goat after this discussion, but I don’t think my Indian restaurant of choice carries it. (Indian Cafe in Irving, TX, off Belt Line Road near I-635, makes a delicious vindaloo, if you’re ever around there.)
A pair of our interns from Hyderabad had never heard the term Vindaloo. They said they were expecting something with potatos since that’s what “aloo” meant to them.
According to a certain online encyclopedia, the name’s derived from the Portugese dish Carne de Vinha d’Alhos (a stew with pork, wine and garlic).
“Aloo” does mean potato, and potatoes are often part of vindaloo, but, so far as I know, that’s just a coincidence/false cognate.