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Any recommendations?
Or (shock horror) are any of those ready made pastes any good?
Both Jamie Oliver and Gordon Ramsey have the best ones I've cooked at home. The GR one is better but the JO one is faar less faffy.
+1 for the JO recipe.
I've got a asian store pretty close to me so i get my thai curry pastes from there, it's fantastic. Can't for the life of me remember what brand it is though, sorry 🙁
Paste from actual Asian supermarkets is great. I've got a proper curry recipe copied from a cook at a guest house we stayed at in Chiang Mai that is out of this world tasty, and that uses pre-made paste. I'll post it tomorrow when I get home.
The pastes are fine although Mrs Labsey insists on making it herself. There's a Thai green curry soup in one of the Covent Garden books. Really nice. Just add an extra tin of coconut milk and throw so rice in while it's cooking.
I've just used a Waitrose red paste to make one. It was grand. I'd imagine their green one would be grand too. I also imagine that making the paste yourself would make it taste even better. Green curry pastes must be pretty standard recipes no? Don't forget your Nam Pla. Smells rotten but works well.
Another +1 for the JO recipe.
There's a fantastic version in one of Ken Hom's books from about 10 years ago. Works a treat every time. Failing that, +1 JO and many others that at least use the basic ingredients. It's worth experimenting with things like Star Anise and Holy Basil if you want an extra bit of fragrance.
The jamie oliver 30 min (or was it 20min?) meal recipe is lush, really easy to make as well.
Gives you time to make basmati butter rice and chapattis along with mint raita.
Yum!.
Ok here's the recipe, I make this base sauce.
This recipe makes enough to fill a 500-ml (18 fl oz) Kilner Jar (the ones with a rubber seal and a clamp). STored thus it will kep for up to three weeks in the fridge. It's not worth making less as the processing of the paste is difficult with a smaller amount of ingredients.
90g/3.5 oz coriander leaves, stalks and roots
40g/1.5 oz mint leaves
8 garlic cloves, peeled
2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp sugar
1 tsp salt
75ml/3 fl oz lime or lemon juice
5-10 green chillies, deseeded if preferred (the seeds make the paste hotter)
100 ml/4 fl oz creamed coconut
Puree all the ingredients together in a blender until smooth.
Nice one saleem I shall be making that!
I use some random combination of green chillies, garlic, gallangal(or ginger will do too) and lemon grass depending on how I am feeling when I am making it... and having just come back from Thailand, I now use about double what I did previously... they really do go in for using loads of paste over there!
You are then supposed to be able to split the thick part of the coconut cream in a frying pan, to seperate the oil and fry with that, but I can never manage that, so just use a small amount of oil to fry off the paste, then chuck in the coconut milk, followed by whatever else you fancy putting in there... those little baby aubergines work very well! Chuck in some kaffir lime leaves here if you have them...
Add palm sugar and fish sauce to taste...
Finish with thai basil and corriander, and a squeeze of lime...
Something like that anyway, I stopped using a proper recipe for this years ago.
If you really do want a recipe, see if you can find David Thompsons one online, if not, email me and I'll see if I can copy it for you. His books are fantastic too btw.