Green Thai Chicken Curry

Well, again I'm going to post one of Thai food because of my curiosity of how to make green Thai curry. The green color comes from green chili peppers such as jalapeno or green cayenne pepper as well. The spices for this recipe are almost the same as red curry yet I have to discard chili pepper powder and turmeric in order to reach more green color. Instead of using red tomato, I'm using green tomatoes which is still available in my backyard. I adapted this recipe from http://thaifood.about.com. As some of you might know that the weather in Winnipeg is getting cooler now so this kind of food is really help me to warm up a bit. So here it is the recipe:

Ingredients:

1 big chicken breast, slice it and bake it in a preheat oven 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes

1/2 medium zucchini, chopped into small chunks

1/2 can of green young jackfruit

1 galangal, bruised it

1 stalk lemon grass, tied it into a knot and bruised it
4 kaffir lime leaves

3 tbs fish sauce

200 ml coconut milk

100 ml of water

1 tbs vegetable oil

A generous handful of coriander/ cilantro leaves, chopped it finely

Spices to blend:

4 shallots

2 cloves of garlic

2 jalapeno

3 green cayenne pepper

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp coriander powder
1 tsp white pepper powder

3 small green tomatoes

1/2 tsp of shrimp paste

1 tsp salt

1 tsp sugar
2 tbs lemon juice (from squeezed lemon)

Direction:

Using a frying pan, saute the blended spices with lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves and galangal until fragrant.

Add water, coconut milk, fish sauce, green young jackfruit and chicken. Let it until boil.

Keep stirring so that the coconut milk would not be broken and add zucchini at the very last. Stir it for about 5 minutes.

Sprinkle with chopped coriander/ cilantro leaves when you serve it.

Serving 2-3 people

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Mackerel in Spicy and Sour Curry Sauce (Acar Ikan Kembung)

There is one tradition in Indonesia that I really miss. We call it 'Bancaan'. It is a dinner tradition which you are gathering to do some prayer with all of your neighbor and you provide food for them. Usually we put the food in a lunch box made from carton or plastic and give it to the neighbor who came. It comprises of rice and some side dishes like spicy fried potatoes, fried noodle, spicy chicken, spicy long beans in curry sauce, spicy and sour chayote curry, pickled cucumber and carrot (sometimes), fried tempe, fried tofu, fried dried salted fish and potato fritter. It's unique you know..Usually we have that tradition for anniversary including death anniversary, birthday party, Indonesian Independent Day, celebrating new born baby (for celebrating new born baby, the side dish is quite different. Usually it consist of spicy fish, spicy vegetable  salad with  grated coconut, stir fry tempe, fried tempe, fried tofu and fried dried salted fish) or a week before wedding. It's common in Indonesia especially in Central Java to give away lunch box along with the wedding invitation to our neighbor or friends. But right now, instead of giving lunch box contained rice and its side dishes, a lot of people just order some buns filled with cheese, chocolate or jam. Yes, it is easier but the old fashioned is better I guess...because I'm a big fan of 'Bancaan' hehehe....Now, I'm going to share one of my recipe which is one of the side dish in 'Bancaan' tradition but I add fish in it. So here it is the recipe of Mackerel in Spicy and Sour Curry Sauce (Acar Ikan Kembung):

Ingredients:
2 mackerel, scaled it and marinate it with 1 squeezed lemon for 20 minutes
1 medium sized cucumber, julienned
1 galangal, bruised it
2 Indian bay leaves
1 lemon grass, tied into a knot and bruised it
4 red Thai chili peppers, cut into angle
2 tbs white vinegar
150 ml water
1 stalk green onion, cut into 1 cm long
5 springs of cilantro/ coriander leaves, chopped finely
2 tbs vegetable oil to saute the blended spices
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar

Spices to blend:
4 shallots
3 cloves of garlic
2 candle nuts
1/2 tsp turmeric powder
1 cm ginger
1 tsp tamarind

Direction:
Blend the spices while deep frying the fish until golden brown.
Saute the blended spices along with galangal, bay leaves, red Thai chili peppers, and lemongrass until fragrant.
Add julienned cucumbers, water, white vinegar, salt, sugar and green onion. Add the fish and green onion. Bring it to boil and let it shimmer.
Sprinkle with cilantro/ coriander leaves when you serve it.

 Serving 2 people

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Red Thai Chicken Curry

Let's travel to Thailand today! That was what I'm thinking yesterday when I decided  to make Tom Yam Goong soup and Red Thai Chicken Curry. I was curious to make Red Thai Curry since first I had it. First time I had it, it was good. It was at Thai restaurant call Sawatde. Then in a grocery store they have its sauce. Uhmm...make me eager to make it  from scratch. Looking around for the perfect recipe in the internet, I found two of them and both are quite different. The first one is from www.allrecipes.com (which I suspected that it must be Westernize Thai Food) and another one is from www.templeofthai.com (I assumed that the owner of this web must be Thai people). So I decided to combine both of the recipe and it ended up really good and spicy, which I love it so much! I have a few big chicken breasts which are not good quality so it's quite tricky to cook it. So what I'm doing is avoid to cook the whole chicken like make chicken cordon bleu, BBQ chicken and all that. Instead I always slice it, bake it and put in a food processor to yield coarsely or finely grind chicken breast. Or simply I just make chicken nugget with it. Anyway, here it is the recipe for red Thai chicken curry:

Ingredients:
1 big chicken breast, slice it thinly and bake it in a preheat oven 350 degrees F for 25-30 minutes
1/2 medium zucchini, chopped into small chunk
200 ml coconut milk
1 cm galangal, bruised it
1 stalk lemongrass, fold and bruised it
2 cloves of garlic, chopped finely
1/4 tsp turmeric powder
1/2 tsp cumin powder
1/2 tsp coriander powder
2 tbs tomato sauce
2 tbs fish sauce
1/4 tsp shrimp paste
3 tbs chili pepper powder
1 medium tomato, cut into wedges
3/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp sugar
1 tbs vegetable oil











Direction:
Using a frying pan, saute garlic, galangal, lemongrass until fragrant. Add tomatoes and chicken, stir it for 1 minutes.
Add coconut milk, fish sauce, tomato sauce, shrimp paste, chili pepper powder, turmeric powder, cumin powder and coriander powder. Stir it gently.
Add zucchini and bring it to boil and let it until shimmer.

Serving 2 people

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Indonesian Spicy Curry (Mangut Terong Ungu dan Ikan Patin)

One of my favorite food when I was in Indonesia is Indonesian spicy curry. My mom used to make it really hot and put a lot of white pepper in it. There is special type of fish that we used, we call that 'Ikan Manyung' or Arius Thalassinus. In Javanese we call it Mangut Ndas Manyung. We just used their head because their head is yummy and not a lot of meat in it. But that's the point of eating head fish eh... Because I couldn't find that fish yet, I just simply used Basa Fish or Ikan Patin Siam in Indonesian language.

Let see the recipe:

Ingredients:

3 fillet Basa fish

1 eggplant, chop into small chunk

1/2 block of extra firm tofu, cut in half then cut in triangle

5 red Thai chillies, cut in angle

1 medium sized tomato, cut into wedges

3 medium size bilimbi (belimbing wuluh)

1/2 cup of coconut milk

1/2 cup of water

Spices to blend:

5 shallots

3 cloves of garlic

2 candlenuts

2 cm of ginger

1 tsp of coriander powder

1/2 tsp turmeric powder

1 tsp white pepper powder

1 bay leaf

2 cm of galangal

Direction:

Sauté the blended spices with bay leaf, galangal and red Thai chillies until fragrant. Add tomatoes and bilimbi.

Pour the water and coconut milk, add eggplant, tofu and fish in the same time. 

Keep stir the broth so that coconut milk has smooth texture.

Serving 3 people

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