Thai Green Curry

Now that you know how to make green curry paste here is a recipe for Chicken Thai Green Curry (Keaw Wan Kai) to get you going.

Ingredients (1 serving)
1 cup fresh Coriander Leaves
3tbsp Vegetable Oil
1 1/2tbsp Green Curry Paste
1 pinch freshly Ground Cumin Seeds
370ml Coconut Milk
2 tbsp Coconut Cream
1 Boned and Skined Chicken Breast, sliced
2 Green Aubergines (eggplants) - quartered
Sprig Pea Aubergines
1 tsp Sugar
1 1/2 tbsp Fish Sauce
2 Kaffir Lime Leaves (torn in half)
6 Thai Basil Leaves
1/2 fresh chilli thinly sliced

Method
In a mortar, pound the fresh coriandar leaves. Heat oil in a wok until very hot. Add the pounded coriandar leaves and fry for 1 minute. Add the curry paste and cumin powder and fry for another 2 minutes or until you get aroma. Lower the heat and add the coconut cream (tip: to get cream from the coconut milk can - put the coconut milk can in the fridge for 20 minutes. This allows the cream to settle up the top. Take a tablespoon and scoop out the cream). Let cook for a minute without stirring. Then add coconut milk a little at a time. Allow it to simmer for 2-3 minutes and then add the chicken and cook until done throughly.

Add the aubergines, sugar, fish sauce, kaffir lime leaves, basil leaves and chilli. simmer for 5 minutes. Transfer to a bowl. Sprinkle with Thai basil and serve with Thai Jasmine Rice.

Tip - you can use baby corn, bamboo shoots and green peas if you cannot find the Thai Aubergines.

Thai Green Curry Paste

A lot of people tend to instantly think of curries when they think about Thai food. There is a lot more to Thai food then just curries however they do tend to be the more popular dishes. Thai coconut-based curries are numerous but the more well known ones are red, green, yellow, panang and masamam curries. Thai names for these are gaeng phet (red), gaeng kiow wahn (green curry), gaeng leuang (yellow), gaeng phanaeng (panang) and gaeng massaman (masamam).

Green curry is the only type of Thai curry paste made with fresh Thai green chilies and thus usually the hottest. All other types of curry paste are made up of dried Thai chilies.

Ready made curry pastes are widely available in Thai and most Asian supermarkets, but just like any cooking, making it fresh yourself gives you a totally different result, and this way you can also orient it to your taste.

What I would like to share with you today is a recipe to make fresh green curry paste.

The key ingredients for most Thai curry pastes are mainly wet and fragrant and include fresh chillies, lemon grass, galangal, garlic, shallot, kaffir lime leaves, cilantro roots and shrimp paste.

Green Curry Paste

Ingredients
15 large fresh green hot chilies
3 shallots, sliced
9 cloves garlic
1 tsp finely sliced fresh galangal
1 tbsp sliced fresh lemon grass
9 tsp finely sliced kaffir lime rind
1 tsp chopped coriander root
5 white peppercorns
1 tbsp roasted coriander seeds
1 tsp sea salt
1 tsp shrimp paste

Method
Combine coriander seeds, and peppercorn in a mortar, pound well. Transfer to a bowl and put aside.
Pound hot chilies and salt together well. Add the remaining ingredients except shrimp paste, pound until mixed well.
Add the coriander mixture and shrimp paste, continue pounding until smooth and fine.

And you have yourself fresh green curry paste.

Bangkok, Thailand

I absolutely adore Thai food so on my way back to London from my trip home to Fiji in January, I made a point to stopover in Bangkok, Thailand for a few days, especially to learn more about this gorgeous cuisine.

For those of you that love to embark on culinary adventures like myself, the details are:
Blue Elephant Cooking School - http://www.blueelephant.com/school/index.html
Baipai Thai Cooking School - http://www.baipai.com/



I enjoyed the Baipai class more then the Blue Elephant one as it was set in a more authentic Thai home-style learning environment.

Spicy Grilled Beef Salad (Yam Nuea Yang)
I have a lot of Thai recipes that I plan to share with you but for my first Thai posting I have chosen the Spicy Grilled Beef Salad, solely because it is the most popular at my dinner parties, and not to mention the most healthy.



Ingredients - Per 1 serving
80 grams Beef fillet
1 tsp Seasoning Soy Sauce
1 Shallot - Finely Shredded
1/2 Tomato - seeded and finely sliced
1/2 Cucumber - seeded and finely sliced
1 Chinese Celery - roughly chopped

Dressing
1 Hot Chillie - finely chopped
3 cloves garlic - finely chopped
2 tsp Lime Juice
2 tsp - Fish Sauce
1 tsp Sugar (Brown)

Method
Marinate beed with seasoning soy sauce for 30 minutes. Then grill over medium heat turning regularly until it is medium or well done. Slice thinly and set aside. Prepare the dressing by mixing chopped chili, garlic, lime juice, fish sauce and sugar together. Combine beef slices, shallots, tomato, cucumber and chinese celery in a bowl and add dressing. Toss well and serve.

Miso Soup

This recipe is quick and easy to make, but more importantly tastes so good it'll make you wonder why on earth you kept buying those awful sachet mixes (oh you know who you are).

Photo courtesy of Japanesefood.about.com

Ingredients (Serves 4)
Fresh tofu - 1 small block (cut into small cubes)
Spring Onions - 1/4 cup
Seaweed (Wakame) - handful
Soy Bean Paste - 3-4 tbsps
Dashi Stock - 3 cups

Method

Add the Dashi stock to a pan and bring to a boil. Add the tofu cubes to the soup. Simmer the tofu for a few minutes on low heat. Take out a little soup stock from the pan and dissolve soy bean paste in it. Gradually return the miso mixture in the soup. Add Wakame. Stir the soup gently. Turn off the heat and add the chopped green onion.

Note: You can find dashi stock with miso paste (combined) in some Japanese stores.

Useful tip: Remember never to boil the soup after you put miso in.

Japanese - (Tamago-Yaki) Rolled Omelette

A few months ago I took a Sushi and Sashimi course. I thoroughly enjoyed the class and would highly recommend it to anyone interested in learning to make Japanese food.

More information on the courses can be found on: http://www.hashicooking.co.uk/

The classes are run by Reiko who is a great chef and an awesome teacher. She welcomes you into her home and shows you how fun and easy Japanese cooking can be. She has years of experience with Japanese food as well as other world cuisines.

And now for some recipes.

Tamago -Yaki (sushi Omelette). Tamago is Japanese for "egg". Tamago-Yaki is sushi using an egg.

The Japanese rolled omelette may look really complex but once you know how to make it, it is quite simple.

An essential is the Tamago pan in which the omelette is made.









Ingredients
1 tsp of dashi powder dissovled in a little bit of water
1 tsp mirin
1 1/2 tbsp caster sugar (can adjust according to taste)
1 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp salt
6 large eggs, beaten

Garnish
Grated Daikon (white Japanese raddish)

Mix all the ingredients in a large jug and stir well. Heat the pan over medium heat and brush it with some vegetable oil. Pour in a quarter of the egg mixture. Till the pan to coat it evenly. When the egg starts to set, roll it up towards you with a pair of chopsticks (will form a roll at the end of one side of the pan). Keep the rolled omelette in the pan. Push back to the furthest side from you. Grease the empty part of the pan and pour 1/3 of the egg mixture in at the empty part of the pan (half the egg mixture is used at this stage). Lift up the first roll with chopsticks, and let the egg mixture run underneath. When it looks half set, roll the omelette around the first roll to make a single roll with many layers. Move the roll gently onto a bamboo sushi mat. Roll the omelette firmly and leave to stand rolled up for 5 minutes. Repeat the whole process to make another roll. Cut the rolled omelettes into multiple inch slices crossways.

Serve with grated daikon on the side with a splash of soy sauce or make Tamago-Yaki. Will add sushi rice and more sushi recipes in the next few days.

Chunky Double Chocolate Cookies

This winning recipe was given to me by a friend of mine a few years ago. I have since whipped up this treat on several occasions and its been a success every single time.

I took a jar full of these delicious cookies to work a few weeks ago and not suprisingly they were gone in no time. So make sure to keep these luscious treats under lock and key unless you are feeling generous ;-)

Ingredients - Makes 20-22
115 grams unsalted butter, softened
115 grams of light muscovado sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla essence
150 grams of self raising flour
75g of porridge oats
115 grams plain chocolate, roughly chooped
115 grams of white chocolate, roughly chopped

Method
Preheat oven to 190°C
Lightly grease two baking sheets.
Cream the butter with the sugar in a bowl until pale and fluffy.
Add the egg and vanilla essence and beat well.
Stir the flour over the mixture and fold in lightly with a metal spoon, then add the oats and chopped chocolate. Stir until evenly mixed.
Place small handfulls of the mixture into 20-22 heaps on the baking tray, leave space for expanding.
Bake for 12-15 minutes or until the cookies are beginning to turn golden.
Let cool for 5 minutes on the baking sheets, before putting them on a wire rack to cool completely

Note: Will post picture the next time I use this recipe