Thai Red
Curry Paste
From: Kate Pugh
Here's a red curry paste recipe, since some of those recipes use
it.
I like this better than the ones that come in jars, now I live somewhere
I can get the ingredients ;-)
This recipe is adapted from one in the BBC Vegetarian Good Food
magazine.
The original recipe used 8 large dried red chillies - I use fresh
ones instead.
2 medium chillies gives a medium-hot paste; sometimes I even use
more, and I'm not a big fan of over-hot food.
Makes 125ml (1/2 cup, 8 tbsp)
- 2 or more fresh red chillies, deseeded
- 5 garlic cloves
- 2 stalks fresh lemongrass
- bottom stems from a large bunch of fresh coriander (cilantro)
(original recipe used 3 coriander (cilantro) roots)
- 1 x 1-inch (2.5 cm) cube fresh ginger or galangal
- 1 large shallot or equivalent onion
- peel of 1 lime (original used 1 tbsp chopped Kaffir lime peel)
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 tsp coriander seeds
- 1 tsp white or black peppercorns
1. Chop the chillies, garlic, lemongrass, coriander stems, ginger
and shallot or onion.
2. Prepare the lime peel by removing as much of the white pith
as possible
(lay it outside down and slice the pith off with a sharp knife held
horizontally) and then chopping.
3. Place all ingredients in the blender and whizz to a fairly
smooth paste.
The raw ingredients come to about 1 cup (225ml, 8fl oz), so it's
enough to put in most small blenders.
4. Store in a screw-topped jar in the fridge
. I've kept it for a week or more.
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