Thai Week: Thai Red Curry

Breakfast: Another quinoa pilaf, this time with coconut milk. It’s SO good!

Lunch: Thai Red Curry with rice

Dinner: Miso noodle soup

Yesterday I took along the vegan burgers to a friend’s leaving BBQ and they went down really well, despite the fact that I used peanuts instead of cashews. Once you’ve got a recipe down it’s easy to make substitutions and shake things up a bit, so give it a try and you’ll find your meals getting better and better!

So I’ve saved the best for last this week; Thai Red Curry is without a doubt my favourite Thai meal, and if you’ve already made the Curry paste (as posted on Monday) this will take you no more than a quarter of an hour, after you’ve chopped the veggies or got someone else to do it for you (hint).

As ever, I learned this from the wonderful May Kaidee; its funny how through years of making something you automatically refine it and make it perfect for your tastes. I could eat this for about a week straight and not get bored of it.

I mentioned a few weeks ago that miso can help treat radition poisoning; lemongrass, too, has some fairly amazing effects. It has been shown to cause cell death in cancerous cells, and as such has strong anti-cancer properties. Its funny how you can be incorporating such fantastic foods into your diet without even knowing of their effects! 10 points for awesomeness, people.

You’ll need:

(Feeds 2)

            1 tbsp Red Curry Paste

            4 slices galangal

            4 kaffir lime leaves

            4 stalks lemongrass

            1 handful squash, cut into chunks

            1 onion, chopped

            1 small head of brocolli, chopped

            2 1/2 cups coconut milk

            2 tbsp soy sauce

            1 tbsp brown sugar

            sunflower oil / extra virgin olive oil

Method:

            Fry the Curry Paste in oil in a wok until fragrant

            Add the galangal, kaffir lime leaves, lemongrass and 1/2 cup coconut milk   

            Stir thoroughly to infuse the flavours

Add the onion, squash and broccoli and all but a little bit of the remaining coconut milk

Cook until the mixture thickens

Add a little water to “slacken” the mixture

Add the soy sauce and sugar

When the vegetables are soft, add the remaining coconut milk

Stir, garnish with coriander or mint leaves and serve with rice!

You can get the awesome-looking rice stack in the photo by cramming your just-cooked rice into a little bowl or a small cup stolen from an airline and just turning it out onto the plate before you ladel the curry around it. Extra smug points for presentation.

Just a note about sunflower oil: this is my preferred oil as it has heaps of vitamin E and is low in saturated fats, and also contains essential omega-6 fatty acids . You should use whatever oil is the best for you personally, so its worth doing a bit of research to decide which one best suits your diet. Peanut oil is also great, as long as you’re not allergic to peanuts, in which case I hope you wouldn’t have picked it out anyway. 

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