Thai curries

There are scattered references to different types of Thai curries all over the Shopping and Cooking board, but I thought I'd start a more unified Thai curry thread for anyone inclined to post about them. I've tended to post a lot of Thai food under the David Thompson thread, but I rarely use his recipes faithfully. I love his cookbooks for inspiration, but sometimes I think the recipe testing was a little cursory. For instance, in the green curry beef recipe in the Street Food cookbook, he recommends braising brisket for about 30 minutes. That's about the time the texture matches that of a superball. I've found other recipes that seem a little off as well.
Recently, I made a green curry beef dish (after having a transcendent version at My Choice in Bangkok).


Green curry paste prep--kaffir lime zest, cilantro roots, turmeric, dried shrimp, lemongrass, garlic, shallots, toasted shrimp paste (LOTs of Thai green chiles plus one roasted poblano, not pictured):


Green curry paste:



The poblano gave it a great chartreuse color:




I followed Thompson's tip of braising the brisket in coconut milk (but for hours and it probably would have been better with a little more cooking)



Thai eggplants plus a few green chiles for garnish:


Finished curry (with 'cheat' frozen roti)

do u find cumin/coriander/white pepper combo used alot in green curries? Ive seen it before but not all the times...

thaiobsessed wrote:...Green curry paste prep--kaffir lime zest, cilantro roots, turmeric, dried shrimp, lemongrass, garlic, shallots, toasted shrimp paste

Where'd you find cilantro with roots? These days I can only find stems and up.

You see bunches of cilantro with intact roots upon occasion in Thai/Vietnamese groceries, though not with the regularity that the late lamented Thai Grocery on Broadway had them. Best thing to do is to grab a bunch when you see it, cut off the roots, and freeze for appropriate future use.

Alternatively, grow some - cilantro isn't really cost-effective to grow for the leaves, but growing it for the roots and the fresh, aromatic coriander seed it produces works great. Just throw the seed in and let it go. No worries. (and vote for cilantro at OneSeedChicago, while you're at it. Two words: FREE SEEDS. )

I think it's extremely rare in Chicago to find cilantro with roots intact, but chefs at the area Thai restaurants will tell you that they use the stems instead. Next, for their Thai menu, sourced them from a farm in Wisconsin IIRC. I try to find cilantro with as much of the stem intact as possible, and then I use the lightest colored stems.

gocubs88 wrote:do u find cumin/coriander/white pepper combo used alot in green curries? Ive seen it before but not all the times...

I actually used all three (I toasted the cumin and coriander seeds) but forgot to include them in my post. You can see remnants of the cumin seeds in the paste (due to my lazy pounding--I should have used a spice grinder for the seeds as it's hard to pulverize them completely in a big mortar).

JoelF wrote:

thaiobsessed wrote:...Green curry paste prep--kaffir lime zest, cilantro roots, turmeric, dried shrimp, lemongrass, garlic, shallots, toasted shrimp paste

Where'd you find cilantro with roots? These days I can only find stems and up.

There's been a fair amount of discussion about this on the board. I grew these this summer and froze some.
Occasionally, I have found them at Whole Foods. On Thanksgiving, the host for our meal (in Denver) found a package of cilantro with the roots attached at Super Target but I have yet to search local outposts.

Can anyone make a recommendation for a good commercial curry pastes - red and green?

For home made, may I suggest this page?
http://www.thaifoodandtravel.com/features/cpaste.html

I am NOT a curry fan. Unless done by my Thai sister-in-laws. They know my adversity to very spicy and can whip up a very mild curry that is great. Otherwise, when they were not around my father appreciated Vermont Curry (yes, that is the brand) but not as often as he would like due to the salt content.

I much prefer red to green. For whatever reason, it always seems much more flavorful. My brand of choice for home use is the Maesri brand.

All you will ever need to know about growing your own cilantro for its roots!

I love Thai food https://merrittsstoreandgrill.com/place ... hai-nampa/ . I am thinking of making an attempt at cooking curry. Anyone have a good panang curry recipe? This could be a disaster...

Ikara wrote:I love Thai food. I am thinking of making an attempt at cooking curry. Anyone have a good panang curry recipe? This could be a disaster...

No disaster, though it may take a while to find what you like.

Epicurious has this How to make Thai curry without a recipe.

How to Thai curry

Regards,
Cathy2

Ikara wrote:I love Thai food. I am thinking of making an attempt at cooking curry. Anyone have a good panang curry recipe? This could be a disaster...

To see a video of a curry being made go to: https://hot-thai-kitchen.com/ and then search on what kind of curry you want to make. Once you get the ingredients, they really are very easy.

If you don't have a Mortar and Pestle you can use a food processor for anything she does in a mortar and pestle.

Chicagoan Leela Punyaratabandhu has a website shesimmers.com, and this recipe is pretty good, although it starts with commercial panaeng curry paste

Her book Simple Thai Cooking is excellent, I was going to link to the Kindle version as it was on sale really cheap last week, alas no longer.

I made the shesimmers Panang curry dish on Monday using the Maesri paste and was very pleasantly surprised at the depth of flavor. I added Thai chilies and basil from the garden along with a whole host of fresh picked veggies and some chicken breast. Would definitely make it again, it was so easy!