This recipe is my husband’s family’s cherished green curry recipe. It is served at every family gathering and more than a few funerals — indeed, at Grandma Nang’s funeral, it was seasoned with the “ganja” that relatives found in her purse and everyone had a nice, mellow time after the cremation. All of which is to say, this might be a lot different from your family’s green curry recipe. It might even look different. My chef friend Dylan refers to the ideal color of curry as “sexy green”, a lovely celadon hue that some curries boast when they are brought to the table, usually in a fancy restaurant. However, this not a “sexy green” curry. It is what Chef Andy Ricker would call a “khaki” green. To be honest, I don’t trust “sexy green” curries. They are like men who are overly groomed and wax their body hair. Why so much focus on appearance?
You might say to yourself, “Whoa, all these words for green curry!” but the truth is, this recipe has been my own White Whale, cavorting in deep and choppy ocean waves just out of reach, only to occasionally ram me port-side unawares. Which is all to say, I have struggled with this recipe. Until I discovered the secret of the house.
Part of the curry paste is store-bought.
Yes! It’s true! There are two chili pastes in this green curry: a homemade paste and a store-bought paste. So you can say that this paste is doctored, just like how I used to doctor a jar of Ragu with extra onions, garlic, vegetables and spices and call it my own when I was 12. Except this curry is way, way more complicated (and delicious) than that spaghetti sauce.
There are three components to the curry paste: the dried spice mix, the homemade chili paste, and the store-bought chili paste. You can use any store-bought chili paste. You don’t need to worry about that part. All you need to know is that you need 2 kg of it (we’re feeding 20, you might want to adjust accordingly.)
Green curry (Gaeng Kiew Waan)
Serves 10-20 (depending on how big your eaters are)
Prep time: 5-8 hours Cooking time: 45 minutes
The night before or early in the morning of:
- 2 kg beef shank, sliced against the grain
- 1.5 L coconut milk “tail” (or UHT coconut milk thinned with a little water)
- Fish sauce to taste
- Palm sugar, broken up in a mortar and pestle, to taste
In coconut milk “tail”, stew beef shank until very tender over low heat in a big pot. This could take anywhere between 5 to 8 hours. Skim fat off of the surface from time to time. Towards the end of the stewing process, season with a little fish sauce and palm sugar. Try a Tablespoon of each. When done, turn off heat and keep on the stove (or counter) next to the wok where you will be frying your chili paste.
For the spice mix:
- 2 Tablespoons coriander seeds
- 3 Tablespoons cumin seeds
- 1 Tablespoon white peppercorns (black should be fine)
- 2 nutmeg pods (or about 9 g nutmeg powder)
- 3 mace blades (or about 4 g ground mace)
While your beef is stewing, toast all ingredients in a dry pan until fragrant, then grind finely in a spice grinder. Set aside.
For the curry paste:
- 2 kg store-bought green curry paste (set aside in its own bowl)
- 5 coriander (cilantro) roots, chopped
- 3 big lemongrass bulbs, sliced
- 2 inch piece of galangal, peeled and chopped
- Rind from 1 makrut lime, sliced
- 200 g Thai shallots, peeled (or 100 g banana shallots)
- 200 g Thai garlic, peeled (or 100 g Western garlic)
- 10 green chee fah (or goat or spur) chilies, sliced
- 10 green bird’s eye chilies, stemmed
While your beef is stewing, make homemade paste. Starting with cilantro roots, pound in a mortar and pestle into a paste before add adding the next thing, one by one, continuing down the list until you get to the bird’s eye chilies. Set aside next to green curry paste.
For finishing curry (the “cooking” process):
- 500 mL coconut cream (“hua kati”)
- 2 Tablespoons palm sugar, broken up in a mortar and pestle
- 2 Tablespoons fish sauce
- 100 g bird’s eye chilies (for garnish)
- 6 makrut lime leaves, torn (for garnish)
- 20 Thai sweet basil leaves (for garnish)
In an already hot wok over medium-low heat, add 4 ladlefuls of coconut milk from the pot of beef stewed in coconut tail next to the wok. Add both curry pastes, homemade and store-bought, to the coconut milk and stir to incorporate. Then add the spice mix and stir. As the paste dries and bubbles, continue adding more coconut milk, ladleful by ladleful, like you’re making a risotto. You continue to stir, adding a ladleful of coconut milk at a time, until the paste is “fragrant” (ie. gets up your nose). This is probably the most intuitive (ie. difficult) part of the curry-making process. You want the paste to have expanded to about 1/4 of the wok, but you don’t want too much oil separation. Stir continuously so that the paste doesn’t burn.
If your beef isn’t on a burner, put it on a burner now and turn on its heat to medium-low. Add paste to the beef and stir to incorporate. In the wok, add about half a cup of water to “clean” it out and add that to the beef as well. We don’t want to waste anything! Turn off the heat under the wok.
Now we season the curry. Add 2 Tablespoons of fish sauce and 2 Tablespoons of palm sugar, and taste for seasoning. If you like the flavor, bring the curry to a boil and add coconut cream.
Lower heat back to low. Taste for seasoning again. Then add your garnishes — chilies, lime leaves, basil — stir and turn up the heat to bring to a boil again. Then turn off the heat and you are done!
Serve with rice, kanom jeen (fermented rice noodles) and/or roti with nam pla prik (fish sauce with chilies), hard-boiled eggs, fresh bird’s eye chilies for spiceheads and maybe a cut-up lime (some people like a little squeeze for freshness).
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