Thai Prawn Red Curry

I absolutely love Thai food. It looks, tastes and smells delicious. The use of ingredients like lemongrass, Thai basil, galangal, garlic and chillies gives this dish a wonderfully fragrant, aromatic and spicy flavour. This recipe is quick and easy to make. To make it vegetarian, simply leave out the prawns and add other vegetables like Thai aubergine, baby corn, green beans, broccoli etc. to it and if you don’t eat/like seafood replace the prawns with chicken.

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 500g raw king prawns, shelled
• 2 tbsp. oil
• 1 red pepper, chopped
• 1 tomato, chopped
• 1 thumb size cinnamon stick
• 2 -3 kaffir lime leaves
• Handful of fresh Thai basil
• ¼ cup of chicken or vegetarian stock (optional)

Ingredients for red curry paste

• 1 ½ cans of coconut milk
• 1 large chopped shallot or scallion
• 1 ½ sticks of fresh lemongrass
• 6-7 cloves of garlic
• 2 fresh red chillies (or more if you like it really spicy)
• 4 inch piece of galangal or fresh ginger
• 1-2 tbsp. chilli powder
• 2 tsp cumin coriander powder
• 2 ½ tbsp. of tomato puree
• 2 tbsp. soya sauce
• 4 tsp sugar
• 2 tbsp. lime juice
• Salt to taste

Instructions

Put all the ingredients for the red curry paste in a blender and process until smooth.

Heat oil in a large frying pan, add cinnamon stick, kaffir lime leaves, tomatoes, red curry paste and the stock if using.

Leave to cook for 5 minutes.

Then add the red pepper and the prawns and simmer until they are pink (maximum 5 minutes).

Make sure not to overcook the prawns.

Finally, stir in the Thai basil leaves and serve with Thai jasmine rice.

P.S The red curry paste can also be made ahead and kept in the refrigerator for up to a week or you can freeze it in batches for up to 3 months to make mid-week meals quicker and easier.