CURRY PASTES
I’m always game for trying new from scratch curry paste recipes. Such a huge payout for a little effort. Each recipe made, give or take, one cup of paste. I portioned them out into quarter cups, and froze them. The ones in the book are pretty formulaic, so I decided to go with the four standard ones, assembly line style.
All four of them contain toasted coriander and cumin seeds, white peppercorn, fresh chopped galangal, sliced lemongrass, kaffir lime rind, shrimp paste, cilantro root or stem, garlic, and sliced shallot. The green includes fresh green Thai chile, while the others use soaked dry red Thai and bird’s eye chiles. The Massaman is spiced with cloves and green cardamom, and the yellow with fennel seed, fresh turmeric, and curry powder blend.
I had to make a few substitutions, as my local 99 Ranch asian market didn’t stock several of the ingredients. There were no dried Thai chiles or bird’s eye chiles, so I had to use something like chile de arbol. Serranos were subbed for lack of fresh green Thai chiles. I don’t think I’ve ever seen fresh kaffir limes at that store, so I used a combo of fresh Persian lime zest and fresh kaffir lime leaves.
The author recommends grinding all the ingredients before putting into the food processor, and this is excellent advice, especially with the galanga which, even when fresh, can be literally like a piece of wood. I processed my pastes in the Vitamix, and all but the green were very dry, requiring constant scraping down. Only the Massaman required a brief frying in oil to finish. So far, I’ve cooked with the green and red, and both were very tasty and well-balanced. One thing that eludes me is the brilliant scarlet color of the proprietary red curry paste. Mine, and many pics on the net of homemade red curry pastes, are always more of a reddish tan. I’m pretty sure it has to do with the variety of dried chile used. If you know the secret to getting that dramatic, crimson-colored paste, please share! TIA
