My partner is from Thailand. She affirms get authentic curry paste. She says to get it at an Asian grocery store, not from an American store. She says get the good coconut milk as well. And she suggests using fresh chilis, lime leaves, and basil.
And she suggests using fresh chilis, lime leaves, and basil.
To be clear for the gringos in the chat, these would be "Thai chili peppers", "kaffir lime leaves", and "Thai basil", all of which should be readily available at your nearest Asian market.
You snip some leaves off the citrus tree in your backyard, add some jalapeños, and sweet basil you're gonna have a whole different dish.
Thank you for clarifying. She probably assumed I knew to point that out, but I didn't.
You snip some leaves off the citrus tree in your backyard, add some jalapeños, and sweet basil you're gonna have a whole different dish.
Now I’m somewhat morbidly curious as to what that would taste like.
I have a "Mexican" lime tree in my yard. I will snip some of the softer leaves for making Thai dishes. I'll also use the jalapenos I grow as well.
My dishes taste better than most of the restaurants where I eat.
Tamarind paste is a great ingredient for Thai dishes.
Without knowing the specific curry you’re looking to replicate makes it hard to make specific recommendations but a few things have helped me up my game.
The first is what you use to add a sour note. In the west we often use lime juice, which is great to add sprinkled at the end, but you need to get some tamarind paste for the depth of flavour. It also adds sweetness, but you can instead use some sugar, preferably brown or palm.
Fish sauce is a must to round out the depth of umami and I find soy really doesn’t work for me. If that’s a no-go because of dietary restrictions you might have to add some yeast flakes with the soy sauce, but it’s not going to have the same depth.
If you can get galangal, use it. Same with lemon grass. But again all depends on the specific curry.
It’s usually “green” that I go for, sometimes red.
Just imagine a little hole in the wall place where the menu is in Thai, with your options being “red,” “green,” or “massuman” and the staff will respond well to the white guy asking for it to be “thai spicy.”
Check out Pailin from https://hot-thai-kitchen.com/, she’s legit. She’s got an incredible amount of videos on her cooking channel, including what brands are good.
Happy cooking.
Penang or GTFO.
Seriously though, a good Thai recipe book on curry or an online source you trust is going to be your bet here, and not subbing out ingredients for the western equivalent.
Elsewhere people have already mentioned avoiding certain shortcuts, but I think you’re going to have to make some allowances the first time around, like a food processor versus using a mortar and pestle. As you track down more ingredients over time, try them out. You might have to go to multiple stores.
Lots of excellent advice in the thread already (could kick myself for not including shrimp paste!) but the truth is there are no surprise ingredients or techniques.
"Tastes like it's from your local Thai restaurant" is different than "tastes like it's from Thailand"
The TL;DR is that the Thai government has sponsored many Thai restaurants around the world as a form of diplomacy. Menus and recipes have largely been standardized by the Thai government, but adapted to local tastes.
Personally, if I want takeout style Thai curry, I use maesri brand curry paste cans. They are cheap and don't take up much space, and they have instructions on them like "add curry paste and 100 ml coconut milk to wok and cook till fragrant. Add 400 g protein ...". It's easy to keep a selection on hand of the different flavors. Yeah, it won't be the same as doing it 100% from scratch, but a lot of Thai restaurant food like pad Thai is notorious for requiring a lot of ingredients.
Thanks for this! I had no idea.
Excellent use of soft power.
What works for us is Cock brand red curry paste.
I use this one and it is awesome.
https://www.amazon.com/Mae-Ploy-Yellow-Curry-Delicious/dp/B007VAMIPM
Mae Ploy is legit.
You want a good curry paste, so not Thai Kitchen if you're in the US. You can make your own if you're feeling fancy but I rarely bother tbh. Cook it in a splash of coconut milk until it starts sizzling, then you can add the rest of the milk. The other big thing is get some lime leaves, they'll make a huge difference.
Great question and I hope other know the secret.
One thing I've heard is that you're supposed to heat activate your curry by cooking it alone for a couple of minutes before adding other ingredients.
It depends on what specifically you like about it I suppose. The main things that hit in Thai cooking are the aromatics: galangal, ginger, lemongrass...etc.
Understanding which of those flavors you like in the restaurant version is key to making it well at home, so maybe understanding what type of curry paste is best for you is the best way to go about it.
Check this: https://thewoksoflife.com/thai-curry-paste/
Fry your curry paste for a little while to get it releasing the flavors. And when you put in coconut milk, don't let it boil or it separates and gets oily.
Curry paste, coconut milk, kaffir lime leaves, and fish sauce (add near the end) are the most important things. Cock brand curry paste is the best I can get where I live and works very well (red/green, or yellow if you want it milder). For the fish sauce, the brand is less important, but Squid brand is good. I also think the rice is pretty important, so try to get decent Jasmine rice (store-bought works fine).
First of all no blender. Mortar and pestle. Shrimp paste (add lateron) I prefer dried shrimp, salt, sjalots (no onion), garlic, galanga (no ginger), Thai basil, lemon grass, birds eye green or red peppers, coriander roots. Pound for half an hour until smooth paste. I like to add toasted cumin and coriander seeds, sellery, lemon and curry leaves. Oh and start reducing a can of coconut cream and reduce to oil to fry the pounded mixture, add proteine, add stock....then add more coconut cream towards the end when the proteine is done.
Last time I looked for an answer, I found Dan Toombs "The curry guy" but I haven't had a chance to try out any recipes yet. They have a YouTube channel and some books. Depending on how you like your media.
May ploy paste. It's what most Thai people in Australia use. It's the bomb.
Mai ploy? May ploi?
Every thing you know is a lie.
It's a blank page. But Maesri is some very good stuff
Also vouching for this stuff.
It's my cornerstone keep in the pantry trick for lazy vegan meal prep and fuck I get so many compliments on the meals I make with it
I'm sure you know this, but some of the maesri pastes are non-vegetarian.
Strongly agreed on the delicious, lazy, vegan food, though.
Taken a nice photo of your creation? We highly encourage sharing with our friends over at !foodporn@lemmy.world.
Posts in this community must be food/cooking related and must have one of the "tags" below in the title.
We would like the use and number of tags to grow organically. For now, feel free to use a tag that isn't listed if you think it makes sense to do so. We are encouraging using tags to help organize and make browsing easier. As time goes on and users get used to tagging, we may be more strict but for now please use your best judgement. We will ask you to add a tag if you forget and we reserve the right to remove posts that aren't tagged after a time.
[QUESTION] What are your favorite spices to use in soups?
!bbq@lemmy.world - Lemmy.world's home for BBQ.
!foodporn@lemmy.world - Showcasing your best culinary creations.
!sousvide@lemmy.world - All things sous vide precision cooking.
!koreanfood@lemmy.world - Celebrating Korean cuisine!
While posting and commenting in this community, you must abide by the Lemmy.World Terms of Service: https://legal.lemmy.world/tos/
Failure to follow these guidelines will result in your post/comment being removed and/or more severe actions. All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users. We ask that the users report any comment or post that violates the rules, and to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting.