thai red curry | GF-Zing!

One reader asked if we had looked at recipes for making homemade Thai curry paste. Well, we have. We used the following useful sources :

Seductions of Rice by Jeffrey Alford & Naomi Duguid 1998

Saveur Magazine

Thai in Minutes by Vatcharin Bhumichitr 2004

Thai Cuisine with Jasmine Rice from Eastland Food Corporation

Thai Culinary Art by Srisomboon Bhandhukravi 1993

Terrific Pacific Cookbook by Anya von Bremzen & John Welchman 1995

Thai Red Curry Paste recipes use a basic list of ingredients, and all the recipes seem to include chilies, coriander, cumin, peppercorn, garlic, lemongrass, galangal, a fishy element like shrimp paste or fish sauce, and salt. Most also include shallots, kaffir lime leaf or zest, and either cilantro leaf or root. A few add nutmeg, paprika, or cardamom.

Dry chilies are usually seeded and soaked. Dry spices are generally toasted in a skillet before grinding. Garlic and shallot are peeled and chopped before making in to a paste. The bottom 3 inches of lemon grass stalk is cut off, the toughest leaves removed, and the whole piece is then smashed with the flat side of a cleaver before the lemon grass is minced.

Shrimp paste or fish sauce must be investigated for gluten free status before using. Shrimp paste is a dry product that is dry roasted before use.

Ultimately, all the ingredients are ground to a homogeneous paste.

Based on the following table, you can see that Thai Red Curry paste is made using a fairly standardized set of ingredients, easily customized by the home cook to make a “signature” gluten free blend.

Thai Red Curry Paste Comparisons from gfzing.com

Make sure that all of your ingredients are gluten free!

Try this excellent curry – you won’t be sorry!

Fry one onion, chopped, in 2 Tablespoons of oil until browned. Add 2 lamb shanks and brown them as well. De-glaze the pan with 1 cup of New England Hard Cider.

In to a pressure cooker, put:

1 can of coconut milk

2 Tablespoons of gluten free thai red curry paste

1 stalk of lemon grass, the white part at the root end only, chopped

2 Tablespoons of fresh ginger, chopped

Add the lamb shank mixture to the coconut milk mixture. Close the pressure cooker and bring up the pressure. Pressure cook for 10 minutes, then let the pressure drop on its own. Lamb shanks take a long time to cook. This pressure-cooking step will give the lamb a head start, ensuring that eventually the lamb gets nice and tender.

Carefully transfer the hot lamb shanks in their curry sauce in to a casserole that has a lid. To this mixture, add

1 Cornish Game Hen

1 mango, peeled seeded and cut in to chunks (an under-ripe mango is perfect for this purpose.)

Braise the dish, covered, in a 350 degree oven for 2 hours, until the lamb is tender. Skim off any fat that has accumulated. Season with salt if needed.

Serve with Jasmine rice topped with plenty of fresh chopped cilantro, and fresh ground sea salt.

Note: If you don’t have a pressure cooker, you can cook everything except the game hen and mango for 1-1 1/2 hours and then add the game hen and mango and bake for an additional hour and a half.

Homemade Thai Red Curry Paste

Rich Lamb and Cornish Game Hen Curry