Vegan Thai Red Curry

My family is a huge fan of Thai cuisine, especially my husband. I recently tried making classic Thai curry to surprise my family. Voila!! Everyone loved it.

Secret ingredient and pillar of this Thai curry is Thai red curry paste which you can avail easily from Amazon. Thai red curry paste comprises of mainly galangal, lemongrass, Kaffir lime leaves, Thai red chillies and hence the unique flavour.

Since Thai cuisine majorly deals with strong aromatic flavours, use more of onion, ginger and garlic in the dish. Another game changing ingredient is coconut milk. It absolutely redefines the rich taste of curry. Thai curry is packed with goodness of variety of veggies which makes it more vibrant. So use lots of veggies. Thai red curry is best when paired with long grain rice or brown basmati rice.

Recipe:

Serves 6 people

Prep time: 30 min

Bake time: 20 min

Total time: 50 min

Ingredients:

Onion - 1 (large sized, chopped)

Garlic - 1 tsp (minced)

Ginger - 1 tsp (grated)

Mushroom - 200g (sliced)

Broccoli florets - 12-15 or 1 cup

Zucchini - 1 (medium sized, sliced) or 1/2 cup

Capsicum - 2 (medium sized, cubed)

Tofu - 200g (Pan roasted, cubed) optional

Thai Red curry paste - 3-4 tbsp

Coconut milk - 800ml - 1ltr (lite)

Soya sauce - 3 tsp

Olive oil - 4 tbsp

Thai red chilli - 1 optional

Lemon juice - juice of half lemon

Lemon zest - 1/4 tsp optional

Basil leaves - 8-10 leaves optional

Salt as per taste

Steps

• In a wok or large wide pan, heat 1 tbsp of olive oil. Saute cubed tofu (water drained) for 3 min or until the sides of tofu is golden brown. Transfer it to a bowl.

• In the same pan, heat half of olive oil on med-high heat. Add half the mushrooms. Saute occasionally for 5 min. (See notes.)

• Add half of the onion, garlic and saute for 2-3 min. Take it into separate bowl/plate. Repeat for remaining mushrooms, onion and garlic.

• Once done, add the first sauted mushrooms, onion and garlic back into the pan. Add other veggies (zucchini, broccoli, capsicum. See notes) along with 3 tbsp of Thai red curry paste + 1 tbsp for extra spice.

• Saute veggies for 2 min with curry paste so that veggies are coated well with curry paste.

• Now pour in the coconut milk, soy sauce and pan fried tofu. (See notes). Add salt as per your taste and let all the veggies cook in coconut milk for 3-4 min. Add Thai dried red chilli (See notes).

• Switch off the flame while veggies are cooked and coconut milk has slightly thickened. Add lemon juice, lemon zest and basil leaves.

Notes

• Cook mushrooms in batches with high heat on wide pan because mushrooms are rich in water content and release water when heated. If crowded or on low flame, water cannot escape easily and hence mushrooms turn soggy instead of nice and crispy.

• Can use carrot, baby corn if you don't find any of the veggies.

• Grate almost 1 and half sized coconut. In batches, grind coconut with adequate water. Squeeze and strain the coconut pulp to extract milk.

• If you don't have Thai dried red chilli, use whatever is there in your pantry or skip it.