I recently came back from 8 weeks of travelling around south east Asia. Whilst there, I ate lots of delicious Thai food, and even went to a thai cookery course- which was amazing. We sourced local fresh produce, before making our own food (link to that is here). One of the recipes I made was a thai green curry, and it was honestly one of the best thai green curries I have tried, better than many of the restaurants. We made our own paste- which was the key to that. Of course, day to day it does require time and effort to make the paste, so you can just use the shop brought one ( I would use a few tbsp of this), but here I have included how to make it from scratch. It does require quite a few authentic thai ingredients- I could find some in the supermarkets ( especially big Sainsbury’s and Waitrose), but you can also order them from an asian online website, which delivers them to your house.

For the paste:

• 5 cloves of thai garlic (or 2 cloves of regular garlic)
• 1 shallot, finely chopped
• 1 lemongrass stick, chopped
• 1 inch galengal or ginger (if you cannot get)
• A few thai coriander roots (or some roots of the coriander herb, if you cannot find)
• 1 inch fresh tumeric (or 1tsp tumeric powder, if you cannot get)
• 1 tsp whole peppercorns
• 0.5 tsp ground coriander
• 0.5 tsp ground cumin
• 5 green chillies
• Large bunch of thai basil

Rest of the curry:

• 2 cans of coconut milk (use the full fat one)
• 3 tbsp fish sauce (leave out if veggie and add some extra salt)
• 3 tsp sugar or palm sugar
• 2 tbsp lime juice
• Meat/ veg (I used chicken, aubergine pieces and courgette pieces)
• Handful of thai basil

1. In a dry pan, roast the cumin and coriander powder for a few seconds.
2. Place all the curry paste ingredients in a pestle and mortar and bash for a good 15 minutes, until very well mixed, and all the fibres have broken down. You could use a blender for this, but pounding it, releases more flavours.
3. Once done, heat about 2-3 tbsp of oil in a wok. Add all the paste and fry on a medium heat, for a few minutes until fragrant.
4. Then add a little of the coconut milk into the paste and mix thoroughly until well incorporated.
5. Then add the rest of the 2 cans of the coconut milk in and leave for 5 minutes, whilst stirring well.
6. Add the fish sauce (if using), sugar and lime juice.
7. Then add your meat/ veg and cook on a medium heat until all is cooked.
8. FInish the sauce with the thai basil.
9. Serve with Thai sticky jasmine rice.

If you want to make more Thai dishes, this is a great salad, and this a great desert.