For my wife's 40-something birthday on July 31st, I decided to try two new Thai curries I've not prepared previously. I've been enjoying Thai curries for twenty years and have been making red Thai curries for the family for over ten years. Last night, as we've lately been enjoying both the Green and Massaman Thai curries from Thai Noodle Town that recently opened in west Kingsport, I decided to try to replicate them.
Last week I paid a visit to The Stockpot in north Johnson City where I procured one 14 oz. tub each of Pantainorasingh Green and Massaman curry pastes. These curries come in small plastic tubs and are packed in plastic bags for restaurant use and at prices a small fraction of what you'd pay at places like Food City for inferior products in small containers. While I think Mae Ploy curry pastes might be better than the brand I bought, they weren't currently available. I do think the Pantainorasingh brand products are quite sufficient for creating great curries.
My wife and daughter aren't quite the fans of hot, spicy Thai curries as are my son, his girlfriend, my daughter's fiancee and me. If it was up to the majority, I'd have made a full-on green curry that would melt paint, which is how we like it. I made the Massaman curry as a conciliation as it's nowhere as spicy hot as a green curry, which is considered the hottest of Thai curries.
Thai green curries get there name for a reason: they're comprised of a large part of crushed green Thai chilis along with several other ingredients such as lemongrass, garlic, Kaffir lime leave, fish sauce, coriander leaves and seeds, cumin, galangal root, just all kinds of tasty things. Thai green curries aren't for the faint of heart: the last one I had at Thai Noodle Town required not one but two paper towels to blot the sweat from my entire head and I enjoyed every bite of it!
Massaman/Massamun curries are a bit different as even the name is a derivation of the old Thai word for Muslim. Pantainorasingh's Massaman curry paste consists of lemongrass, shallots, red chilis, salt, garlic, galangal root, coriander seed, cumin, Kaffir lime peel, cinnamon and citric acid. The flavor profile is very different than a green curry and is somewhat closer to a red curry. While it's loaded with the red chilis, it's not nearly as hot as a green curry.
Thai curries are pretty simple to prepare. It all hinges on the additional ingredients that are required and the preparation technique. I decided to make both of these curries based upon chicken. The basic technique is to heat a large skillet and add some vegetable oil. I use my trusty stainless steel 14" Belgique skillet with vented cover lid that we bought with leftover wedding money over twenty-five years ago. It's an amazing skillet that has an aluminum laminated bottom for even heat distribution and would easily cost well over $100 if bought at a kitchen store today. There's a number of manufacturers/marketers producing some pretty good stuff lately at reasonable prices that you can even buy at Walmart. Wearever and Revere Ware make decent quality and it's only a fraction of the price of brands like Cordon Bleu and the like. The biggest requirement is that is has the laminated bottom with an aluminum or aluminum/copper core, is quite deep and has a lid. If you have a gas stove and have a good carbon steel wok with a decently fitting lid, you're also in high cotton!
The first step in preparing Thai curries is assembling the ingredients and prepping them to go into the pot. Almost all Thai curries involve two key ingredients: coconut milk and Thai fish sauce which is known as
nam pla. These are critical and no real substitutes work very well. Coconut milk is to Thai cooking what chicken broth is to the Chinese. Same for Thai fish sauce: this is what is used for a salty flavor that the Chinese would employ soy sauce for. While most brands of Thai coconut milk are quite similar, there's a big difference between Thai fish sauce. I recommend only Golden Boy or Squid Brand due to their very high quality but you'll only find them in Asian groceries like in The Stock Pot. Food City and Kroger carry Thai fish sauce in ther Asian foods section but they are of inferior quality and very expensive compared to what The Stock Pot and most other Asian grocers carry in the big quart bottles.
Thai curries, like Indian curries depend upon properly prepared steamed/cooked rice as the foundation. Thai Hom Mali also known as Jasmine rice is among the best tasting in the world. It is a very long grain rice with a scent of popcorn as it cooks. It's somewhat similar to the Indian Basmati rice but is not aged and the individual grains are quite separate if prepared properly. If you've been used to Uncle Ben's or Mahatma, you don't know what you been missing. The differences are considerable in both taste and texture. Regardless of what rice you have on hand, you need to prepare your rice at a 3:1 ratio with the rice being the majority ingredient. Just think of biscuits and gravy.
Thai curries are a fairly simple proposition as they are somewhat like creating a stew. The devil is in the details and you must pay careful consideration as to when ingredients are added as well as the cooking temperature. You heat up your skillet, add some oil and basically stir fry your chicken or other meat. Most curries are very tasty whether your preference is chicken, beef or pork and even shrimp is amazing if sufficient care is taken in it's preparation that it's the final ingredient rather than the first as with the other meat choices.
When your meat (other than shrimp) is about half done, add a large onion that's been peeled, halved and sliced into wedges that's been broken apart and stir fry away. When the onion appears to be translucent and the meat is no longer pink, you need move the meat aside to make a well in the center of your skillet or wok in order to add 1/4 can of Coconut milk. Be advised that coconut milk isn't the same thing as coconut cream which is a super-sweetened coconut milk used for making drinks like a Pina Colada. Coconut milk is not sweet and has an unmistakable taste and is made by basically squeezing the liquid under pressure out of freshly grated coconut meat. It is a critical ingredient and can be bought quite reasonably even at Walmart in the Asian food section for less than $2 per can. Into this well you need to add your curry paste and let it cook into the coconut milk for a minute or two. The amount of curry paste you need to use can vary wildly. For the green curry I made, I added about three tablespoons of green curry paste and even that wasn't enough according to my diehards. For the Massaman curry, I added a couple of tablespoons as it was going to be a smaller curry for only two people. The Massaman curry paste is very, very thick and requires quite a bit of effort to blend it into the coconut milk. I take a fork to do the initial blending of the curry pastes in the center of the vessel until somewhat mixed. A stick blender would probably do a great job as well but I didn't think about breaking mine out until later. Once the curry paste has been blended into the coconut milk, thoroughly mix this with the meat and veggies at are already in the skillet. At this point add the rest of the can of coconut milk along with at least one half can of water so that all veggies and meat are completely covered. Continue thinking of a curry as a stew to find the right consistency. With the green curry, I let it ride as I was also preparing cubed and boiled red potatoes to go into it when the curry was finished and used a total of two cans of coconut milk. With the Massaman curry, I then added cubed eggplant, finely sliced orange bell pepper strips and green onion segments along with the balance of the can of coconut milk and half a can of water.
Thai curries typically take about twenty to thirty minutes to mature after the meat has initially cooked. They need to be stirred often and the stove's heat level needs to be only a simmer when the vessel is covered. Whether green or Massaman, the curry will need to be tasted and seasoning adjusted well prior to serving. To adjust the saltiness, Thai fish sauce is critical. You can buy a quart of Squid Brand at The Stock Pot for less than a 6 oz. bottle costs at Food City. Sugar is a critical ingredient with most curries with the Massaman being the sweetest of the lot. Palm or brown sugar is preferred although regular white sugar is better than nothing if the others aren't available. A good green curry shouldn't be but slightly sweet when finished whereas a Massaman curry has a definite sweetness to complement it's spicy flavor.
My recommendations for anyone attempting to create Thai curries in their own kitchen is to first taste it as a master chef would prepare it. The older lady that is the chef at Thai Noodle Town in Kingsport should be your benchmark. She puts all others in the Tri-Cities, TN away with her skills that I'm sure were learned over many years. When you get to her level, you've really accomplished something. I'll never get to her level but I'm quite happy with what I've prepared at home as everyone seems to like it. Another thing about Thai curries: unlike most Chinese dishes, Thai curries are wonderful the next day as left overs. Fear No Food!
