Coconut Chicken and Shrimp Curry
Recipe byCooked Thai fusion style, this coconut chicken and shrimp curry comes with potatoes and peas. Chicken thigh fillets and frozen shrimps are used to cut down prep and cooking time.
Ingredients
Curry paste
- 2 stalks lemongrass white portion only, peeled and thinly sliced
- 3 shallots peeled and quartered
- 4 cloves garlic peeled
- 1 one-inch knob ginger thinly sliced
- 1 one-inch knob galangal thinly sliced
- 1 one-inch knob turmeric thinly sliced
- 4 stalks cilantro root ends only
- 1 pair kaffir lime leaves
- 2 bird's eye chilies
Stew
- 400 grams chicken thigh fillets
- 400 grams potatoes
- 2 tablespoons coconut oil or other palm oil
- fish sauce
- 1 ½ cups coconut cream divided
- 2 cups chicken broth
- 400 grams medium to large shrimps peeled and deveined (thawed if bought frozen!)
- ⅓ cup sweet peas
Instructions
- Dump the curry paste ingredients into a food processor (or use a mortar and pestle for a more traditional method) and process into a coarse paste.
- Pat the chicken thigh fillets with paper towels to remove surface moisture.
- Cut the chicken fillets into two-inch cubes.
- Peel the potatoes and cut into 1 ½-inch cubes.
- Heat the oil in a wide shallow pan (a wok is ideal).
- Dump in the curry paste and cook over medium-low heat until the solids begin to separate from the oil.
- Spread the chicken on the bottom of the pan and cook without disturbing for a minute.
- Stir the chicken and cook, tossing often, just until no longer pink.
- Add the potatoes to the chicken.
- Drizzle in about two tablespoons fish sauce.
- Pour in half of the coconut cream and all of the broth, and stir.
- Bring to a gentle boil, lower the heat, cover and simmer for 15 minutes.
- Taste the sauce and add more fish sauce, as needed.
- Stir in the shrimps, peas and the remaining half of the coconut cream.
- Over medium heat, boil gently for five minutes or just until the shrimps are cooked through.
- Taste the sauce one last time, and add more fish sauce if needed.
Notes
If you're really pressed for time and you want to cut down the prep time even more (or if you're having trouble finding some or most of the ingredients for the curry paste), you may use store-bought curry paste or powder. However, I still recommend sauteeing shallots, garlic and ginger before adding the curry paste or powder.
