Due to popular demand, I have decided to write up a cooking post about two recent recipes I created using different forms of curry. There are many kinds of curry, and they are used in various nations of Asia. Common to our western experience the cuisine of India and Thailand use many types of curry, but it is also used in several other nations of the region.
I have come to regard curry as one of the most interesting and pleasing spice mixtures I have yet encountered in my culinary adventures. Because I love cooking as well as enjoying the products made, I wanted to share some things I’ve learned about this awesome spice.
Recipe #1: Three meat curry chili
This was a real crowd pleaser at our 50th birthday party on October 21st, 2011. It is a beanless chili recipe with three kinds of meat and three kinds of curry. For this recipe I used three premixed curry spices: Curry Powder from Simply Organic, Hot Madras Curry Powder from McCormick’s Gourmet Collection, and Red Curry from Spice Islands Gourmet Blends.
Other ingredients used were three kinds of onion (sweet, hot white, and red onion) and three kinds of sweet pepper (green bell, sweet yellow bell, and sweet red bell peppers), one hot pepper (jalapeno), and fresh canned tomatoes from our garden plus canned tomato juice. Additional spices needed were minced or crushed garlic (lots), salt, white ground pepper, flaked red pepper, and lots of crushed or minced garlic. The three meats were boneless pork chops, new york strip steak, and ground beef. I didn’t keep records on the amount of meat used as I cook by eye and taste not by written recipe so you will have to use your judgement a bit depending on how much meat you prefer in dishes.
The secret ingredient for all good soups is time; not the spice (thyme) but rather the property of the universe (time). You simply cannot make the best soups in a short period of it. This recipe will take three to four hours.
Start out by cutting the beef steak into cubes 1/2″ to 3/4″ or so in size. Put crude Sesame Oil in a Wok and put a Medium High flame under it. Throw the beef into the Wok and add some crushed garlic to it immediately. Add some white pepper and some Curry Powder to it and stir, stir, stir to cook evenly. Slice up the red onions and add them to the beef mixture as long strips and stir some more. Chop up the Green Bell Pepper into long thin strips and then cut them in half lengthwise and add them in, stirring and folding the meat and vegetables over from bottom to top to keep it from burning. When it is well cooked, because you are trying to cook in the spice so the meat holds it’s flavor, then remove the beef steak and put it in the big pan you will cook the chili in.
Clean the Wok and start cutting up the pork into narrow strips about 1″ to 2″ long and thin. Start the Wok on the stove again with Sesame Oil and add the pork into it when the oil is hot. Again add garlic and add Red Curry Powder, stir stir stir. Chop up the hot white onions and add them in with the pork and stir some more until the pork is well cooked. Slice up the Sweet Red Bell Pepper and add it in the same manner you treated the Green Pepper in the previous step. Put this mix in the same pan the beef mix went into and clean the wok.
Take the clean Wok and add the ground beef to it on a Medium High flame. You don’t need to use oil with the ground beef. Chop it up with a spatula as you fry it and chop up your sweet onions and throw them in with the ground beef, stirring frequently. If you start to get a lot of grease then remove the excess leaving only some grease to help with the frying of the meat. Add about two tablespoons of the Hot Madras Curry and a couple heaping tablespoons of minced garlic, then stir it up thoroughly. You want the ground beef to become small pieces that have the spices cooked in. Slice up the Sweet Yellow Pepper and finely slice the jalapenos and add them into the frying ground beef in the same way as the peppers in previous steps were added. Stir it all up and cook it together until the peppers are somewhat limp but not fully cooked. Do not burn the ground beef! When the peppers are a bit limp and the beef looks browned, add this meat into the soup pan. Clean the Wok again and put it away. Now your work will be done in the soup pan.
Chop up any remaining vegetables you have not used and add them to the pan, you may want more jalapenos or sweet peppers and if so you can add them at this point, chopped up and added to the mix in the soup pot.
Turn the burner on Medium under the pan and start heating it. Add the canned tomatoes. Stir more, DO NOT LET IT SCORCH.
Add the tomato juice. Stir more. It should be simmering when you add the tomato juice. Let it reheat to a simmer, stirring frequently, to keep it mixed up and off the bottom. When it is good and hot again and at a good simmer you are ready to continue.
Add more garlic and red curry slowly with stirring and some tasting to determine how much spice you want in the chili. The jalapenos will slowly make the mix hotter but you may want to use some red pepper to add a bit of extra hotness. A bit of cumin may also be pleasing but add it slowly and cautiously since it has such a strong flavor. Finally at the end decide how much salt you want added, slowly adding it and stirring it in then tasting for correct level. Reduce the heat under the pan to a low setting and let it simmer slowly one to two hours, frequently stirring it and tasting for level of hotness, garlic and curry flavor. Adjust as desired but add small amounts slowly so you do not overspice. Serve this chili with jalapeno corn bread for a fantastic hot chili meal. It’s a great change from the typical bean chili you find everywhere.
Recipe #2: Thai style Ginger Pork with three sweet peppers and mushrooms in peanut and coconut milk sauce with green and red curry
I had a roommate once from Hong Kong when I was in college, and he was the person who taught me the beginnings of my knowledge of eastern cuisine and cooking technique. Jackson, as he said we should call him, was a brilliant guy that was working on twin PhD degrees from Michigan State University in Electrical Engineering and in Computer Science. In his spare time he was a cook at Hong Kong House, because cooking relaxed him and he enjoyed it. Thank-you for that life lesson Jackson.
Jackson would cut vegetables up differently depending on how they were to be used in a dish. When you are going to stew a vegetable in a sauce for example, you should cut the pieces thicker and a bit larger so they keep some of their flavor even as they pull in the savor from the sauce while they stew. This dish starts out like a stir fry but it ends as a stewing simmer of the meat and vegetables in a lovely coconut and curry sauce, so the way the veggies are cut up matters.
This dish starts out with a Wok and Crude Sesame Oil like so many other eastern dishes, except some prefer Peanut Oil. I like the flavor of the crude Sesame Oil better. It is kind of expensive unless you buy it in a Chinese Food Store if you happen to live in Chicago, Toronto, or some University Town like East Lansing or Ann Arbor Michigan. Peanut Oil can be used instead and it is less expensive but won’t be quite as tasty.
Put your clean Wok on the Medium to High flame and put the oil in it. I use three or so tablespoons of oil most of the time, but it should be enough oil to coat the bottom of the Wok when you slosh it around, and still have some oil standing in the bottom after you slosh.
When the oil is hot it will start to smoke. You must catch it when the first little bit of smoke comes off the oil, not when it looks like Mt. Vesuvius and your insurance agent will get involved because of the fire damage. That’s too late, in multiple dimensions.
The oil starts to smoke a little bit so it is good and hot. You of course read this recipe ahead of time so you also know that you must have crushed or minced garlic ready as well as your thinly sliced pork chops that you sliced ahead of time in 2″ to 3″ long slices and thinly sliced, say 1/8″ or so thick. You chuck in the minced garlic, I like a ton but you may prefer to stop at 1 to 2 heaping tablespoons of it. It will throw a lot of steam up so be ready with a long handled wooden spoon to stir it up evenly and then within the sixty seconds following the addition of the garlic to the hot oil you throw in the sliced pork and start stirring and folding it over with two long handled wooden spoons, or if you want to be seriously authentic with cooking chopsticks and a big wooden spoon.
Cook the meat until most of the red color is gone and it is starting to brown. While you are waiting, between stirrings, slice up our old friends the three colored sweet Bell Peppers, one red, one yellow, and one green. Make the slices a bit thicker than you normally slice things in stir fry. Maybe make them twice as thick. You can leave the slices fairly long for a lovely appearance or cut them in half for easier eating. Throw the peppers into the meat and stir it up good. Next you slice up your favorite type of mushroom, but for this dish I really recommend a mild one like a button mushroom. Slice them up in medium thick slices and add in, then stir and fold the mixture to make sure it is evenly cooking.
Now it is time to add a can of Coconut Milk. I prefer to get the whole Coconut Milk from Thai Kitchen, and this recipe is also using two of their canned Curry Pastes so you may want to check your local big food store ahead of time in the Ethnic Foods aisle to see if you can buy their products. Look here to see the Thai style curry pastes we will use. We are using the Green Curry Paste and the Red Curry Paste. If you cannot get their ingredients, then find another Green Curry Paste and another Red Curry Paste and another kind of whole canned Coconut Milk.
The Coconut Milk will be really think like grease when you open the can. There is squishy liquid hidden in the middle so be careful when you spoon it into the Wok. Put the whole can in. It will quickly melt. Stir everything up and let it start simmering then reduce your heat to Medium Low and keep it simmering. It will really start to smell nice. As it simmers, put a couple heaping tablespoons of Red Curry Paste in and stir it around then do the same for the Green Curry. They have very different flavors. The Red is especially good with Pork in my opinion. After both are mixed in well the color will get a bit odd, like an off green. That is normal. Let things simmer until the meat is tender. Stir frequently. If it starts drying out add a little water or more Coconut Milk if your cholesterol level isn’t already too high. Stir stir stir, fold fold fold. Keep it cooking evenly.
After the meat gets tender you are ready for the last step. Adding the Peanut Butter. Yes, Peanut Butter. I prefer the crunchy kind as some Peanut fragments in the dish add character as well as flavor. Put about a cup of it in and stir it around really well. It also will melt. Mix it into the stewing sauce and stew it all a bit longer. When you believe it is all cooked together well taste it and decide if you want more curry paste or not, and also add Soy Sauce to make it saltier. Salt it to taste with Soy Sauce.
Serve this dish with nice fluffy Jasmine Rice. Put the Pork with Ginger and Thai Curry over the rice and enjoy with a good glass of red wine like a Malbec or a Merlot.