This delicious Thai red curry stir fry with prawns and green beans is a super quick dinner to throw together. You can make it within half an hour. Cutting the vegetables is the hardest part. After that, you just throw the ingredients together, cook, season and serve.
To make things really easy, use store bought curry paste. But if you have the time, it’s worth making your own curry paste, because the taste will be more fragrant and you get the healthy goodness that all those fresh herbs and spices provide. It’ll taste good either way.
The dish is called “ pad ped” in Thai, which literally means : Spicy stir-fry. And that is exactly what it is. It’s a spicy dish that includes red Thai curry paste, that you normally use to make a Thai red curry. If you don’t like spicy, you could use less red curry paste. But the dish is supposed to taste a little spicy, hence the name. If you can’t handle even a little bit of heat, then this dish is probably not for you. But the flavor isn’t only spicy though, it’s balanced. It’s spicy, salty and umami with a little bit of sweetness.
Thai red curry has become a well known dish these days. It’s easy to conclude that this stir fry, because it uses almost the same ingredients, must taste really similar to a red curry, but it’s actually different. It’s more of a stir fry than a curry. It uses Thai red curry paste for flavor but with a lot less coconut milk than a curry does, so it’s less “soupy” I suppose.
It usually includes some vegetables with either meat, chicken, seafood or tofu. I’m making it with a lot more vegetables than usual and i’m using prawns. If you don’t like prawns, you could substitute it with chicken. And to make this dish vegan, use tofu and leave the fish sauce out. Substitute it with the light soy sauce. The taste won’t be much different. And if you’re making your own curry paste, just omit the shrimp paste.
Enjoy this easy Thai red curry stir fry with prawns and green beans served over some fragrant jasmine rice or healthy brown or black rice.
Servings: 2-4
Ingredients:
- 1 tbsp Thai red curry paste or 2 tbsp homemade red curry paste
- 100 ml. coconut milk
- 75 ml. water
- 300 grams of green beens, ends trimmed off and cut in half
- 2 red bell peppers , cut in thin strips, the same size as the beans
- 1 tbsp fresh, frozen or dried kaffir lime leaves
- 250 grams of prawns (cleaned) or diced tofu
- 30 grams of palm sugar or sugar
- 1 tsp fish sauce ( or substitute with light soy sauce)
- 2 tsp light soy sauce
- Thai basil or regular basil
- Fresh chili’s ( optional, because the dish is already spicy as it is)
- vegetable oil
Method:
- Heat the oil in a medium sized pan with a lid.
- Fry the red curry paste until fragrant and add the coconut milk, water, the vegetables and kaffir lime leaves.
- Let it come to a boil, lower the heat and put on the lid. Let it cook for about 15-20 minutes until the beans and the bell pepper are tender and soft to your own liking.
- Then, add the prawns and let them cook for a bit until they turn pink in color. Don’t let them cook too long though, or they will get tough.
- Season with the fish sauce, light soy sauce and palm sugar. Garnish with the basil and fresh sliced chili, if you like it spicy.
To make your own home made red curry paste:
Ingredients:
- 7 garlic cloves
- 1 tsp peppercorns
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1 tsp ground coriander
- 10 dried red bird eye chili’s , soaked in hot water until soft, and drained
- 1 shallot, sliced
- 2 kaffir lime leaves
- 2 coriander roots
- 3 cm galangal, chopped
- 5 cm lemon grass, outer skin removed and sliced thinly
- 1 tsp shrimp paste ( optional)
- 1/2 tsp salt
Method:
Add all the ingredients to a blender with a tiny bit of water and blend into a paste. Keep in a jar in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.
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