Thai Red Curry with Chicken and Vegetables

There hasn't been much quilting or knitting going on around here lately. I've been painstakingly repairing a pair of socks for the last few weeks. It seems to be taking longer than knitting a whole new pair! The yarn, Regia Color 4-Ply, is supposed to "wear like iron" but I'm not impressed. They are a full year younger than my oldest socks, the Lorna's Laces Jaywalkers, and they first found themselves in the mending basket a year after the Jaywalkers so I thought that the yarns were wearing equally. But upon closer inspection, it turned out that the Regia socks were completely threadbare around the toes and heels.


I opted to do some duplicate stitch over the threadbare areas to reinforce them and eke out a few more years of use, but after spending several hours, I'm starting to question that decision... my time would have been better spent knitting a new pair of Lorna's socks! Ah well. Lesson learned. Don't waste time knitting socks with Regia if I want them to last!


While my sewing machine has been sitting idly by, the stove has been pretty busy. It is getting chilly in the house so I tend to gravitate toward the warm west-facing kitchen. I've also been trying to make the most of the last few weeks of outdoor farmer's market by frantically buying and cooking all kinds of produce before I'm forced back to the grocery store for the winter (ugh!).


We've been eating a lot of soup and roasted fall vegetables lately so I wanted a change. Something Asian. Something a little bit spicy. Something soup-like but not exactly a soup. And quick.


I found this recipe in my email archives. Not sure what the original source is or if I just made it up after a little research. The version below is what I had made in Cleveland a couple years ago, using tofu. Tonight's version used boneless skinless chicken breasts cut into large bite-sized pieces and stirred in after the curry-garlic-ginger step. I was trying to make the chicken more flavourful by briefly sauteing it before adding the coconut milk. Not sure it was any different than adding it later, but it did have the advantage of having the chicken be cooked through by the time the vegetables were just tender. Had I added the chicken after the coconut milk, I think the vegetable would have gone from tender to soft by the time the chicken was ready.

Red Curry with Tofu and Vegetables
This served 5 for dinner with some leftovers.

Feel free to substitute any veggies you like - diff bell peppers, cauliflower, broccoli, potatoes, various peas (shelled, sugar and snap pods), shelled edamame, zucchini, yellow squash... This is just what I used, to give a sense of quantity.

In a large pot, heat some oil.  Add:

1 med onion, halved and then thinly sliced
Saute this on med-high heat for 3-4 min until onions soften. Add:

3-4 cloves garlic, minced
1" piece of ginger, minced
2 t. Thai Red Curry Paste (it's in the asian aisle at the store, 3" high bottle. usually it's reasonably spicy but tonight's bottle was really mild so I had to add quite a bit more)

Saute 1min and mash up the paste so it is evenly dispersed.


If using chicken, add:


2-3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts cut into large bite-sized pieces.


Saute 1-2min. Add:

1 can Light Coconut Milk
1/2 can water
1 T. brown sugar
2-3 T. soy sauceBring to a boil, then add:

1 red bell pepper, thinly sliced in 2" strips
2 carrots, sliced thinly on the diagonal
4-5 baby bella mushrooms, stems removed, sliced
1 small (6-8oz) can of baby corn
handful of green and yellow beans, cut into 2" lengths on the diagonal (I probably used a total of 50 beans - it was literally handful of each colour)
1 container Firm or Extra Firm Tofu, cut into 1" cubes (I don't recommend "Silken" brand because it is all slippery and disintegratey and totally falls apart when you stir it!)

Lower heat to a simmer.  Add another half can of water if there isn't enough liquid to cover everything. Taste the curry - if it is too mild, add more of the paste at this point. Cover the pot and simmer for 8-10min or so.

* * *

The version I made tonight included mushrooms, red bell pepper, yellow bell pepper, yellow squash, some shelled edamame, and I think there was something else that I can't remember now.  I also stirred in some fresh baby spinach towards the end.  We ate this with frozen paratha because I didn't feel like making rice. Plus P loves paratha and declared the meal "super delicious"!


Oh, and I should add that I accidentally used regular/full fat coconut milk - should have just used half the can. It was a little too rich for my taste!


Also, not sure what is going on with the formatting. I am not sure why I have to reset all my customizations with every post...

Pinning!

For a long time I've been trying to figure out a system to keep track of all the "stuff" I find online - images, tutorials, recipes - and have a meaningful way of organizing them. I tried Evernote but it felt awkward (though in fairness, I gave up pretty quickly even though it came highly recommended). And then a few days ago I discovered Pinterest. My new beloved. 

It does everything I didn't know I wanted it to do! I love being able to keep track of everything in an organized way. All I have to do is pin an image and Pinterest saves the link back to the original source.  It's so easy to share images and ideas... goodbye tedious copying and pasting of images into emails!  

I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I've been pinning like mad for the last couple days, to the exclusion of all other nonessential activities! I might need a 12-step program to ease my way back, but at least my partner in pinning (PIP!) will be there with me!

Ready to see what it's all about?

Don't worry, there was a brief break from the pinning frenzy to cook a meal when we ran out of leftovers:

Believe it or not, my phone took that picture!

Pink!

I'd like to claim that we made pink pasta in honor of breast cancer awareness this month, but it was really just an excuse to use the beets that I bought with too much enthusiasm and not enough planning!  

Pintu thoroughly enjoyed mixing this in the food processor and cutting the strips. He could not stop exclaiming about how much he loved the color.  Unfortunately that beautifully saturated, almost-magenta dough turned into a pale and fleshy pink after being cooked!  But it still tasted good enough for P to request it for lunch tomorrow.

Carefully cutting strips

Laying them on our makeshift drying rack until we have enough to go in the pot

After dinner, P tried to claim all the credit, saying that the meals I cook without his help are just OK but when he helps, they become super delicious!  A couple more years and that might actually be true!