Entrees

Massaman Curry

/node/5501

This Thai curry is Muslim in origin, and is fragrant with spices from the global spice trade. It was taught in a City Market cooking class on vegetarian cooking.

Prep Time

90 minutes

Cook Time

30 minutes

Yield

6 Servings

Ingredients

7 pepper, chile (dried)
5 cloves
2 cinnamon stick
14 cardamom seeds (divided, 8 seeds ground)
1⁄4 teaspoon nutmeg, ground
4 bay leaf
1 lemongrass
7 cloves garlic
7 shallot
1 teaspoon oil
1⁄2 teaspoon salt
1 1⁄2 pounds tofu
2 potato
4 cups coconut milk, full fat
1⁄2 cup peanuts (roasted and salted)
3 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon tamarind concentrate
3 tablespoons water (hot)
1 lime
2 tablespoons brown sugar

Instructions

For the dried curry powder:

 

Place the dried chili peppers, cloves, 1 stick cinnamon, 6 cardamom seeds, nutmeg, and bay leaves in a dry cast iron skillet on medium-high heat and stir until fragrant. Don’t burn. Let dry goods cool and place in a coffee grinder until well ground. This ground mixture is now a wonderful “curry powder” and can be used in all sorts of dishes.

 

For the curry paste:

 

Fry garlic and shallots in oil until browned. Add ground dried curry powder to these wet ingredients and stir thoroughly; optimally you would use a mortar and pestle. Alternatively, put it in a food processor and blend to a thick paste.

 

For the Massaman Curry:

 

Prepare tofu in your favorite manner: Either cut into chunks, or fry chunks lightly in oil. Place the potatoes, coconut milk, peanuts, and soy sauce/fish sauce into a wok or saucepan.  Cook/boil until potatoes are just tender. Raise temperature and reduce volume of sauce. Add tofu, curry paste, cinnamon stick and cardamom. Simmer for 5 minutes. Stir in tamarind, FolkFoods Master Sauce if using, water, lime juice, and brown sugar.

This can now be served over jasmine rice or over a flatbread and garnished with basil and more peanuts. Yum!

 

Variations: You can add fresh minced ginger to the wet mix of the curry paste. You can also add additional vegetables to the curry (pineapple is sometimes used in this curry).