Green Curry Paste

While I was out of town, staying with my roommate in spirit, she showed me how to make a delicious curry recipe. It's one where you make a curry paste, that lasts a couple weeks in the fridge, for multiple meals. We were using the tasty looking recipe from Rebar: Modern Food Cookbook "Victoria, B.C.’s favorite restaurant and juice bar, featuring fresh, healthy, predominantly vegetarian fare." so says the publisher.

In trying to make the recipe again, I tried to put together the ingredients from memory but also consulted with a few online recipes, such as CanadianLiving.com.

Ingredients:

3 fresh cilantro plants (roots, stems and leaves; wash well)
3 green onions
1 or 2 jalapeño peppers
3 lemongrass stalks (sliced)
3 cloves of garlic
a few centimeters of ginger (peeled and cut in 3)
zest of one lime and juice of 2 limes
1 generous sprinkle of each: cumin, coriander and turmeric

Normally, you throw all of the ingredients into the blender and add a little water, as needed, until it turns into a green pulp. Unfortunately, I do not own a blender, but I do own a "wand" or handheld immersion blender. You learn pretty fast that this thing can paint the walls within seconds, so I found a rather useful narrow plastic container that fits it just perfectly. This has revolutionized our fruit smoothie consumption..

Anyways, I used that, with a little bit of arm power and voila! Homemade Green Curry Paste. Will have to let you know how it is once I have the curry, but it smells delicious!

As for making the curry, you throw in 3 big spoonfuls of the paste in with some broth to cook the veggies. Once cooked, add some coconut milk and let it simmer a little to let everything become nicely integrated. You can also throw in some pepper flakes for spiciness and a spoonful of sugar and/or fish sauce and/or peanut oil to give it that tasty Thai curry flavour.

As for the contents of the curry, I have a feeling it's one of those things were you can throw in all the leftover ingredients from the fridge and it will still be tasty. I'm planning to make it with: potato, zucchini, eggplant, extra firm tofu (toasted with soy sauce), and possibly some chickpeas if it seems it is lacking. Served with rice, sprinkle with fresh cilantro leaves.

Rebar Cookbook photo from publisher Culinate - Big Ideas Publishing