Fish curry

I used to make this dish with Garnisha Masala Paste which is a low-sodium mild curry paste. Garnisha looks like it has gone out of business, so I just tried making my own curry-paste from the recipe here. I duplicate it here so I can add adjustments and in case the original goes away.

Ingredients:

Curry Paste:

• 2 red chillies - sliced (recipe says birds-eye - I just got small hot red chillies)
• Approx 1 inch piece of fresh ginger - peeled and finely grated
• 5 kaffir lime leaves
• 1 lemongrass stalk - finely chopped
• 4 shallots (recipe says 4 - mine were large bulbs with two "body" sections - think garlic cloves - I used 4 of those sections instead of 4 whole bulbs)
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp ground coriander
• 1/2 tablespoon paprika

Fish Curry:

• 2 medium sweet-potatoes (kumara) - peeled and sliced
• 1 eggplant - 1-2cm cubes
• Plain flour or cornflour
• 2 blue grenadier fillets - cubed
• 1 red capsicum - sliced
• 2 440ml cans coconut milk
• Oil

Directions:

Make the curry paste:

1. Chop all ingredients and combine. My kaffir lime leaves were dried, so I soaked them in water first.
2. Put into food-processor/barrel blender. Blend into a paste.
3. I refrigerated the result overnight - I don't know if this helps develop flavours, it did firm the texture a little

Make the fish curry:

1. Slice the peeled sweet potatoes into "discs". Heat a sauce-pan and fry about a table-spoon of curry-paste until fragrant. Add the sweet-potato and enough water to cover. Bring to boil and simmer until just about tender.
2. Meanwhile, shake the eggplant cubes in a bag with the plain-flour. In a large frypan or wok, fry the eggplant in oil until browned. Remove from pan.
3. Fry the remaining curry-paste until fragrant. Add the red-capsicum and stir-fry.
4. Pour the sauce-pan of sweet-potato and water/curry into the frying-pan, add the eggplant and coconut milk.
5. Bring the liquid to a simmer and add the fish
6. Allow to simmer for 2-3 minutes until the fish is cooked
7. Serve over instant noodles or rice.

This is a variation on an old recipe we used before going low-sodium from a pack of Ayam instant noodles. Although their sodium content has increased a little in recent years we still quite like it served on instant noodles.

You can probably skip the simmering of the sweet-potatoes if you don't mind them being a little undercooked.

You can adjust the heat by adding or removing chillies. This two chilli recipe was fine for my 10 year old who is being introduced to spice.

Thai Green Curry

This recipe is from Junior Masterchef Australia: Official Recipe Collection but I've altered it to be low salt.

Ingredients:

• 1 tbs peanut oil
• 8 chicken thigh fillets, trimmed, cut into 3cm pieces
• 270ml coconut cream
• 175g green beans, trimmed, halved
• 4 kaffir lime leaves
• 1 tsp caster sugar

       Curry Paste

• 3 or 4 long green chillies, seeded, chopped
• 3cm piece of ginger, grated
• 2 stalks lemongrass, finely chopped
• 4 kaffir lime leaves, roughly chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 2 eschalots, finely chopped
• 1/4 cup Thai basil, finely chopped
• 1 tbs peanut oil
• 2 tbs + 1/4 tsp water

Directions:

1. Make curry paste by placing all ingredients in a food processor and process until it forms a smooth paste.
   Chef's Tip: The quantity of ingredients for the paste should fit in a small food-processing barrel-attachment for a food-processing wand.  The straight sides will do a better job than the concave sides of a full-size food-processor.
2. Heat 1 tbs oil in a wok over medium-high heat. Add 1/2 cup of the curry paste and cook, stirring, for 1 minute.
3. Add the chicken and cook, stirring, for 4 minutes or until chicken is browned and almost cooked through.
4. Add coconut cream, beans and lime leaves and stir to combine. Simmer, stirring, until the chicken is cooked through. Add sugar and stir to combine. Serve with rice.