Amazing Thai Green Curry for Vegan Skeptics 🌱

Sawasdee ka, welcome to Hot Thai Kitchen. So you know that I don't make vegan food very much, but when I do, you know I put a lot of effort into making sure that it'll satisfy even the most hardcore meat eater because I live with one. So today I'm going to veganize the most iconic dish of Thai cuisine, green curry. Let's get started. Let's start with the curry paste. If you're feeling ambitious, go ahead and make your own from scratch. I will link to the recipe below, but I will show you something even more useful. Three things you can add to good old store-bought curry paste to make it even better. Julienned spinach. Yes, you can use any leafy greens, even the Thai basil that you're gonna need for the curry later, but I find spinach breaks down really easily. And the reason I do this is because traditionally, green curry gets its green color from green chilies. So when you buy green curry paste, they don't put a lot of green chilies because otherwise it's gonna be way too spicy for most people, right? So this is how we add color without the heat. There we go. As fine as you can. The second thing we're gonna add is to replace the shrimp paste, which is normally added to traditional green curry paste. However, many commercial pastes leave it out to make it vegetarian, but we're also missing the umami. So we gotta put it back somehow. And instead of fermented shrimp, we're gonna add fermented soybean. Miso to the rescue. And if you've got the Korean fermented bean paste, donjang, that will work as well. Now, you can stop here, but if you want to take it to the next umami level, and let's face it, there's no such thing as too much umami, you can also add dry shiitake mushrooms. And I'm simply going to grate it with a microplane so that it will seamlessly mix into our paste. And the reason for the mushroom is it's loaded with umami. And in Asian vegan cooking, it is a rockstar. We put it in everything. Now, I'm just gonna pound to mix that up. Oh, we forgot to add, forgot to add the curry paste. I was wondering that looked a little skimp. Green curry paste going in. You can use any brand of curry paste, but read the ingredient list, make sure it doesn't contain the shrimp paste. Okay, look at that. That looks more beautiful already. A note about the amount. The amount I'm giving is just the guideline. If you can tolerate a lot of heat, you can add more curry paste and get more flavor out of it. But if it's too spicy, a little less is also okay. Heat on. We're gonna start, as always, by reducing a little less than half of our coconut milk. So it's reduced by about half now. We can go in with our curry paste. It doesn't have to be precise. You can reduce it further if you'd like. Now I'm gonna mix that in. And now at this point, I'm gonna let it really reduce until the coconut oil from the coconut milk starts to separate from the paste. And once you add the curry paste, you do want to be stirring. Otherwise, it could scorch to the bottom. So that is one reason to take your coconut milk further before you add the paste so you don't have to stir for as long. But I'm usually impatient and I wanna just get the whole thing started already. Try not to wear white when you make this. In fact, I recommend wearing green. Look at that, that dark green. That is the coconut oil that has picked up the color from the curry paste and it's separating out. That's exactly what we want. So after this happens, I'm gonna give it just another minute or so. If you're making the paste from scratch, it's very important that you really take your time to cook it at this stage because all your herbs are raw. When you're using store-bought paste, it's already been heat treated so you don't have to cook it as long. Okay, that looks good to me. I'm happy with that. Now I'm gonna go in with the rest of our coconut milk and lighten it up a bit with some water. Now, while that's coming to a simmer, let's talk stuff for our curry. When choosing stuff for your vegan curry, you have to be very intentional with what you choose because that'll make a difference between something that tastes like a complete meal and something that tastes like a vegetable side dish, okay? For protein, I'm using tofu, but not any tofu. I'm using fried tofu, and no, you don't have to fry it yourself. They come already fried at your local Chinese grocery store. And the reason is the fried skin is chewy and that chewiness is gonna make your curry feel substantial and meaty, so to speak. Second vegetable, I'm going with bamboo shoots. Now, bamboo shoots is a classic pairing with Thai green curry. It's one of my favorites. It's crunchy, again, very substantial. And the bonus is it comes in a can. All you have to do is rinse it very, very well. It has a smell to it, but I find in green curry, it doesn't really come through, but if that bothers you, boil them for about five minutes before using. Finally, we can add soft things, and my favorite and another green curry classic is winter melon. It is a flavor sponge. We like to add it into soups and curries because it really absorbs all the flavor so well. You can buy it at a Chinese grocery store, and you just peel the skin off and remove the spongy bits from the middle and then cut it into chunks. And if you don't have it, zucchini would make a fine substitute. I wanna take a break and tell you about this beautiful mortar and pestle. This is Krok, and they are sponsoring this video. So I love my mortars and pestles, as you know, and at first, I only had this massive one. But over the years, I had to introduce smaller ones to my collection because I felt like I was gonna throw my back out whenever I was hauling this thing around. So Krok came up with a brilliant design that gives you the bigger capacity without the weight by replacing some of the base with cork and also by making the wall thinner. The cork also protects your countertop, so I don't need to put a cloth under it like I normally do with these. The pestle is longer than average, so even with big hands, you're not gonna hit the sides as you pound. Now, because it's lighter, it does wiggle around a bit more when you pound than a solid granite one, but I do think there's a lot of value in something lightweight, just because you'll be so much more likely to actually use it for everyday cooking. I also love that Krok is handmade in Thailand using a traditional method, which is a dyeing art, and they use high-quality Thai granite, which means it's denser and more durable. It's, of course, made in Ang Sila, which is the epicenter of granite mortars and pestles in Thailand. This is where the craft has been passed on for generations and also where I got my little guy. So if you've been wanting a set or been thinking about a gift for a foodie friend in your life, click the link in the description below or go to KrokCraft.com and use the code PAIYALIN to take $10 off your purchase. So now that the curry's come back to a simmer, we're gonna add all our veggies and protein in without splashing green things all over yourself, and bamboo shoots, other winter melon. In addition to that, I'm also going to add some makrut lime leaves to add some citrusy aroma to our curry. If you don't have it, you can skip it. It's not a deal breaker. There's already some makrut lime zest in store-bought curry paste. I'm gonna give it a twist to bruise the leaves so that the essential oils come out and add that in. And don't eat the lime leaves, by the way. It's for infusion only. It's not for eating. You can try. It's not pleasant. Now, normally I would add fish sauce to a Thai curry, but soy sauce is a similar salty liquid that's full of umami, so that is what we're going to use. I'm gonna add just a tablespoon for now because the curry paste can be a little salty, so you wanna save some to adjust, and some palm sugar to balance the saltiness. This just needs to cook until the winter melon is cooked through, which is about 10 minutes to 15 minutes depending on the size. The bamboo shoots are like magic vegetables. They can simmer for two hours, and nothing happens to them. It's crazy, so you don't have to worry about it. Winter melon's done. We're very close. I'm going to add some red bell pepper, and this is just for color. You don't have to add it, or you can add other kinds of peppers to give it something other than green. See, now it looks like Christmas. So give that a minute to soften, or longer if you like them soft. All right, now I'm gonna turn it off and finish it with our trusty old Thai basil. There's no such thing as too much Thai basil. Just load it up, and the residual heat of the curry is enough to wilt that. You don't need to boil them to death. Now, very important when making curry, taste. You must taste because every curry paste is gonna be different, so on and so forth. Ooh. Oh, that is spot on. It's like I've made this before or something. Fun fact, green curry in Thai is called gang kiew wan, which literally means sweet green curry, but it should not lead with sweet. The sweet in the name is referring to the color, that it's not a dark green, but it's sort of like a sweet and creamy pastel green. So the sweet flavor should just be supporting the main flavor, which is salty. All right, let's eat. Bam. Ah, it's so good. Here we go. My favorite is a combination of winter melon and tofu. Mm, you couldn't tell. If you didn't know this was vegan, if you ate this, no way would you be like, this tastes a little different from the regular green curry. No, you would just say, this is a delicious pot of green curry. What did you do? Give me the recipe. It is full of umami because of all those tricks that we added, and if you've never had winter melon before, it is amazing. It's like a flavor sponge, especially tomorrow, once it's had time to sit in this for several hours, it'll be full of flavor and silky, melt in your mouth. Tofu is nice and substantial, exactly what we intended for all these things to do. So I really do hope you give it a try. Whether you're vegan or not, try it out, and you'll be amazed at all these little tricks and tips that really make for a flavorful vegan curry. The recipe, as always, will be on hotthaikitchen.com, and a special thanks to our Patreon members who help support the show. And if you wanna know what that's all about, you can check the link in the description below. Thank you, as always, for watching, and I will see you next time for your next delicious Thai meal.