Jungle Curry (Kaeng Pa) // The virtues of obscure ingredients

When we went to Thailand, our travels through the northern part of the country landed us at a great cooking school in Chiang Mai. Here, we learned about the difference between northern Thai food, influenced heavily by other cultures and their significant distance from the coast, and southern Thai food, flavored heavily with coconut, fiery chiles, and plenty of fish. In the north, pork reigns supreme, and an interesting curry dish has emerged - jungle curry, known most notably for its absence of coconut milk from the sauce. Drawing on the other flavors of the countryside - fermented fish sauce, lime leaves, palm sugar, and a pungent red curry paste - mixed with chicken broth, it is a very enticing, filling, and yet surprisingly healthy alternative to the usual cholesterol-laden curry dishes from Bangkok and parts south. We cooked a decent version that day, which we carried home with us.

Fate being the cruel mistress that it is, we tried to replicate this dish following that recipe multiple times, to no avail. I tried making my own curry paste, finding different vegetable mixes to add, making Thai-infused chicken stock, buying a can of green peppercorns, and even growing my own kaffir lime tree to get things right. Nothing worked. Disgusted, embarrassed from one too many hosted dinner party failures, and on the verge of a breakdown, we tried one last time last night, with a careful eye on the exact ingredients called for.

The results were astounding. Somehow this dish rocketed from the bottom of our Thai repertoire to near the top, for a few reasons - it's healthy, it's easy, it's delicious, and it's exotic. This is the only dish I now make that has two very specific ingredients, which we had to learn (painfully) not to substitute for others. We didn't even have to make our own curry paste for this, just used the cans and it came out great. Still in shock, we may make it again tonight just to confirm that we have this one in the bag.

This is what the dish should look like

A prior attempt included making curry paste from scratch

I have no idea what I was thinking

Prep for the older version - too many substitutions, way too much effort, and an unbelievably disappointing meal. We will refer to this image shortly

So read on to learn about why this last photo is completely wrong, and how you can do this right.

Thai Pumpkin in Red Curry (Kaeng Phet Fak Thong)

This is a great dish to make in the fall, which is actually when I made this, despite taking forever to post it.  I had always wanted to try making a pumpkin curry after I tried one at the very excellent Thai X-ing, an off the beaten path restaurant literally in someone's living room in Washington, D.C.  The pumpkin curry dish surprised me with how much flavor it packed in - the standard pungency of a curry sauce, but with the smoothness and slightly sweet and nutty overtones from the stewed pumpkin (in that case, acorn squash).  So the first fall that came around, when fresh squash reared their heads, I made it a point to try this out.

I highly recommend kabocha squash to make this dish instead of other squash or pumpkins.  It holds up well, is fairly easy to work with, and seems to be the traditional gourd preferred by many Thais, in addition to being one of the mystery orange vegetables in an order of Japanese tempura.

Don't be misled by the name, this dish is non-vegetarian given the addition of some boneless pork to round out the protein content of the dish.  After all, squash and pork chops seem to go together, so why not pork with squash curry?

Thai Basil Chicken (Gai Pad Krapow)

Update 9/2024: after reading through Andy Ricker's Pok Pok Noodles book, it is very clear that I have made a huge error in describing this dish. Krapao doesn't translate as "basil", it translates as "holy basil", which is very different from the thai basil with licorice flavor and purple stems. Reading this and confirming it all over the internet, I realize that I have no idea what this dish is really supposed to taste like, so I'll have to update this page again once I find or grow the correct basil, and get a better feel for the correct flavors. The version with thai basil is certainly fine, but it's not authentic, and I've been spreading misinformation with what's below. Holy basil (Ocimum tenuiflorum), also known as tulsi, has notes of mint and clove in addition to licorice. I might try some of my wild basil to see if that's similar.

Original post:

It's always nice when you eat a dish in a restaurant and think "I could make this at home", and then you go home and try to make it and it's a dismal failure. Sometimes a homemade meal is a shell of its former glory, when you previously paid for a professional to make it for you. But every once in a while, you make something at home that could pass for restaurant food, if only you had shoved it into a plastic take-out container before serving yourself. And this was one of those moments.

I can't tell you how many times I've ordered pad krapow.  I believe the dish literally translates as stir-fried (pad) basil (krapow - see 9/24 correction, this is actually holy basil) with chicken (gai), which leaves very little mystery.  It is typically served in a large bowl, and consists of ground chicken, a ton of basil, and sometimes a couple of vegetables. I poked around online until I found one that sounded good, then modified it slightly to include a couple of produce items I wanted to use. The result was pretty much identical to the restaurant, although significantly cheaper, and hopefully more healthy. Apparently, the secret to this dish is a ton of fish sauce, although I'm learning more and more that this is the secret to pretty much all Thai cooking.

I've made a few dishes using Thai basil before, but have perhaps skipped over its importance. Thai Basil Chicken is not "Basil Chicken" with Thai flavoring; it is chicken that has been blessed by the infusion of Thai basil. Here's what this looks like:

Thai basil plant, from my garden.  Money well spent - I put this stuff in everything!

Notice that the leaves are not as large as those of regular basil.  I'm no botanist, but this is clearly not the same plant, and shouldn't be confused as such.  You can also probably get away with holy basil, which has more of a purple-colored leaf, and which probably tastes more like licorice than the Thai varietal.

Other than that, there are no mysteries to the ingredients.  I ground my own chicken, which is totally unnecessary unless you happen to only have whole chicken breasts and a grinder.  But other than that, this dish should come together very quickly and easily.