500g / 1lb 2oz of new potatoes |
800g / 1lb 13oz of stewing beef steak or beef shin |
Large can (400ml) of coconut milk |
3 level tablespoons of massaman curry paste |
Approximately 5cm / 2in piece of root ginger |
1 teaspoon of sugar (light muscavado is best but normal sugar will do well) |
1 lime |
1 tablespoon of fish sauce (available from most supermarkets) |
60g / 2oz of roast peanuts (salted or unsalted) |
Small bunch of fresh coriander |
Cut each new potato into three or four.
Chop the beef into 4cm / 1½ inch
cubes.
Peel then grate the ginger.
Cut the lime in half and put one half to one side for use when serving.
Grate the zest (surface) of the
other lime half and squeeze the juice out as well.
Break all the peanuts into their two halves.
Finely chop half the coriander,
keep the remainder in a cool place.
Massaman is a curry paste mixture which consists of chillies and lots of fragrant spices. Like many Thai dishes the emphasis is on fragrance with only a background heat from the chillies. We checked availability of Massaman curry paste and both Tesco and Waitrose stock it but Asda and Sainsbury's do not. It costs just under £2 for a jar which will be enough for several curries.
The recipe originates from southern Thailand but from the ingredients used to make the Massaman curry paste it's clear that the paste anyway has lots of Indian influence. Wherever it comes from it tastes delicious.
Ask anyone who has cooked Massaman Curry in a conventional pan and they will tell you that it tastes better when left in the fridge overnight. Cooking it in a slow cooker does an even better job of letting the flavours develop. Traditionally Massaman Curry is cooked with beef although chicken, lamb or even pork go well.
Slow cooking the beef tenderises it and this curry will be cooked for eight hours so use a cheap cut of meat such as stewing steak or beef shin. We don't believe that the beef needs to fried in a pan before adding it to the slow cooker. The benefits of pre-frying are often said to add colour and seal the beef. Well, take our word for it, slow cooking beef pieces in a curry sauce will result in a brown colour without frying.
As for sealing the beef pieces that again is wrong. When slow cooking a curry you want the beef pieces to open up slightly (and they do exactly that) as they tenderise.
Having said that, this is not quite a one pot dish. If you want the full flavour of the Massam Curry to develop it seems best to fry the paste with a few other ingredients in a pan first - it only takes three minutes.
Recipe by David Marks.
Add sugar, lime zest, lime juice and fish sauce. Stir well and pour into the slow cooker.
Cover and cook for eight hours on the low setting. When the curry is cooked stir well and taste for seasoning. Add more fish sauce if a saltier taste is wanted.
29 September 2012 | From: George | |
An absolute delight. |
14 November 2012 | From: Dennis Shaw | |
All the ingredients placed in the slow cooker, dried up after 6 hours cooking, no way you can cook this for 8 hours. Did taste great though although a bit dry. OK, thanks for that comment. We'll re-cook in the next week and see how it goes. I'll then respond back. ANSWER: Well, we cooked the curry again, for the third time and it was very moist, creamy in fact and in no way dry. You can see from the pictures above what the curry looked like in the slow cooker after 8 hours. So there must have been a problem in the method you used. We assume you had the lid in the slow cooker? Also, it should have been set to low as per the recipe? The final reason might have been that you used too little coconut milk, a small can rather than a large one? Give it a try again and we promise, as the pictures show, it is deliciously moist and creamy. |