Thai Curry in Coconut Sauce

We had our friends over on Saturday evening and I decided to cook Thai food for them. For long I have wanted to try the Traditional Thai Vegetable curry from scratch instead of using the paste.. and I felt "what better time than now". So, off I went searching for a reliable source and succeeded in finding one.. sorry two. Now, that was the confusion. I simply could not decide on one since both seemed very delicious in their own way. Well.. then it was endowed upon me to incorporate the two and come up with one very satisfying yellow curry. The first website explained a curry that basically didn't use any paste.. it just relied on the natural taste of the ingredients used

1. http://www.importfood.com/recipes/tvegiincoconutsauce.html

The second one was a recipe for the paste used in the curry.

2. http://www.templeofthai.com/recipes/yellow_curry_paste.php

I took both and did some slight modifications to come up with my version.

Ingredients:

For the curry

Coconut milk - 14 fl. oz
Carrots diced into big rounds - 1/2 cup
Water chestnuts - 4 oz
Bamboo shoots - 4 oz
Edhamame/ soy beans - 1/2 cup
Peas - 1/2 cup
Onion - Sliced 1/2 cup
Red bell pepper Sliced - 1/2 cup
Oil for stir frying the veggies.

For the paste

I ommitted the shallots since I didn't have any and the shrimp paste since we are vegetarians. I also used a little more of ginger since the grocers didn't carry galangal called for in the original paste recipe (A type of sweet ginger)

Dried Red chilles - 2
Garlic Cloves - 10 nos. broiled
Ginger - 1/2 inch piece - broiled
Lemon grass - 2 (Skin removed and cut into long pieces)
1 tbsp roasted coriander seeds
1 tsp roasted cumin seeds
1 cube of the Golden King Thai yellow curry masala (subs. with any Thai curry paste)
Turmeric powder - 1 tsp

Method:

• Broil the ginger and garlic in oven over high for a couple of minutes. Take care not to burn.
• Grind together roughly all the ingredients for the curry paste.
• Heat oil in a sauce pan. Add the onions. Fry till they are transparent. Add the rest of the veggies and stir fry for a couple of minutes.
• Add the paste and fry it along with the veggies for a couple of minutes.
• Now add the coconut milk and salt. Bring to boil.
• Simmer over low heat for about 5 minutes. The veggies are supposed to be still crunchy while serving. Take care not to over cook them as it might spoil the taste.
• Serve hot with Jasmine rice.