An Easy Green Curry Recipe with Chicken

I have always loved Thai food… From the second I was introduced to it in high school until now. I find it to be a healthier/less greasy alternative to Chinese food, but with lots of bold, fun flavors in many of its dishes. My usual goto Thai dish is Chicken Kra Prow, or Spicy Chicken with Thai basil and Peppers. It’s sometimes called Chicken Ka Pow or Gai Kra Prow. The translation gets a bit messy, as you can tell.

However, the first Thai Dish I ever had was a Green Curry from a little noodle place I can’t remember the name of near Yale University in New Haven, CT. My tutor at the time — Ms. O — took me there just before graduation from high school for a congratulatory dinner. She didn’t teach at the school – but tutored students on the side.

Over the years Ms. O and I became close friends, and without her I probably wouldn’t have passed geometry, chemistry, OR biology. At the time, as a high school boy the dinner sort of felt like a date to me (even though it wasn’t in the slightest). But I do remember thinking to myself, “Did she take all her students out to restaurants?” All kidding aside, I am truly grateful to Ms. O for expanding my horizons to this completely alien but wonderful cuisine and just being a great mentor. The weirdest thing is that afterward I totally forgot the name of the dish. I just remembered the rich coconut-milk broth and those udon noddles I tried so hard to grasp with my chopsticks, only to fail miserably and thus embarrass myself on my madeup “date” with my high school tutor. Why i couldn’t figure out the dish until years later is probably b/c i didn’t realize that it was a curry — since I associated curry with yellow Indian curry… And then over time, the whole thing became a blur.

So it wasn’t until many years later, when my coworker Christine ordered Green Curry takeout from a Thai place near our work called Neisha and offered me some, that I put two and two together. Since then, I have become a huge fan — now that I know the name of the dish — and will typically alternate my orders from local Thai places between Kra Prow and it. But I wanted to take it one step further and make it myself.

At first I was going to make it from scratch, but I chickened out after seeing an all-in-one Green Curry “10 minute simmer sauce” by a company called Thai Kitchen, when struggling to find Galangal and Kaffir Lime Leaves at my local supermarket. I mean seriously, WTF is Galangal?

While initially a bit skeptical, I was happily surprised with how it tasted! The sauce is a bit mild by itself, so you’ll want to add a chili or two if you like your Thai food spicy. In time I think I’ll take a stab at the real thing. But until then, this is a cheap and easy alternative…

Easy Green Curry with Chicken (Serves 2)

Ingredients

1 Jar of Thai Kitchen 10-minute Simmer Sauce
Vegetable Oil
1/2 a green pepper
1/2 a red pepper
3 stalks of green onion
A couple handfuls of green beans
2 boneless-skinless chicken breasts
1 Thai chili (Use 2 or more if you want to bring the heat)
2 servings Jasmine rice OR 2 servings Udon noodles

Directions

1. Dice your green onion, chop up your thai chili(s), and cut your green & red peppers into thin slices. Set aside.
2. Season chicken breasts with salt & pepper.
3. Heat a medium skillet with oil over medium-high heat. After a minute or so, add chicken and cook for about 5 minutes on each side. Once cooked, set aside in a dish covered with aluminum foil (if it’s not fully done, that’s fine – it will finish cooking later when we add it back with the sauce).
4. Add more oil to the pan. Add onions, peppers, green beans. Saute for 5 mins.
5. Chop chicken into bite sized pieces. Add back to pan and top everything with the green curry sauce.
6. Simmer over low heat for 15 mins.
7. Serve over Jasmine Rice or with cooked Udon noodles.