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Homemade Thai Red Curry Chicken
I remember years ago when I was a grad student in New York. A friend of mine gave me a small 20” old television and I felt in love with a show that used to be on Foodnetwork – Sandra Lee’s semi-homemade cooking and this Semi-Homemade Red Curry Chicken is inspired by her show.
At that time, the 20-something-me thought it was entertaining to watch Sandra cook because she just seems so smart – use semi store-bought ingredients to cut cooking time in half. How neat !
But I didn’t fully appreciate her wisdom until I started my own family. And this semi-homemade red curry chicken was born based on Sandra’s ethos.
Speaking of my semi-homemade red curry chicken recipe –
The store-bought red curry paste from Thai Kitchen is good however, it misses that little something something to push it to the next level – like a really good Thai or Malaysian restaurant-level curry.
I went ahead and started adding fresh herbs and some “uncommon” ingredients like lemongrass, grated ginger, and lime zest because I want my readers who don’t have access to exotic ingredients to be able to replicate my recipes at home easily. I call this little invention my Curry Flavor Booster. You can see a similar version for a green curry called my freezer-friendly green curry chicken.
The result is a much more complex flavor of chicken curry. Full of depth, and what a comforting and soul warming feeling every single bite!
You can freeze my Curry Flavor Booster in an ice cube tray and when you are home from work, just pop 2 of the cubes in the pot with your favorite store-bought curry paste when you make semi-homemade curry next. My curry flavor boosters are good for about 4 weeks in the freezer before they start to lose fragrance.
Pair the chicken curry with my Chinese steamed eggplant with garlic sauce or Chinese smashed cucumber salad for a flavorful healthy homemade meal!
Be sure to check out the video below where I demonstrate how quick and easy it is to make this sinfully delicious pot of Semi-Homemade Red Curry Chicken.
And if you are on Pinterest, click the Pinterest logo to your left (or to the top of your mobile screen) to save my long and beautiful pins to as many boards as you like. They are designed specifically for you only !
Semi-Homemade Red Curry Chicken
Ingredients
- 1 ½ lbs chicken breast skinless & boneless, slice into thin/bite-sized pieces
- 2 tbsp coconut oil sauteing
- 14 oz full fat coconut milk 1 can
- 2 tsp Red curry paste from the Thai kitchen brand
- 4 Thai eggplant diced (alt. 1 medium size Italian eggplant, cubed)
- 2 tbsp fresh pineapple juice optional
- Handful Italian basil best. Thai sweet basil
My curry flavor booster: (store extra in ice cube trays in the freezer for up to 4 week.)
- 5 cloves garlic
- Half one whole shallot
- 1 ½ tbsp sliced ginger
- 1 cup fresh cilantro
- 2 red Fresno chili pepper remove seeds
- Half one whole lime zest
- Half one whole lime juice
- 1 tsp sea salt
- ½ tsp Red boat fish sauce
- 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
Instructions
- Blend everything under “my curry flavor booster” in a food processor. Blend until a fine mixture.
- Heat 2 tbsp coconut oil over a wok/saute pan, when hot, add 3 ½ tbsp curry flavor booster. Stir the ingredients with a wooden spoon. Add 2 tsp store-bought red curry paste. Keep stir-frying over medium/medium-high heat until fragrant.
- Add 1 can full-fat coconut milk. Turn the heat down to medium. Cover with a lid and let the broth simmer until it’s slightly thickened.
- Add sliced chicken breast. Turn the heat up to medium-high. Cook until the chicken is cooked through. About 8-10 minutes. *Note: you’ll see a light layer of red color oil surface to the pot during the cooking process. That’s the oil from the homemade curry flavor booster, mixed with tons of herbs and aromatics.
- Add diced eggplants. Turn the heat to medium and cover the wok/saute pan with a lid. Cook until the eggplants turn softer.
- When the eggplants are cooked through/turn softer, taste and see if more salt or fish sauce is needed. If you like, add 2 tbsp fresh pineapple juice to make the curry slightly sweeter. Add basil to the curry pot, give a quick stir, and then turn off the heat.
- Before serving, garnish with more basil (optional), and a bit more lime zest.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Also check out my Chiang Mai Noodles (Thai Chicken Curry Noodles), Thai coconut curry meatball soup, Instant Pot pumpkin chicken curry, Thai green curry chicken, Dutch oven roasted red curry whole chicken, and Grilled green curry chicken.
This curry sauce is ridiculously delicious. I skipped the pineapple juice and used different veggies but the curry flavor is where it’s at. Love it.
So happy to hear. Love homemade curry!
Oh man, this looks so good! I saw your IG story tonight and had to quickly look for those flavour boosters so I didn’t forget later. Definitely going to try this in the next few days. Love your IG stories, thank you for all your work! 🙂
Can you tell me the difference between red and green curry? I love Thai green curry so much that I can’t bear to even try the red curry and miss an opportunity to eat the green curry! And red and green chilis, what’s the difference?
Thanks so much Brenda and thank you for taking the time to share with us ! In my opinion the basic red and green curry paste are the same with the exception of chilis. Green curry uses green chili and red curry uses red chili.
I accidentally discovered a quick way to make any store-bought curry paste even more flavorful and better than any restaurant and take out joints. I called it my Curry Flavor Booster. This semi-homemade red curry uses red curry flavor booster and if you search green curry on my site, the most recent post will show you a homemade green curry version.
I hope this helps ! Xoxo
Gorgeous! “Semi-homemade” recipes might be my favourite. Roast chicken is such an easy item to get already made, and this curry is a fabulous way to use it.
Thanks so much, Irena ! I love this semi-homemade chicken curry too !