This was sooo good. I'm Vietnamese and I've been craving my mom's curry ever since I've moved away from home. Needless to say this was just like Mom's don't tell her I said that! Some additions and substitutions I made to the recipe: instead of lime leaves I used fresh basil - makes all the difference. No stalks of lemon grass but I did have chopped lemon grass added about a tablespoon. For the reviewer who wondered why he/she couldn't eat the lemongrass - that's because stalks are not supposed to be eaten. It's there for flavoring just like the bay leaf. When chopped finely the lemon grass isn't as hardy as you chew all the other goodness. Also added a little bit more red peper flakes for an extra kick. Everything turned out so great that I brought some in to work for a buddy and he loved it also. Thanks Billy!
In Vietnam people don't put bell pepper (or so called sweet pepper or Da Lat papper in Vietnamese) carrot and ginger in the curry. However you can customize the dish and add many vegetable as you want but this will make it look more like the curry dishes of other countries.
this is awesome!!!!!!!!!! I do cut back on the red pepper flakes (like 1/2 tsp.)...the fish sauce smells awful in the bottle but doesn't make the soup taste fishy at all...the cilantro is a perfect touch at the end. Excellent reheated the next couple of days too. 3-23-07 update...don't substitute LIGHT coconut milk for the regular....yuck....makes it too thin!
WOW! This soup is excellent! The fresh ginger lime leaves and lemon grass really compliment the curry and give it that "South East Asia" flavor. It is a lot of work chopping everything up but if you don't you'll never get to experience the pure wonder and joy of fresh curry. I went overboard and threw on a handful of fresh bean sprouts as a garnish. This recipe has become my new and final favorite.
I put this in the slow cooker with chicken breasts. I simmered the sauce ingredients with the onion and chicken all day then about 1 1/2 hours before serving I added the vegetables (except the potatoes left them out entirely). I added a couple basil leaves to the broth and used lemon zest instead of lemon grass because that is what I had on hand. This soup was fantastic my husband and I loved it!!
This was great! Very flavorful and a tad bit spicy. I'm Vietnamese and it was about as good as my mom's. However I did make some changes to make it more like hers. I didn't have lemon grass stalk so I took another user's suggestion and used 1 tbsp of minced lemon grass. I left out the green bell pepper lime leaves bay leaf and cilantro. I did however added sweet potatoes like my mom. By the way you are going to need a HUGE pot. I had to use two 6qt stockpot to accommodate everything.
Great soup! I used 2 potato and 1 rutabaga. The store I shop at did not have lime leaves still wonderful.
DELICIOUS! I loove my family's vietnamese chicken curry and this tastes exactly like how my mom makes! I added a little dash of salt and it brought out the flavors more. i also added sriracha to spice it up. it was perfect! i ate it with french bread. YUMMY! i can't wait to make this again.
Wonderful! I doubled the vegetables and coconut milk and took out the water which made for a thicker soup/stew. I also cooked it for about an hour and a half to make sure the potatoes were soft. It went great with the recommended french bread!
I wanted to love it. I really did. I thought the flavor was really bland. Even with all the yummy ingredients it just needed more flavor. Also the red chili flakes were wayyyy too much. Thank you to whomever submitted this-even though I personally didn't like it it appears that some people do.
