Noodles with fish and coconut curry

Ingredients for 4 servings:

• 300 g noodles (rice noodles, rice sticks), dried
• 2 eggs, hard-boiled as a side dish
• 100 g white cabbage or Chinese cabbage, cut into strips and 50 g mustard greens, pickled (Asian store) as a side dish
• 100 g cucumber(s), sliced ​​as a side dish
• 50 g soy sprouts, blanched as a side dish
• 10 chili pepper(s), red, long, dried, briefly dry roasted as a side dish
• 10 stalks of basil (Bai Menglak, Thai lemon basil) as a side dish
• 500 g fish, e.g. mackerel
• 8 shallot(s), Thai
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• 5 cm galangal
• 2 stalks of lemongrass
• 100 g ginger, Chinese (Krachai, finger root)
• 5 chili peppers, red, dried
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp shrimp paste (Gapi)
• 250 ml water
• 1 can coconut milk (525 ml)
• 3 tbsp fish sauce

Instructions

Working time approx. 50 minutes; Total time approx. 50 minutes

Kanom Jeen Nam Ya, Thai street food

Soak the noodles in boiling water for 3 minutes. You can also use spaghetti or cappellini if ​​you like. Skim off the thick layer of coconut milk (about 1/4 of the contents). Keep both thin and thick coconut milk ready. Wash and clean the fish and remove the head. Place it in a small pot, add a little water, and cook covered until tender. Drain the fish and reserve the stock. Once the fish has cooled, remove the skin and bones. Roughly chop the shallots, garlic, galangal, lemongrass, krachai, and chilies. Place it in a pot with the shrimp paste, salt, and a little water. Bring to a boil and simmer for about 10 minutes. Then let it cool. Add the fish and puree the mixture very finely with an immersion blender (or in a mortar). Place this mixture in a pot with the thin coconut milk and bring to a boil. Add the fish stock and fish sauce. Simmer over low heat, stirring, until the sauce thickens and the surface is glossy. Now add the thick coconut milk, stir briefly, and remove from the heat. Plate the noodles, spoon the curry over them, and serve with the side dishes mentioned above. This dish is typical Thai street food. Almost every market has a stall selling it. The numerous side dishes are arranged on long tables; you buy a plate of noodles and choose the sauce you like to go with it (there are usually three different ones). Then you sit down at a table and take as much of the side dishes as you like. I made my sauce very rich. In most recipes, it’s much thinner.