It is a actual Panang Curry recipe for curry connoisseurs who adore genuine Thai meals and may deal with the warmth! It’s made utilizing a selfmade Panang Curry paste which is simple to make however will probably name for a visit to the Asian retailer. However should you actually need one of the best, it’s value it. You may’t get good Panang curry in jars!
Make this creamy coconut Panang curry with both prawns/shrimp or rooster. Each are nice!

I solely make Panang curry from scratch
It is a recipe for Thai Panang curry that’s completely made out of scratch, together with a selfmade Panang curry paste. Whereas I’ll fortunately make Thai Crimson and Inexperienced curry utilizing my favorite curry paste from a jar, nothing compares to a Panang Curry paste while you make it your self from recent substances!
Even the Panang curry paste by my favorite Maesri model falls too brief in comparison with selfmade. Properly, perhaps that’s going too far. It makes a tasty sufficient curry. However not an actual deal Panang curry!
What Panang curry tastes like
Panang Curry tastes like a extra intense model of Thai Crimson Curry. Whereas it has comparable substances, Panang curry is a bit stronger, richer, sweeter and thicker than Crimson Curry, in addition to barely nutty because of the addition of floor peanuts within the paste.



Panang curry is spicy. Cope with it!
Panang curry is spicy. However in contrast to most different curry recipes, you can not scale back the spiciness with out shedding flavour as a result of chillies are the important thing ingredient for Penang curry sauce.
How spicy, you ask? Thais would class this Panang curry as medium or “not so spicy”. For Westerners, it’s in all probability getting up in direction of scorching. However not volcanic. Basic consensus amongst my crew is that it’s a 7 out of 10 on the spicy scale. The one different curry on my web site that hits this degree of spiciness is Vindaloo, if that’s a helpful comparable for you.
So should you can’t deal with spicy meals, I counsel you give Panang Curry a miss and make a milder Thai Yellow Curry or Massaman Curry as an alternative!
* Spiciness testing: My crew and I labored on this Panang curry recipe a LOT. We did so many variations to emphasize check the spiciness and we’re all in settlement that should you scale back the chillis to scale back spiciness, you lose flavour and it’s not Panang curry. We ended up making a recipe utilizing milder Chinese language chillies reasonably than spicy Thai ones, to get sufficient sauce flavour with out blowing our heads off.

OK, due warning on the subject of spiciness given. On to the recipe!
Panang curry substances
First, I’ll run by way of the attractive recent substances for the selfmade Panang curry paste. Then all the great things that goes within the curry!
Panang curry paste substances
There’s a good few Asian particular substances right here, however acquainted substances to those that have made different selfmade Thai curries. Particularly, Thai Crimson Curry – as a result of the substances are nearly the identical!
It can require a visit to the Asian retailer, although you may truly get every thing at Harris Farms and the bigger grocery shops in Australia, aside from shrimp paste (however there’s an alternative to that).

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Dried chilli – Key ingredient, so mentioned beneath. Don’t get this fallacious – you’ll remorse it! 🔥
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Lemongrass – Recent is greatest however should you can’t get it, use 1 tablespoon of lemongrass paste as an alternative.
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Galangal – appears like ginger however is extra citrusy and more durable. It’s fairly powerful so greatest to grate to make sure your curry paste is easy, in any other case you danger lumps in your sauce. Yow will discover it in Asian shops + some grocery shops in Australia (Harris Farms and a few Woolworths promote it). Substitute: use the identical quantity of ginger + 1/4 tsp lime zest.
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Shrimp paste in bean oil – I exploit Por Kwan Shrimp Paste in Bean Oil, pictured beneath, the most well-liked one bought at Asian grocery shops right here in Australia. (Listed here are some on-line hyperlinks – for Australia and America). Substitute with 1 1/2 tsp belacan dried shrimp paste, roughly chopped (even bought at Woolies in Australia!) + 1 tsp oil + 1 tsp fish sauce + 1 garlic clove + 1 tsp miso, should you can – any sort). Use instead of shrimp paste in recipe.
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Kaffir lime leaves – Earthy lime flavour in contrast to anything! Bought at Asian shops, Harris Farms & giant grocery shops in Australia. Freezes 100% completely – utilized in Thai crimson curry, coconut rice, Thai meatballs.
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Eschalot (US: Shallot) – Often known as French onions and referred to as “shallots” within the US. They’re like child onions, however with purple-skinned flesh. To not be confused with what some folks in Australia name “shallots”, ie. the lengthy inexperienced onions. Substitute with half a crimson onion.
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Garlic – 5 entire cloves!
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Peanuts – That is what offers the Panang curry the signature peanut-y flavour. Beats utilizing a scoop of peanut butter any day!
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Dried spices – Cumin, coriander and nutmeg.

Dried chilli for Panang curry paste
Dried chilli is the important thing ingredient in Panang curry, for each sauce flavour and color. It’s also what makes Panang curry spicy. However should you scale back the chilli, you’ll lose sauce flavour. In order really useful above, should you can’t deal with spicy meals, it’s best to provide this a miss.

Chilli sort issues!! Use Chinese language dried chillies, not Thai or Indian! I do know it sounds unusual to inform you to not use Thai dried chillies however they’re SUPER spicy and in contrast to Chinese language chillis, they don’t scale back in spiciness a lot when cooked. Identical with some Indian chillies, like kashmiri. Let’s simply say my crew and I put our our bodies on the road to determine this out!!
* Examine label for nation of origin.* You need chillies from China. And despite the fact that the spiciness of Chinese language chilli varieties and types will differ, we discovered that the cooking course of on this curry reduces the spiciness of the chillies in order that they find yourself being the identical degree of spiciness – even utilizing Chinese language chillies labelled scorching and additional scorching.
The model I exploit is pictured above. It’s a quite common model right here in Australia and never that costly (~$3), bought in Asian shops and even some giant grocery shops.
Quantity to make use of – We’d like 1/2 cup chillies as soon as chopped, so begin with about 2/3 cup entire chillies. Dried chillies differ in size so the quantity you want will differ, from (say) 12 very giant ones to 40 small ones. Get giant ones should you can as a result of we have to deseed them and it’s a lot sooner to take care of 12 giant ones than 40 small ones.
You’ll want to deseed completely – the seeds are the place a lot of the spiciness is!
The protein – rooster or prawns/shrimp
The bottom recipe requires recent, entire prawns/shrimp. It’s because I like so as to add my very own contact by repurposing the heads to make a straightforward prawn inventory to be used within the sauce. This underlines the candy, prawn-y flavours of this curry and catapults it into wow territory. Nevertheless, we’ve additionally made it with rooster and it’s extraordinarily good too!

For those who can’t get / don’t have / actually can’t bear the considered peeling your personal prawns, it’s okay, you need to use peeled prawns and skip making the prawn inventory.
Rooster inventory? Sure! Retailer purchased fish/seafood inventory is de facto not good. However rooster inventory is a lot better, and will get infused with prawn flavour from the prawn heads (which is the place a lot of the prawn flavour is!).
Panang curry sauce
Right here’s what you want for the sauce and different add-ins for the curry.

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Coconut cream – Extra intense coconut flavour than utilizing coconut milk, and thickens the sauce too. Full fats important! No level utilizing low-fat as a result of fats is the place all of the flavour is.
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Fish sauce – Gives a lot of the salt within the curry, however with extra savoury flavour. We do add some salt too as a result of if we solely use fish sauce, it will get a bit too…effectively, fishy. 🙂
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Sugar – Only a contact, as a result of Thai meals is all about balancing the sweet-salty-savoury!
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Thai basil leaves – Recent herb utilized in Thai cooking that tastes like Italian basil with a slight aniseed flavour. Substitute with Italian basil.
The way to make Panang Curry
The making half may be very straight ahead and fairly fast truly. The step that takes the longest is soaking the dried chillies!
Make prawn inventory – if utilizing prawns/shrimp
For those who’re making Panang curry with prawns/shrimp, get the prawn inventory going first. For those who’re utilizing rooster, you may skip this step.

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15 minute simmer – Place rooster inventory, prawn heads and shells in a saucepan. Simmer for quarter-hour, crushing the heads now and again with a potato masher to extract as a lot flavour as you may.
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Pressure the inventory and discard the prawn heads. We began with 1 1/2 cups of inventory, it is best to find yourself with round 1 1/4 cups. High up if you’re brief.
Then set the inventory apart for five minutes to let the sediment settle to the underside. We are going to keep away from pouring that backside layer into our sauce.
Curry paste

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De-seed chillis – Reduce the chillis in half then twist / faucet / use chopsticks to take away all of the seeds. Be thorough right here – the seeds is the place a lot of the spiciness is! I obtained slack in the future and let’s simply say I significantly regretted it.
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Soak half-hour – Roughly chop the chillis then soak in boiling water for half-hour.
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Drain and reserve the chilli soaking liquid. We shall be utilizing some for the curry paste.
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Blitz – Put the peanuts right into a jug simply giant sufficient to suit the pinnacle of a stick blender. Blitz right into a tough paste. Then add all of the remaining curry paste substances and blitz till easy. It solely takes round 20 seconds or so.
Word: You may as well use a small meals processor. You’ll battle to make this in a big meals processor as there’s not sufficient curry paste.
Making Panang curry
This half is sweet and fast – about 10 minutes from begin to end!

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Sauté curry paste – Prepare dinner the Panang Curry paste for round 5 minutes till it darkens in color and isn’t moist and sloppy. This intensifies the flavour.
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Sauce – Add the prawn inventory, being cautious to pour off simply the clearer liquid and leaving the sediment behind. If utilizing rooster as your protein, simply add plain rooster inventory/broth.
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Add coconut cream, sugar, fish sauce and salt.
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Add the beans then simmer for two minutes till the beans are half cooked.
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Add prawns, stir, then simmer for an additional 2 minutes till the prawns are cooked. They prepare dinner rapidly – and can maintain cooking as we end it!
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Serve – Then lastly, stir within the Thai basil leaves. Serve over jasmine rice garnished with chopped peanuts, chilli and extra Thai basil leaves!

One other RecipeTin crew effort!
This recipe is a RecipeTin crew effort, one which I’m proud to say we created from scratch ourselves, utilizing Panang Curry eaten in Thailand and at actually respected, genuine Thai eating places right here in Sydney as our benchmark.
We referenced many recipes through the course of our analysis, notably from extremely regarded Thai meals consultants together with David Thompson and Sujet Saenkham of the acclaimed Spice I Am eating places, and YouTube movies from Thai residence cooks. However we did a number of experimentation and variations of this recipe ourselves to reach at our remaining recipe, and make this a recipe accessible to folks dwelling exterior Thailand.
In reality, this Panang Curry was topic to higher ranges of testing than standard, together with unbiased recipe testers, as a result of this recipe was earmarked for my cookbook. A curry chapter that was eliminated on the final minute as a result of my e book was too large!😭
Anyway, I simply needed to place this large blue field right here to acknowledge my groups’ efforts with this recipe, as a result of curries are onerous! Getting the spice stability good is troublesome, and also you by no means know what the ultimate flavour shall be till proper on the finish. And due to the spiciness of this curry, testing it was additional painful – we tried so many various chillies!
Particular shout out to my brother who was the driving pressure behind the event of this recipe, and Chef JB who’s in all probability made this curry extra instances than anybody else. We did it!

So, with the large blue field of thanks carried out, I hope these of you on the fence about making an attempt this could have the arrogance to make it realizing it’s been topic to additional thorough testing! We actually do suppose that is an distinctive Panang Curry. You’d be onerous pressed to seek out one pretty much as good aside from on the actually high tier Thai eating places. In Sydney, I’d solely suggest Lengthy Chim and Spice I Am.
Bear in mind – be courageous with the chillies! Go on, you are able to do it! 😉 – Nagi x
Watch methods to make it
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Panang Curry – actual, from scratch
Prep: 30 minutes
Prepare dinner: 30 minutes
Dried chilli soaking: 30 minutes
curries, Fundamental
Thai
Servings4 – 5
Faucet or hover to scale
Substances
For prawn inventory (shrimp):
Directions
Prawn inventory:
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Simmer – Peel prawns, reserving heads and shells. Carry rooster inventory to a simmer in a small pot on excessive warmth. Add prawn heads, deliver again to a simmer, then scale back to low warmth. Simmer uncovered for quarter-hour, periodically crushing the heads frivolously with a potato masher and skimming off any orange scum.
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Pressure right into a jug, discarding heads. It is best to have simply over 300 ml (1 1/4 cups) of inventory. Depart undisturbed to let the sediment settle (~ 5min+).
Curry paste:
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Reduce chillies in half then faucet / squeeze out seeds (use a chopstick if wanted for cussed seeds). Discard seeds (spicy!). Chop chilli.
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Soak dried chillis in 2 cups of boiling water for half-hour. Drain in a colander, reserve soaking liquid.
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Peanuts – Put peanuts in a tall jar that comfortably matches the pinnacle of a stick blender (or use a small blender). Cowl the jar opening together with your hand and pulse till finely floor.
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Blitz paste – Add drained chillis and remaining Curry Paste substances, together with 1/4 cup of the reserved chilli soaking liquid. Mix, scraping down the edges as you go, for about 30 seconds till easy, utilizing additional chilli water provided that wanted to assist mix.
Cooking:
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Prepare dinner curry paste – Warmth oil in a big deep frying pan over medium-low warmth. Prepare dinner curry paste for 10 minutes, stirring continually. The paste must be drier, darker, smelling fragrant and not uncooked.
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Sauce – Add 1 cup (250 ml) prawn inventory, being cautious to pour off simply the clearer liquid and leaving the sediment behind. Stir within the coconut cream, sugar, fish sauce and salt. Combine within the inexperienced beans.
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Simmer for two minutes till the sauce thickens and the beans are half cooked.
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Add prawns, stir, then simmer for an additional 2 minutes till the prawns are cooked. Stir within the Thai basil leaves. The ultimate style ought to lean largely savoury and candy, and medium spiciness.
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Serve over jasmine rice garnished with chopped peanuts, chilli and extra Thai basil leaves!
Recipe Notes:
1. Proteins – I feel juicy prawns go notably effectively with panang curry, plus you get to re-purpose the heads to get free, bonus flavour into the inventory which makes this actually particular. If utilizing pre-peeled prawns, utilizing 350g/12 oz and skip the inventory making steps.
Rooster – Recipe works completely with rooster too! Use 350g/12oz, thinly sliced. Skip the inventory making steps, prepare dinner rooster as per recipe does with prawns.
2. Rooster inventory? Sure! Retailer purchased fish/seafood inventory is de facto not good. However rooster inventory is a lot better, and will get infused with prawn flavour from the prawn heads (which is the place a lot of the prawn flavour is!).
3. Use Chinese language dried chillies, not Thai or Indian! Thai dried chillies are SUPER spicy and a few Indian ones are too (like kashmiri) and don’t scale back in spiciness a lot when cooked. Examine label for nation of origin. Although the spiciness of Chinese language chilli varieties and types will differ, I discovered that the cooking course of on this curry reduces the spiciness of the chillies in order that they find yourself being the identical degree of spiciness. Be courageous! Strive to not scale back the chilli an excessive amount of as a result of they’re additionally a key flavouring for the sauce. For those who can’t deal with spicy meals, I counsel skipping this recipe!
Dried chillies differ in size so the quantity you want will differ, from (say) 12 very giant ones to 40 small ones. You want sufficient so you will have 1/2 cup chillies as soon as chopped. You’ll want to deseed completely – the seeds are the place a lot of the spiciness is!
4. Lemongrass prep – lower the reedy finish off, we’re solely utilizing the white and pale inexperienced half, across the backside 20cm/8″. Trim root off, peel off reedy outer layer. Then grate utilizing a microplane, discard stringy bits left. Sub: Recent is greatest right here however should you can’t get it, use 1 tablespoon of lemongrass paste as an alternative.
5. Galangal – appears like ginger however is extra citrusy and more durable. It’s fairly powerful so greatest to grate to make sure your curry paste is easy. Yow will discover it in Asian shops + some grocery shops in Australia (Harris Farms and a few Woolworths promote it). Sub: use the identical quantity of ginger + 1/4 tsp lime zest.
6. Shrimp paste in bean oil – I exploit Por Kwan Shrimp Paste in Bean Oil, the most well-liked one bought at Asian grocery shops right here in Australia. (Listed here are some on-line hyperlinks – for Australia and America). Substitute with 1 1/2 tsp belacan dried shrimp paste, roughly chopped (even bought at Woolies in Australia!) + 1 tsp oil + 1 tsp fish sauce + 1 garlic clove + 1 tsp miso, should you can – any sort). Use instead of shrimp paste in recipe.
7. Kaffir lime leaves – Earthy lime flavour in contrast to anything! Bought at Asian shops, Harris Farms & giant grocery shops in Australia. Freezes 100% completely – utilized in Thai crimson curry, coconut rice, Thai meatballs.
8. Thai basil leaves – Recent herb utilized in Thai cooking that tastes like Italian basil with a slight aniseed flavour. Sub with Italian basil.
9. Leftovers will maintain for 3 days within the fridge or 3 months within the freezer. Preserve basil separate – it degrades as soon as stirred in.
Vitamin per serving assuming 5 servings, excluding rice.
Lifetime of Dozer
Getting fitted for a particular reader dinner developing subsequent week on the 4 Seasons lodge in Sydney! YES, Dozer shall be waddling round a ballroom in his tux. 😂 There’s nonetheless some tickets out there – see beneath for data!

Tickets right here for a dinner hosted by Dymocks e book retailer on the 4 Seasons Lodge in Sydney on Thursday tenth August. Ticket worth features a 3 course meal developed with the Chef on the lodge in collaboration with our very personal Chef JB, in addition to all drinks!
