Recipe for Chicken Curry Kapitan
Nonya cooking in the North West of England…
Here’s my new curry for one of our brasserie menus. I always feature a curry of some description and origin and laksas apart this is my first one from Malaysia. Curry Kapitan or Captain’s Curry is without doubt one of my all time favourite currries. I have had some fabulous versions in both Pennang and Singapore and it was whilst in Little India in Singapore that I bought my first and only packet of pre made curry spice mix. It was a dry mix for curry kapitan and being so enthralled by it I had to buy it to disect the ingredients if nothing else.
This curry is mild but wonderfully fragrant and made all the more intriguing by its use of Chinese five spice. This gives it such a warm, rounded finish that I have begun to consider it more as a flavouring in other possible dishes as well as this one but more of that later.
So here’s a recipe for the spice paste for Curry Kapitan, very straightforward so make a batch and keep it in the refrigerator until required….
5-6 dried chillies soaked in water
2 diced red onions
2-3 garlic cloves
3 bulbs of chopped lemongrass
2tsp turmeric
2 tsp Chinese Five Spice
1 tbsp chopped ginger
small spoon of shrimp paste.
Use a pestle and mortar or food blender and blitz all together until you have a smooth paste.
Vegetable oil to bind
Curry Kapitan
You can add a couple of spoons of this to some fried chicken pieces, cook until the paste becomes fragrant before covering with coconut milk. Add a cinnamon stick and a couple of lime leaves (optional) followed by a spoon of palm sugar if you have it. Simmer until the chicken is cooked, finish with fresh lime juice and some toasted ground coconut.
This curry looks amazing and it’s the end of a long day and I’m very hungry (and no desire to cook). Would you please pass a plate of that over to Golden, Colorado? I don’t see lemon grass around here very often. Wonder why? It does add wonderful flavor, doesn’t it. The fragrance of your curry is seeping through cyberspace. I can almost smell it!
Big sigh!
Melissa
November 6, 2009 @ 12:14 am
Melissa,
It is a great curry, I love the five spice in it. Surprised you don’t get much lemongrass, that’s a pity because it’s so useful. Use dried if all else fails.
Miles
November 6, 2009 @ 8:56 am
Chef,
a great looking dish and the recipe seems pretty straight forward
Good stuff
Rod
November 6, 2009 @ 9:46 am
Miles,
Fragrant curries suit me far more than savagely hot so this recipe ought to suit just about everyone…. vegetarians too. My pre Christmas guilt trip has already started….. I’m attempting to knock off a few pounds (same old story) so if I allow myself some Kapitan curry, I’ll have a smaller portion with steamed rice and be truly grateful.
Cid
November 6, 2009 @ 8:46 pm
Rod,
Worth a bash..might knock one up pre gig.
Miles
November 7, 2009 @ 12:07 am
Cid,
I made another batch of paste today and it blew my head off…might want to pull back on those chillies
Miles
November 7, 2009 @ 12:08 am
Miles,
Singapore is on my list of places to visit before I die. My impression is that it’s like the ‘Glasgow Central Station’ of the whole of Asia! Okay, reaching a bit there, but it’s a place where ethnicity and culture is on proud display.
In the meantime, I’m having some of that there Kapitan curry!
GDave
November 7, 2009 @ 12:47 am
Miles & GDave,
might knock one up pre gig
I’ll bring a jar from M&S
Singapore is on my list of places to visit before I die
Don’t bother, come to Lincolnshire instead, your lower colon will thank you for it
Best
Rod
November 7, 2009 @ 9:30 am
Gdave,
It is a great place, I’d go back in an instant.
Miles
November 8, 2009 @ 10:07 am
Rod,
Rather you brought the chicken
Miles
November 8, 2009 @ 10:07 am