Curry Cabbage
This is a homely local recipe for curry cabbage (咖喱高丽菜). The curry goes well with both rice and fried bee hoon. The recipe is similar to my curry vegetables, except that I used cabbage as the main vegetable component here. I also added “tau pok” (beancurd puff) and leftover vegetables (cherry tomato, french bean & carrot) to make it more sumptuous.
Serve this with:
See Also:
I love home-cooked curry as it contains the right amount of heat and spices, sans MSG. This vegetable side-dish takes less than 30 minutes to make from preparation to end. Leftover curry can be stored in a glass or stain-proof food container in the fridge overnight. Reheat the curry on the stove on medium heat, stirring through until the curry starts to bubble.
These are the aromatics (shallots, dried chilli, dried shrimps, garlic & oil) for my curry. I place them in a food processor and pulse briefly until smooth. Fry this blended spice paste together with curry powder (see next paragraph below). This blended spices will enhance the curry greatly.
This is the brand of curry powder I used to cook my curry cabbage. It’s very convenient and do not contain MSG or preservatives. I always use half a packet each time I cook a pot of curry.
Curry Cabbage Recipe
This recipe uses dried shrimps and fish sauce. For vegetarian version, omit the dried shrimps. To replace the fish sauce, use mushroom seasoning powder, light soy sauce and/or salt (to taste) instead.
Ingredients:
- 35g vegetable curry powder
- 3 sprigs curry leaf optional
- 1 tbsp cooking oil
- 1 litre water
- 500g round cabbage (高丽菜) cored, leaves coarsely cut to smaller, uniform pieces
- 8 french beans (or 4 long beans) ends trimmed; cut to short sections
- 15 cherry tomatoes
- 50g “tau pok” (beancurd puffs) cut to smaller pieces
- 300 ml coconut milk
(A) Spices
- 20g dried shrimps (蝦米) soaked in hot water to soften; drain & pat dry
- 5 dried chilli soaked to soften, drained & snipped to smaller sections
- 3 garlic cloves peeled
- 7 shallots peeled
- 1 1/2 tbsp vegetable or olive oil
(B) Seasonings
- 3 tbsp fish sauce to taste
- 1 tsp Maggi seasoning sauce substitute with salt, mushroom powder, light soy sauce or more fish sauce; to taste
- pinch of cayenne pepper for extra heat; only if needed
Directions:
- Blend spices. Place spices (A) in a food chopper or food processor. Blend until smooth. Alternatively, pound them using a mortar & pestle.
- Fry spices. Place blended spices, curry powder and curry leaf sprigs in a large wokpan with 1 tbsp oil. Fry briefly until fragrant.
- Add vegetables & simmer. Add water and bring to a boil. Add cabbage and simmer briefly until they start to wilt (and reduce in volume). Then add french or long beans, cherry tomatoes and bean curd puffs. Cover the wok and simmer for about 10 minutes, or until the cabbage reached desired softness. Add more water during simmering if needed. Season the curry to taste with (B). Lower heat and add coconut milk, stirring to warm through the curry before serving.