I think my favourite red curry is this one which comes with roasted duck. In Thai it is called "gaeng phet pet yang". In Thai restaurants it can be quite expensive to order. So, it is useful to know how to cook. The ingredients will vary a bit from book to book. I like to add pineapple and I hear some people add rambutan. In the picture below, you can see: sweet basil, roasted duck, palm sugar, kaffir lime leaves, plum tomatoes, pea eggplants and red curry paste in the middle. The ingredients of the paste include: red chilli, galangal, lemon grass, red shallots, garlic, kaffir skin, cilantro seeds and shrimp paste.
Heat the oil in a wok and add the red curry paste. Gradually add coconut milk to form a runny paste. Continue this process until it is fragrant and a red oil surfaces. Next comes the roasted pork. In preference, de-bone the duck first. In many Thai restaurants there always seem to be more bone than meat. Cook for another minute or so. You can add more coconut milk if it dries out too much. Add the plum tomatoes, torn kaffir lime leaves and the pea eggplants. Turn off the heat and prepare the seasoning. For this you add a mixture of fish sauce and palm sugar. Our red curry paste bought ready made at the market was a bit too salty. They probably added too much shrimp paste. So, we didn't put in so much fish sauce. If it is too salty, try adding more sugar, coconut and/or stock. Finish with a handful of sweet basil which you should carefully stir in. However, not all recipes call for basil. We decorated the dish with thinly sliced red spur chilli and a sprig of sweet basil.
