This delicious Thai Red Curry Chicken with Quinoa is a great weeknight dinner recipe. It's super easy to make and so good!
So today I made a Thai red curry sauce, with chicken and quinoa on the side. I usually use quinoa as a substitute for white rice. .... and I have about 10 pounds of quinoa in my pantry, as my husband could not pass up a chance to buy it in bulk at a much cheaper price.
I love Thai food and good Thai restaurants and often try to replicate Thai dishes at home. After trying many recipes for red curry sauce, experimenting with ingredients and proportions, I came up with this wonderful curry sauce, which is now my "go-to" recipe and is very popular with my family. I'm really glad that I can cook my favorite Thai dishes at home! Because this way I can control so many things on my end: the ingredients I use, for instance, I like to use high quality chicken, cook different types of vegetables, serve quinoa instead of rice and so on.
Thai Red Curry Chicken with Quinoa
Ingredients
- 14 oz coconut milk
- 2 tablespoons red curry paste of moderate spiciness, such as Thai Kitchen brand. Use less of red curry paste if using a spicier version of the paste
- 2 tablespoons fish sauce
- 3 tablespoons brown sugar (use more or less sugar, depending on your preference)
- 1 tablespoon lemon grass or 1 lemon grass stalk
- 1 lb chicken breast
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- ½ cup mushrooms
- 1 red bell pepper
- ¼ cup basil leaves chopped (or use ½ teaspoon dry basil)
- 1 cup quinoa
- 2 cups water
Instructions
- In a medium pan, heat olive oil. Add sliced mushrooms and sliced bell pepper. Cook on high heat for 10 minutes until vegetables soften.
- In the mean time, cook chicken breast (or use the one already cooked). You can either boil it, or roast it in the oven. After it’s cooked, cut the chicken breast in medium size pieces.
- Bring coconut milk in a large pan to boil, reduce to simmer. Add 1 tablespoon of curry paste, fish sauce, brown sugar, lemon grass, and stir really well so that curry paste dissolves. Taste your stew and add 2nd tablespoon of curry paste, if desired. For a red curry paste, I usually use the one produced by Thai Kitchen (it’s a popular brand sold in most stores). I like to use frozen lemon grass (chopped lemon grass), which you just add and it remains in the dish. If I were to use a lemon grass stalk – I would remove it at the end of cooking time. Simmer for 30 minutes for all tastes to blend. During the last 10 minutes of cooking, add cooked vegetables and sliced chicken breast into the soup, stir well.
- In the mean time, bring 2 cups of water and 1 cup quinoa to boil, reduce to medium and cook quinoa for 10-15 minutes until all water is absorbed and quinoa is cooked al dente.
- To serve, pour soup into each bowl, garnish with basil leaves. Serve quinoa in a separate bowl.
Nutrition
The nutritional information on this website is only an estimate and is provided for convenience and as a courtesy only. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed. It should not be used as a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
I made this last night but doubled the recipe since I had a lot of mouths to feed!
Next time I will use less fish sauce and brown sugar, I don't think I needed to double those two ingredients. I'll start small and add more as I think is needed! I also added minced garlic to bring a little savory back to the sweet.
It was my first time using lemongrass and curry paste! Would you be able to achieve the same effect with curry powder, you think?
Overall, a great recipe!! We topped ours with crushed cashews and toasted coconut
Thank you for such a detailed and insightful comment! Love that you topped this dish with crushed cashews and toasted coconut - so delicious!
I don't think using curry powder will have the same effect as using red curry paste - the flavor would be very different!
came here from Pinterest. Your sit is so full of popup ads I cannot read a whole recipe. They take me to other sites as they wont let me close them. Looked like you have some good stuff here but can't get through the ads to find out.