Perfect Sunday Brunch Recipes - Khao Suey

So I'm starting this series with things that you can easily make at home for lazy Sunday brunches and lunches just with the family or when inviting friends over.

Khao Suey seems like a lot of work - what with so many condiments it just seems like a pain to do. But the good news is that you can prepare a lot of these things in advance. The chicken or vegetable stock, the boiled eggs or even the Khao Suey curry itself can be made a day or two in advance.

Why Khao Suey is ideal is because it is like a community activity, you don't have to make anything else along with it, and you can have fun and conversation with this, everyone has to make it themselves so the serving aspect is easier for you. You can cook both rice and noodles so that the more traditional people who don't think meals are complete without rice are also satisfied.

You need a whole bunch of Ingredients for the Khao Suey and I would suggest that for this dish, don't compromise on things, especially the celery as it really lends great flavours to the dish. I've adapted this recipe from my mom's famous Khao Suey she makes for us on weekends with so much love and also from a recipe that I had seen online once the source of which unfortunately I cannot find (:( ). My mom also has an awesome secret recipe for this delicious chilli sauce which I also will share the recipe of. This sauce, if you don't put any water in, stays for around a month in your refrigerator and is great for Chinese dishes as well.

Ingredients: for 8 - 10 people (Who will only have Khao Suey)

1 kg boneless chicken (Babycorn, mushrooms, pak choi and bamboo shoots for Vegetarians - 150 gm of each)

4 onions

10 cloves of garlic

2 inches ginger

1½ tsp turmeric powder

3 tsp red chilli powder

40g besan (gram flour)

½ litre coconut milk

2 tbsp fish sauce (soya sauce for vegetarians)

Salt to taste

2 tbsp oil

For the stock:

½kg chicken bones (vegetarians please skip this ingredient!)

4 stalks celery, chopped

2 carrots, chopped

2 onions, quartered

1 inch ginger

For the accompaniments:

4 boiled rice noodles (or egg noodles) packets. Once you boil them, strain out the water. Take a large wok, put some oil, splutter 8 - 10 curry leaves and 1 teaspoon of Mustard seeds and salt to taste. Add the noodles to this and carefully mix together so as not to break the noodles and keep aside.

You can also have boiled rice with a jeera "tadka" or Jeera Rice along with/instead of the noodles

6 tbsp each of fried garlic slivers, chopped and fried onion, chopped spring onion, chopped celery, coriander, lime wedges, red chilli flakes (can take from your take away pizza leftovers) and chopped hard-boiled egg.

(I use my mother's chilli sauce instead of the chilli flakes here - 6 cloves of garlic, 4 Kashmiri Mirchis, 2 tbsp vinegar and a good dash of salt all whizzed together to make a chutney like consistency)

Method:

For the stock: To make a stock from the chicken bones (just skip the bones if you're vegetarian, put the rest into the water and follow the same method) add them to 1 litre water, with the onion, ginger, celery and carrot. Bring to a boil and simmer for about 1 hour 30 minutes, till the liquid is reduced to half. Take out the chicken bones and keep aside. take the rest of the liquid and whizz it up together to form a thick soup.

For the Khao Suey Curry: Put the onion, ginger and garlic in a food processor to make a paste. Add half the paste to the boneless chicken pieces. Add turmeric and red chilli powder and keep aside for a good hour to marinate. Fry the remaining onion, garlic and ginger paste in a pan until brownish. Add the marinated chicken pieces. Cook until the chicken is fully cooked (around 10 mins)

Add most of the stock and simmer for 30 minutes. Add the coconut milk and let it simmer. Add fish sauce and salt to taste. Mix the besan with the rest of the stock to make a smooth paste. Add it slowly to the curry while stirring continuously so that no lumps are formed. This will thicken the sauce.

Serve the curry in a huge bowl with a large ladle for splashing the sauce all over the noodles. Take similar looking bowl sets and put all the condiments in each bowl so that it looks uniform and attractive and you are ready to start your lazy Sunday brunch!