Brian doesn't know what he missed. This was excellent. Fish sauce is one of the weirdest ingredients I use. It smells so foul and disgusting it's hard for me to believe that I ever use it. However, when it combines with the coconut milk it imparts this salty sweet flavor to the dish. This curry just wouldn't be worth making if it weren't for the flavor component of the fish sauce. It's even more important than the basil.

I just looked it up. Fish sauce is made from salting fresh fish and fermenting it in the hot sun for nine months to a year. If you ever make a Thai curry, don't smell the fish sauce - it truly smells repulsive and you may not use it. That would be a mistake.


This morning, before I left for work, I noticed a big turtle in my front yard. When I told Alex, I (jokingly) told him that I considered eating the turtle, he was worried that it was in the curry. I wonder if there's a recipe for Red Curry Turtle with Basil.