A Fishy Thai Green Curry

If you're a student like me you thrive on a cheap meal, but it doesn't need to be beans on toast every night. And no doubt you certainly can't afford to get a takeaway either, it's not good for your waistline or your wallet.

I try to cook as often as i can, but sometimes it can be difficult to find the time, or even to afford to put together a proper home cooked meal. However it really doesn't need to be.

I've just put together a simple, quick Thai Curry with fresh Haddock for dinner & the whole thing cost around £4, although admittedly I had some of the ingredients already around the kitchen. This was the first time I've cooked this dish, and I mostly just made the recipe up as I went along... but everything turned out quite nicely and very tasty.

You don't need much for this dish:

• Fresh fish; Haddock, Salmon or whatever you fancy. My Haddock was only £2 for a large fillet from the fish counter,
• Thai Green Curry paste about £1.50 a jar that will last for ages,
• A dash of Fish sauce,
• Coconut Milk,
• A small onion and a couple of cloves of garlic,
• A stalk of lemon grass,
• Fresh chopped coriander,
• salt and chilli peppers or ginger as desired,
• Rice.

To begin with put the rice on a gentle boil and dice the onion nice and small. Crush the garlic and lemon grass with the flat of your knife or the base of a pan, there's no need to chop or use a garlic crusher.

Gently fry the onion and garlic for a few minutes, add a dash of water so they don't burn, then add the curry paste and a little bit of fish sauce, not too much as it's pretty strong stuff. Mix all of this together in the pan then pour in the full can of coconut milk and add the lemon grass, coriander and chilli and ginger.

Turn down the heat and let it simmer while you cook the fish. The fish you choose doesn't really matter, you could do this with prawns or even chicken if you fancy it. I cut the fillet into three equal pieces and then fried them slowly in the pan. If there's skin, then leave it on and cook it skin side down with a dash of oil, rather than poking and flipping the fish just leave it alone for a good few minutes and let it cook through, then just near the end flip it and let it sear the other side.

When it's done put the fish to one side to rest for a few minutes then serve with the rice and the sauce on top. If you wish, add the lemon grass and sprig of coriander to improve the presentation!

I looked this up at my local Thai takeaway and it would cost about £9.50 and no doubt would be full of allsorts of nasty things and old frozen ingredients, this way you know exactly what's in it and how fresh it is. Plus it should only take 20 minutes, much quicker than ordering out.

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