Thai Mung Bean Curry

We love vegetable based meals and using beans and lentils in the place of meat is a choice we often make.  We are not a family that follows recipes, so almost every meal we have is made up on the spot – which has made recipe writing hard!  Mung beans require soaking and cooking (or sprouting) before you eat them.  Sprouting is perhaps the best way as you increase the nutritional content of the beans before you cook them.

For this recipe I simply soaked the beans for 8 hours (overnight) before cooking the curry.  We often soak and cook extra beans and freeze them so that we have a ‘convenience’ supply ready to make a dinner that wasn’t planned – which is most nights.

Prep Time: 15 mins (excluding soaking of mung beans)

Total Time: 1hr

Ingredients:  

    • 1 small onion
    • 1 garlic clove
    • 400g of soaked organic mung beans
    • 1 can of coconut milk (sadly never as good as you get in Thailand – just look for the most natural brand you can find)
    • a few kefir lime leaves
    • 1 tbsp thai red curry paste (look for a natural base – free from nasties e.g. msg)
    • 1 tbsp fish sauce (msg and additive free – ask in your local health food shop)

Method:

  1. Fry the onions and garlic in olive oil for 5 minutes
  2. Add the coconut milk, kefir lime, curry paste and fish sauce
  3. Add the mung beans and put the lid on at a simmer for the total cooking time – stirring regularly
  4. Serve with organic brown jasmine rice or organic brown basmati rice