Curry Kapitan

It took me till now to discover Curry Kapitan, a Peranakan dish. Apparently, a British naval officer saw his domestic helper preparing a curry, and this inspired him to create a curry that was only half as spicy as normal curries. This works for our family. We are not fans of tongue-numbing spiciness and so, curry is not really in my repertoire of home cooked dishes. 

Curry Kapitan is the first curry that my children have said, "This is a keeper, Mom!" The curry sauce merely pretends to be spicy. The Daughter said that the sauce itself is worth making, sans meat. I also tried this recipe with pork shoulder. It tastes great too.

Ingredients for Rempah

4 stalks of lemongrass
15 shallots
1 bulb of garlic
15 candlenuts
5 thumbsized turmeric
half a fist-sized galangal
10 large fresh chillis
15 dried chillis
1 thumb-sized block of belachan

(1) Blend all the above ingredients together in the food processor till you get a smooth and even paste.

(2) Fry in some olive oil till fragrant.

Other ingredients
juice of 7 limau kasturi
15 leaves of limau purut
1 kampong chicken/ 1 kg of pork shoulder
3 litres of water
200ml of coconut milk

(3) Mix the fried up rempah from (2) in a thermal pot with 3 litres of water and the coconut milk. Bring to a rolling boil.

(4) Cut the chicken into half. Immerse both halves into the boiling liquid. This will cool down the boiling liquid. Bring to boil again.

(5) Once the water boils again, remove from the fire and insert into the thermal pot's insulation sleeve. Leave in there for 3 hours. If it is a pork shoulder, then bring the pot to a boil after 3 hrs and leave the pork shoulder in there for another 3 hours, i.e., 6 hrs in total.

(6) After 3 hours (or 6 hours, if pork shoulder), remove the meat from the water. Keep aside.

(7) Cut the limau purut into small bits. Add to the water, along with the limau kasturi juice.

(8) Bring the water to a boil and reduce the water content till only 1 quarter of liquid is left. This will give you a nice thick paste.

(8) Put the 2 halves of the chicken (or pork) back into the nice thick curry paste. Serve.