How To Make Massaman Beef Curry

Massaman Curry was served at the royal palace of Siam for centuries before finding its way to the west as one of the Thai curries. This curry is great with beef.

This recipe is naturally gluten free.

Watch A Video

Here is a video of 2 Cooks in the Kitchen making Massaman Beef Curry

https://youtu.be/rgZQ_xlGW60

Ingredients For Massaman Beef Curry

• 3 Tbls Coconut Oil
• 1 12 lb Beef cut into cubes
• Lemongrass Trimmings
• 2 Cups Beef Broth
• 4 Tbls Massaman Curry Paste, Divided
• 1 Can Coconut Cream, Divided
• 3 Tbls Coconut Oil
• 3 Tbls Massaman Curry Paste
• 1 4″ Piece Lemongrass
• 1 Large Potato, cubed
• 1 Tbls Coconut Sugar
• 2 Tbls Fish Sauce
• 1 tsp Tamarind Pulp
• 1 Cup Pineapple Pieces
• 1/4 Cup Chopped Peanuts for serving
• Chile Oil for garnish
• Serrano Pepper, chopped, for garnish

Brown The Beef

We’ll put some coconut oil in a large stockpot and brown the beef. We will stir it to get it browned on all sides. We are using a chuck roast for this dish. You can use any cut you like but we are stewing it low and slow so a tougher cut will be tender with this method.

Lemongrass Trimmings

Next we’ll add the lemongrass trimmings. You’ll usually onlu use about the bottom 4 inches os a lemongrass stock but everything you trim off still has some flavor so we’ll get that in our beef while it’s cooking.

Beef Broth

Next we’ll add in our beef broth. You want a good quality beef broth for this. We make bone broth that we freeze and use for things like this.

Coconut Milk And Massaman Curry Paste

Lastly we will add 1/2 cup of our coconut milk and one tablespoon of our Massaman curry paste. We are going to let this cook low and slow for 2 hours to get the beef tender.

Reserve The Beef

After our beef has cooked for 2 hours we will remove the chunks and reserve it. We’ll remove the lemongrass pieces, put the pot back on the burner and cook it until the liquid reduces to about one and a half cups.

Cook The Massaman Curry Paste

Now we are ready to start our curry. The method for using our curry paste involves cooking it in coconut oil to bring out all the spices and flavors in the paste. We’ll start with 1/4 cup of coconut oil in a large stockpot and add the remaining 3 tablespoons of Massaman curry paste. We will stir this as it cooks for about ten to fifteen minutes. We are trying to cook it slowly over fairly low heat and not rush this step. The paste should be very fragrant at this point.

Add Coconut Cream And Lemongrass

Now we’ll add some of our coconut cream and stir the curry paste into that. We’ll let this cook along until the cream breaks and the oil forms bubbles throughout the pan. we want to wait until the bubbles get fairly large before moving on.

More Coconut Cream And The Beef Broth

Once we have our large, colorful oil bubbles we’ll add the rest of our coconut milk. We’ll let that cook until we can see our bubbles again and then we’ll add in the reduced beef broth.

Cook The Potato

We’ll add in the potato, cover the pan and let it cook for 15 minutes until the potatoes have softened.

Sweet, Sour, Umami

Now we add the magic ingredients for Massaman Curry. This curry works with a balance of sweet, sour and umami flavors. We’ll add coconut sugar, but you could use any sugar forthe sweet. We’ll also add a little bit of tamarind and about a cup of pineapple pieces for the sour. And lastly we’ll add fish sauce for the umami. We’ll let this cook for about 10 minutes to let the flavors marry.

Add The Beef

Lastly we will add the beef back in and cook for about 2 minutes until the beef warms up.

Serve With Chopped Peanuts

We will ladle some of our curry into a bowl and sprinkle with a generous amount of chopped peanuts. The peanuts are an important flavor addition so don’t leave them off.

Optional Garnish

This curry doesn’t have much heat to it so you can garnish with chile oil and chopped serrano if you want more spice.

We have a page dedicated to a lot of other curry recipes you might like to try.

Some of our favorite curry recipes:

• Butter Chicken
• Red Curry Chicken
• Red Curry Pork Tenderloin
• Yellow Curry Crab
• Crab Stuffed Mushrooms With Yellow Curry Sauce
• Thai Coconut Curry Crab
• Chicken Satay With Peanut Sauce

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