I kind of made this one up based on various things I’ve seen on the telly, it took me three tries to perfect it, the first time was lush, the second time was a right mess (I got distracted by the internet and hollyoaks and the soup turned into a sauce) and the third time was fantastic. It’s a nice creamy soup, without being thick, packed with flavour and takes no longer than 15 minutes from opening up the packets of ingredients to taking your first bite. You can make it spicy-hotter by chopping up more of the chilli and adding that, or sprinkling more at the end, or you could make it weaker by leaving that bit out. What I made was just right for me. This is the first time I’ve used fresh herbs or limes before in cooking, and it really does add something to it.

What You Need For One Person (plus enough for lunch the next day)

• Wok, Ladle, a good knife for chopping things up, serving plate. I can’t work out weather it’s a Spoon Soup or a Fork Soup, so I opted for both.
• A packet of noodles, don’t get pre-cooked, as they don’t’ soak up the soup as well; the ones in nests are what I went for.
• A packet of stir-fry veg, or some mixed veg that you like. I used baby sweetcorn, Mushrooms, Sugarsnap Peas, Spring Onion…cut up into bite-sized pieces.
• Thai Curry Paste, but I suppose any kind of curry paste you like would work. I used Marks’n’Spark’s “Malaysian Rendang Paste”, it’s nice and peanutish, not to hot at all. I suppose this isn’t really ‘Thai’ thinking about it now, oh well.
• Uncooked Prawns, ‘cus I like them, but would work with beef or chicken.
• A touch of oil, whatever you got, it’s not important.
• A lime, a bunch of coriander, a chilli, garlic (didn’t use, but would work) and fat man’s two-fingers-up of ginger.

What you need to do to make it work =)

• Preparation first. Cut up the veg into bite-sized pieces if you’ve not used a packet of stir-fry mix.
• Cut off the end of the chilli at about ¼ of the way from the tip and chop that up. If you like it hotter, cut ½ or more, or even the whole one and use another for this next bit. With the rest of the chilli, cut a line down it, that way when it comes to cooking, it’ll release some of it’s heat and flavour without making the dish too hot.
• Chop the ginger into matchsticks, as thin as you can get. I found I used too much in these photos but use your own judgement.
• Open the can of coconut milk.
• Heat up a bit of oil in a DRY wok, doesn’t need a lot of heat at all as he wok gets hot easily. Put your hand over the wok and if you can hold it there for about 5 seconds before it starts to really feel hot, you’re about right.
• Add the ginger, about 3 dollops of paste and the chopped bit of the chilli to the oil; give it a minute or two (it might spit at you a bit) for everything to do its business.
• Add the veg and mix it up, about 4-5 minutes should do it, keep on sturing it around so it’s all coated.
• Now add the can of coconut milk and then again about ¼ to ½ the can of water on top, mix it up a little. Plonk on a nest of noodles on top, it doesn’t matter if half the nest is covered by coconut goodness, and half of it is sticking out the top. Add the stabbed chilli thing here.
• After about 5 minutes, the bottom of the noodles should all be the way they should be, so you can stir them around a bit and get the non-covered part under the coconutty goodness. It’ll still hold its nest shape though at this stage, so flip them ‘round.
• After about 5 minutes, chop up the coriander, and add that. I got it from the shop across the road that’s by a busy road, so ran it under a tap before I chopped it to get any sort of car-crap out of it. Add that to the wok and stir it up. You don’t wanna do this to early ‘cus then it’s too coriandish. All the noodles should have separated by now.
• After five minutes now, it’s all more or less done, give it another stir and add the prawns. About 5 minutes should do it depending on size. Give it a stir every minute to make sure all the prawns are covered. I’m gonna do a chicken version of this for Ma’ next week, where I’ll cut the chicken thinly and add it a bit earlier. My mate Nielly P says that if you dust them in cornflower first, the chicken will go slightly silky and tender, so I’ll give that a shot when I do that.
• Roll the lime on a hard service with the palm of your hand to break it up a bit, cut it in half, add the juice and serve (remembering to take out the stabbed chilli thing). Sprinkle some more coriander on top and some chopped chilli if you want it hotter.

Sorry about the mess, photo was between Try 2 and Try 3 and I didn't clean up between them (it was only 5 minutes while i nipped to the shops to stock up again)

Lovely _Malaysian_ Curry Paste... Ok, not Thai.

ERmmm.... prawns. Quite small so only need a few minutes to cook. Bigger ones would take longer.

Veg: Use half a stir-fry pack or chop your own.

The stabbed chilli bomb.

Fry up the paste, chopped chilli and ginger.

Stir up the veg in the paste and bits.

Add the coconut milk, corriander and 1/4-1/2 cup of water.

Noodles ! (use one nest, not two as in here)

Add the prawns !

KAPLOWIE ! Serve and enjoy =).... I used to many noodles though, wasn't quite soupy enough.