The best Sunday meals are the ones that cook while you ignore them.
What you need
- About 1.5 kg of beef brisket, cut into thick chunks
- Two heaping tablespoons of red curry paste (a good Thai brand — Mae Ploy if you can find it)
- One can full-fat coconut milk, plus another half if you want it richer
- A thumb of ginger, four cloves of garlic, two shallots, all smashed not minced
- Fish sauce, palm sugar (or brown sugar), a couple of kaffir lime leaves if you have them
- Two carrots and a few small potatoes — cut chunky, they're going to cook a long time
How it goes
- Brown the brisket hard in a heavy pot. Don't crowd it — work in two batches if you have to.
- Take the meat out. Drop the curry paste into the same pot with a splash of oil. Let it fry until it smells like a different room.
- Add the coconut milk, scrape the bottom, return the meat and aromatics.
- Pour in just enough water to come halfway up the meat. Simmer covered, low, for three hours.
- Add the vegetables and a splash of fish sauce. Another hour, lid off the last twenty minutes.
- Taste. Sweeten and salt until it stops you mid-sentence.
Serve with
Jasmine rice. A bowl of cucumber slices in rice vinegar to cut the richness. A beer. Don't overthink the side — the pot is the point.