Pumpkin Soup with Thai Red Curry Paste
This Pumpkin Soup with Thai Red Curry Paste is spicy with a subtle sweetness emphasized by Thai lime leaves and creamy coconut milk. Serve inside a pumpkin for a spooky Halloween presentation or just enjoy it alone.
Ingredients
Thai Red Curry Paste
- 10 dried red Thai Chilies
- 1 tablespoon whole coriander
- 1 tablespoon white peppercorns
- 1 tablespoon cumin seeds
- 3 tablespoons lemongrass, thinly sliced
- 6 Thai lime leaves, finely chopped also called kaffir lime leaves, or bak makroot
- 1 1/2 tablespoons galangal, chopped
- 5 red Fresno peppers*, chopped or 1 cup chopped red chilies/pepper mix
- 1/4 cup garlic, thinly sliced
- 1/2 cup shallots, diced
- 2 teaspoons shrimp paste*
- 1 tablespoon Morton Kosher Salt
Pumpkin Soup with Thai Red Curry Paste
- 4 cups pumpkin 1 medium-large sugar pie pumpkin
- 1/2 cup broth
- 1 can light coconut milk
- 1/2 cup Thai red curry paste
- 1 tablespoon fish sauce
- 1 tablespoon coconut sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon Morton Kosher Salt, or to taste
- 1 Thai lime leaf
Spooky Halloween Pumpkin Bowl Presentation
- 1 sugar pie pumpkin, medium-large
- black permanent marker
- red food dye
- large knife
Instructions
Thai Red Curry Paste
- If you haven't made the paste beforehand, you can start baking the pumpkins while you make it. See instructions below for starting the Pumpkin Soup. Pour 2 cups of boiling water into a bowl with the dried chilies. Let the chilies soak while you prepare all the other ingredients.
- Toast the coriander, peppercorns, and cumin in a skillet over medium-low heat until fragrant, light brown, and they begin to crackle and pop (about 1 to 2 minutes). Transfer to a bowl and allow to cool completely before grinding in a spice grinder, in a mortar and pestle, or in a Vitamix.
- Drain the chiles soaking in the bowl but reserve the soaking liquid.
- Place the chiles in the bowl of a food processor and pulse until they have been chopped into fairly small pieces.
- Add the lemongrass and pulse until they have reached a shredded consistency.
- Add the Thai lime leaves and cilantro and pulse. Add the galangal and pulse until it’s finely chopped and incorporated.
- Add the red peppers and pulse until finely chopped and incorporated.
- Add the garlic and shallots and pulse until they are finely chopped and are fully incorporated.
- Add the shrimp paste and pulse until it is incorporated. You might have to add a tablespoon of the reserved chili-soaking liquid to make the mixture move around.
- Add the toasted and ground spices and the salt and pulse until fully incorporated.
- Store in mason jars in the freezer.
Pumpkin Soup with Thai Red Curry Paste
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Cut a sugar pie pumpkin in half and place face down on a baking sheet.
- Bake for 40 minutes or until you can pierce the skins with a fork.
- Scoop out the pumpkin and puree in a blender or food processor. Measure out 4 cups.
- Add the broth and the pumpkin to a high-speed blender and blend on high until smooth.
- Heat a large skillet over medium heat. Pour a little coconut milk into the skillet and add the curry paste. Stir until it starts to sizzle (1 to 2 minutes).
- Add the rest of the coconut milk and cook until it starts to simmer.
- Add the pumpkin puree and stir until combined.
- Add the fish sauce and coconut sugar, stir. Taste and add salt, if needed.
- Add the Thai lime leaf and cook until the soup has come to a simmer and is hot.
- Optional: take the Thai lime leaf out and blend the soup again for a completely smooth soup without bits of waxy pepper skin.
Spooky Halloween Pumpkin Bowl Presentation
- Cut out the top of the pumpkin, cutting down into the cavity of the pumpkin and making sure the hole is big enough to fit your hand through. Scoop out the seeds and stringy strands of pumpkin. Trim the bottom of the lid as well.
- Draw the Jack-O-Lantern face on in black permanent marker.
- Season the cavity of the pumpkin with butter, salt, and pepper. Place the pumpkin and the cut-out top on a baking sheet and bake for 40 minutes. Watch the lid, if it starts to shrink go ahead and take it out of the oven. Otherwise, it will become smaller than the opening and fall through.
- The pumpkin flesh will still be a little hard but it needs to be firm enough to hold liquid.
- Pour the prepared soup into the pumpkin, place the lid on, and arrange the knife. Be careful to not pierce through the pumpkin’s skin.
- Drip red food dye around the top of the lid and let it drip down the face of the pumpkin.
- Don’t throw the pumpkin bowl out! You can make another batch of soup with it or create something else with it.
Notes
*Easily adjust the heat of the paste by choosing any red pepper or chilies you want. You can use red bell peppers if spicy food isn't your thing.
*Shrimp paste is a salt-fermented shrimp product and adds a lot of flavor to curry pastes. For vegetarian or vegan versions, the best substitutes would be salt-fermented soybean products such as yellow bean sauce, fermented bean paste, or fermented tofu (also known as fermented bean curd, tofu cheese, soy cheese, or preserved tofu). Replace the fish sauce with soy sauce or Tamari.
Use two separate pumpkins for the soup and for the presentation. If you take the pumpkin flesh out of the roasted whole pumpkin, it won't hold the soup. You can also just use a raw pumpkin for the bowl. I just like the oven roasted look better.