PENANG ASSAM CURRY MEE!!

I have to start of by saying that I intended to make curry mee but the end result, and my flatmates comments on it, prompted me to change the known dish to a somewhat fused concept between laksa and curry mee. Penang Assam Curry Mee!! However, I shall tell you the story of how I tried to make curry mee as this was the intention:)

Well this was a close call to home. My flatmate loves her Maggi chicken curry paste mixed with egg noodles and fishballs and she calls that 'curry mee'. I, on the other hand, have a very different opinion on what curry mee should taste like. Maggi chicken curry and egg noodles was NOT curry mee to me (although the result was still pleasant). I researched different recipes online and a fusion of those recipes have me this end result.

The oriental shop, where I bought my ingredients, had run out of egg noodles and the only other alternative was ramen. I thought there wouldn't be much difference but there was. It was less springy and less flavourful compared to thick egg noodles. It also had a starchy after-taste to it which I would have been happy to dispense with.

So I started the process of making my curry mee and suprisingly, it took me more than 1 and a half hours to finish cooking! I am a very fast cook but the peeling and the deseeding of dried red chillies really did get the best of me. What did I think of the dish? I will take this in turn:

The Penang Curry Mee gravy:

I really liked the base. The coconut milk was a splendid addition since it balanced out the richness of the spices in the gravy. The entire curry base came from a mix of coriander powder (suprisingly not curry powder), dried chillies, belacan, shallots, garlic and a variety of other ingredients. There was also the addition of lemongrass which was nice but many recipes asked that I put in 3 stalks into the blender with the other spices. I reduced that amount to 2 stalks and still found that the lemon grass smell was a little too strong in the gravy. The citrusy taste was also very evident. Personally, I would have preferred for that taste to be in the background rather than fighting its way to the forefront.

The Fish Balls!:

Nothing else needs to be said about these beauties. Always a delight to have in any soup-based or curry-based noodle dishes. The only other thing I wish I had was cockles! My mother would probably scream in terror as she is not an advocate of consuming shellfish in abundance, which is exactly what I would have done had I been able to get my hands on these critters! Blanched and served, that is how I like my cockles. Still a little rare in the middle and not overdone and tough.. Shrimps would have been great as well but here in the UK, shrimps are pre-cooked and highly priced.

The Chillie Paste:

I remember having this little addition in the curry mee shop in front of my house in Johor Bahru. It was spicy, oily and salty. However the saltiness was not excessive. This chillie paste that I had concocted was very 'dried prawn' based and that...... was not so bad. But I didn't think it was all that great. There was too much dried prawns in it that the paste was more flaky than oily smooth. Perhaps I should research more on how to get the best chillie paste for curry mee. It wasn't amazing and that bit needs some work.

Overall, this dish was a good try and aside from the overpowering lemon grass smell and flavour and the flaky chillie paste, the dish was a not bad try for a beginner. 6.8/10 (because we all know that there is no such thing as a 10) ;)