Tag: makrut

Lemon Curd

2 June 2022

A Lemon Meringue Pie, a Tarte au Citron or Scones with Lemon Curd: tasty, refreshing, bitter, sour, a bit sharp and sweet. We love it! Provided of course that the lemon is more than just juicy and sour.

This has been a bit of an issue over the past years. Similar to the German consumers who complained about the watery and flavourless Dutch tomatoes they bought around 1990, we think that most lemons lack aroma and taste. We tried limes, bought more expensive lemons, added a bit of yuzu, but in the end, we still missed the true taste and aroma of an old-fashioned lemon.

Until one day we bought a Bergamot lemon. Its aroma is intense, floral and long. The juice is sour, deeply citrusy, refreshing and bright. Exactly what we were looking for! We went home and prepared a lovely curd.

Recently we had a similar experience when we visited a dear friend. She grows a Makrut (or Thai) Lime tree, also known as Makrut Lime, in her garden mainly because she wants to use the fresh leaves in Thai and Indonesian dishes such as Tom Yum, Soto Ayam and various curries. The leaves have a complex citrus flavour with floral notes. We talked about the lovely yellow fruit and how you could use its very aromatic zest as well.
The fruit contains little juice, so when preparing a curd with Makrut limes, you need to add lime, Bergamot or lemon juice.

What You Need

  • 65 ml of Lemon, Lime, Bergamot and/or Makrut Lime Juice
  • 65 grams of Butter
  • 100 grams of Sugar
  • One Egg
  • Zest

What You Do

  1. Beat the egg, melt the butter and combine all ingredients
  2. Make sure the sugar is fully dissolved
  3. Cook Au Bain Marie until you have the right consistency. Or transfer to your microwave, put it on 50% or 70% power and heat with intervals of 20-30 seconds. Mix between the intervals. This is a very precise way of heating the mixture and it gives you full control over the process. Towards the end of the process you may want to reduce the power or shorten the intervals. The percentage and the duration of the intervals depend on your microwave and the bowl you use. We use a microwave saucepan (£1,29 only) and it works perfectly. The material doesn’t absorb warmth, so the mixture doesn’t get extra heated when you stop the microwave
  4. Pass through a sieve (you don’t want the zest in the curd)
  5. Cool in a water bassin
  6. Store in a jar.
  7. The curd keeps for a week in the refrigerator .

PS

Around 1992 a German television program characterised Dutch tomatoes as watery and tasteless, and called them ‘wasserbombe’. The short-term impact was enormous: Dutch tomatoes went from 50% market share in Germany to something close to zero. Longer term the impact was very different: Dutch producers invested in their product, making their tomatoes tastier, richer and more diverse.

Lemon Curd ©cadwu
Makrut Lime Plant ©cadwu
Makrut Limes ©cadwu

Curry with Shrimps, Cardamom, Coriander and Ginger

2 January 2018

A simple but very tasty main dish. Serve it with some rice and you will have a lovely and rich dish.

We enjoyed our curry with a glass of Spanish gewürztraminer. The white wine needs to be aromatic and herbal. The gewürztraminer should come with a touch of sweetness which links nicely to the coconut and the cardamom.

What You Need
  • 1 small Red Onion or a bigger Shallot
  • 1 Chilly Pepper (a quarter or a half, depending on the spiciness)
  • 1 Garlic Clove (both fresh and prepared)
  • 1 Cardamom
  • Coriander (seeds and fresh leaves)
  • Ginger (fresh, 5 centimetres)
  • Nutmeg
  • 1 or 2 Djeroek Poeroet leaves (these are the leaves of the Makrut or Thai Lime (Citrus Hystrix); if fresh use 1 leave
  • Curry Powder
  • 6 – 10 fresh Shrimps
  • Coconut Milk (150 ml)
  • Olive Oil
  • Black Pepper
What You Do
  1. Clean the shrimps and remove the parts you don’t want to eat, especially the dark vein. This is actually the shrimp’s gastrointestinal tract, so not something you want to eat
  2. Once cleaned, set aside
  3. Cut the onion in four and then slice
  4. Remove the seeds from the chilly pepper and cut the pepper in small bits
  5. Fry the onion gently in a skillet with olive oil
  6. Use a mortar to crush the coriander and cardamom seeds
  7. Add the curry powder, the cardamom, the coriander, the grated nutmeg and the chilly pepper to the pan
  8. Fry a bit more, making sure you get all the tastes
  9. Add one clove of fresh garlic, one prepared and the grated ginger
  10. Fry and stir
  11. Start adding the coconut milk and keep stirring
  12. Add the djeroek poeroet
  13. When the sauce starts to thicken, check if you have sufficient sauce for the shrimps.
  14. f not, add some more coconut milk
  15. When thickened, add the shrimps and let cook for 4 minutes, maximum, depending on size
  16. Chop the fresh coriander leaves
  17. Just before serving add three quarters of the fresh coriander leaves to the curry and mix
  18. Check if some black pepper is required
  19. Sprinkle some more fresh coriander just before serving the dish.
  20. Serve with rice, preferably Camargue red rice because it offers such a wealth of taste. Indian Basmati will also do the trick of course.