“Fragrant Clams with unpredictable taste of Asian cuisine!”
You probably did not come across this dish. You probably did. Ate it somewhere, just could not recall the dish name.
Well, I am going to introduce this dish, the home cooked version.
Appearance of the dish might look quite common, but, its taste is unpredictably pleasant.
This dish was not the usual curry flavour. In fact, couldn’t really taste the curry, neither was it spicy. It has mainly the fragrance of curry leave complements the taste of Belacan (Sun-dried shrimp paste).
Yes, curry leave. Many strong-scented ingredients were used in this dish, such as dried shrimp, Belacan, curry powder and leaves. Curry leave is the main lead in this recipe, which makes the dish extensively fragrant. In return, you’ll get an intensive taste from the dish.
Clams can be cooked in various styles. Mainly in soup, or with western recipes. This Curry Belacan Clams recipe is kinda “Asianistic”. Very Asian.. Laughing.
Ingredients
1 kg of clams aka “la la” (蝲蝲), steeped in salt water for 20 min.
Half a palm sized of dried Belacan (Sun-dried Shrimp paste in thin round solid browish colour block)
2 tablespoon of meat/ seafood curry powder
2 Chili Padi/ red chili, sliced
2 cloves of garlic, minced
2 tablespoon of dried shrimps
Handful of curry leaves
Sprinkle of sugar
1 small cup of water
2 tablespoons of cooking oil
Method
1) Boil a pot of water over high fire, pre-boil clams till 80% cooked. Drain and reserve for later.
2) Heat wok with oil over medium-high fire. Add garlic, Chili padi (or red chili) and dried shrimps, and stir fry for 20 seconds. Reduce heat to medium-low fire. Add in belacan. Mash it using wooden spatula, and stir-fry till fragrant, about 1 minute.
3) Add curry powder and curry leaves. Add some water, and stir-fry for 1 minute.
4) Return clams to wok. Sprinkle sugar. Stir-fry for 2 minutes, until all ingredients mixed well. Heat off and serve.
1 portion (about 15 clams) of clam with this recipe is about 220kcal.
Tips: Do not over-boil the clams as the meat will shrink.
* I bought the belacan in thin solid brownish colour block which easily available in many Chinese or Malay provision stores and supermarkets.