Recipe
Fingerroot paste for Thai fish curry
- Herb:
- Fingerroot Boesenbergia rotunda
- Method:
- Culinary use
- Plant part:
- Root
About 20 minIntermediateRecipe science profile
Procedure
- Scrape and chop the fingerroot fingers and pound them in a mortar with 3 garlic cloves, 3 shallots, 2 dried chillies and a pinch of salt.
- Add a teaspoon of fish (shrimp) paste, a piece of galangal and the white part of a lemongrass stalk and pound to a smooth paste.
- Stir the paste into 400 ml of coconut milk, bring to the boil and simmer 5 minutes.
- Add pieces of fish and Thai basil, cook 5 minutes and season with fish sauce and lime; serve with rice.
Extraction
- Herb:
- 5–6 fingers of krachai (about 40 g) for a batch of paste for 4 portions
- Solvent:
- pound in a mortar with salt and the other ingredients; no water
- Shelf life:
- 1 week in the fridge, 3 months in the freezer
- Target compounds:
- essential oil (1,8-cineole, camphor, geraniol) and flavonoids (pinostrobin, panduratin A) are released by pounding; fish paste and salt preserve the mixture
Notes
A kitchen recipe from central Thailand (the base for kaeng liang and fish curries). Fingerroot is a spice — the Thai folk reputation of a 'natural viagra' has no clinical backing.
Why it works
Fingerroot rhizomes contain an oil with 1,8-cineole, camphor and geraniol, which gives the paste its camphorous scent, and the flavonoids pinostrobin and panduratin A, to which the review by Eng-Chong et al. 2012 attributes anti-inflammatory and antimicrobial activity — so far only in the laboratory and in animals. Pounding without water releases the oil into the fat of the coconut milk; fish paste and salt preserve the paste.
Literature
- Eng-Chong T et al. (2012): Boesenbergia rotunda: From Ethnomedicine to Drug Discovery. Evidence-Based Complementary and Alternative Medicine 2012:473637 — Review of traditional uses and composition (panduratin A, pinostrobin); preclinical data.
Related
Fingerroot — Herb card
Culinary use — Processing method detail