Thai Cuisine Recipe

1. Using a food processor, put all the ingredients in the work bowl except for the mussels, basil leaves, julienne chili peppers, sliced kaffir lime leaves and the corn husk. Blend everything until a smooth mousse is achieved.

2. Spoon some of this mix out and fry a small amount in a small pan to check the taste. It should taste very fragrant with the red curry paste, creamy salty enough not to be over powering and naturally sweet from the coconut milk.

3. To make the corn husk basket, tie both ends of the length of wide pieces of corn husk allowing the ends to protrude out a little as if twisting either end of a candy wrapper.

4. Line the bottom of the inside of the basket with some basil leaves, then add the mussels and fill the cup with the curried mousse. Topped the mousse with a few drops of coconut cream, red chili peppers and kaffir lime shreds. Take all these baskets over to the steamer and steam for 15 minutes until done. You can keep it outside until prior to service. The at service time take these baskets over to the grill and grill until hot and very fragrant. This dish can be served with rice as one of the many main courses in a Thai meal or as an appetizer or cocktail snacks in Western kitchen.

a. Traditionally, this mousse is put into banana leaf cups. But I wanted you to know that you can use other thing to products that might be more easily available in you home country.

b. You don’t need to grill the Hor Mok if you don’t want to but when I used corn husk for shell the grilling process makes this dish more fragrant and interesting.

c. In the olden days they do not use food processor to make Hor Mok but rather ground fish meat and an earthen bowl to incorporate all the ingredients. My using the food processor is considered by true traditionalist as sacrilegious!