Greenery Day Green Curry

Greenery Day (midori no hi) みどりの日 also known as Arbor Day on the 4th of May is part of a string of holidays and celebrations over a week long period in Japan called Golden Week. It is a day when people like to celebrate nature and the environment.  They might visit a local park or flower garden maybe to view the wisteria or azalea that are flowering at this time. In fact the old name for May is Satsuki meaning azalea. Last year I had planned to be in Japan at this time to see them both, I cannot believe another year has gone by. When we can all safely travel again we definitely won’t be taking it for granted any more! Other festivities could be planting trees and seeds, it is also the time when the first tea leaves are harvested. I have a few posts on here about Greenery Day with some more recipes you can check out.

This year I made a green curry using some lovely Hourensou spinach

(this is an Asian spinach which has much bigger leaves ) just use what ever spinach you can easily get where you are.

You will need: 3/4 of canned coconut meat from a can of coconut milk  ( don’t shake the tin just use the harder meat at the top) the lighter milk can be used for another recipe.
Spinach enough to yield around one cup when cooked down.
1 teaspoon maple syrup or sweetener of choice.
2 teaspoons of hot curry powder
a pinch of salt and a drizzle of tamari

Cook down the spinach in water, then drain off most of the water leaving a little at the bottom of the pan ( keep the drained water in a jug just in case you need to add more later).

Then add the coconut meat, it will melt in the warm water, give it a stir then add the rest of the ingredients. Transfer to a blender or use a hand held blender like I did and blend until smooth adding a little spinach water or milk from the coconut if needed, depending on how thick you want your curry.
Return to the heat in a pan ( if you want to thicken the curry you can add 1-2 teaspoons of kuzu root to a bowl and add a teaspoon of the coconut milk or cold water to make a slurry then add this to your curry when heating).
Now you can serve up your curry however you like. With rice and maybe some roasted peppers and marinated tofu and shiitake.

I added 1 teaspoon of maple syrup, 2 teaspoons lemon juice, 2 teaspoons tamari and 2 teaspoons of sesame oil to a bowl. I gave it a mix and poured it over tofu chunks and sliced shiitake. I marinated it for half an hour then popped it in the oven to roast. Other toppings were coriander, sliced cucumber and tomato, sliced red chilli and some blanched snow peas.