Thai Green Soup

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

125g rice noodles

1 tbsp olive oil 600ml vegetable stock 400ml coconut milk 8–12 raw tiger or king prawns, peeled Lemon and lime juice, to taste 125g mangetout, diagonally sliced 75g spinach

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the curry paste

5cm (2 inch) fresh root ginger, peeled and roughly chopped 3 garlic cloves, roughly chopped

1 lemon grass stick, bashed

Small bunch of fresh coriander, leaves and stems roughly torn ½ tsp ground coriander

1 banana shallot, roughly sliced

1 green chilli, deseeded and roughly sliced

2 fresh kaffir lime leaves

Finely grated zest of 1 lemon and 1 lime

2 tbsp fish sauce

To garnish

4-5 spring onions, sliced

Small bunch of Thai basil or fresh coriander, leaves chopped 1 green chilli, sliced

Lime wedges

Method

First make the curry paste. Put all the paste ingredients into a food processor and blitz until you have a smooth paste. Cook the rice noodles, then drain and set aside. Heat the oil in a large saucepan over a high heat. Add the paste and cook for 3-4 mins. Pour in the vegetable stock and coconut milk and bring to the boil. Add the prawns, reduce the heat and simmer for 10 mins until the prawns turn a lovely pink. Season the soup to taste using salt, pepper and the juice from the lemon and lime that were zested for the paste.

Divide the drained noodles between 4 or 6 bowls. To serve, stir the mangetout and spinach into the soup, then take the pan off the heat immediately. Ladle the soup over the noodles and serve with the garnishes alongside.