Namya or fish curry is eaten with thin rice noodles and assorted vegetables. Traditionally, there is no namya curry paste. Namya curry paste and curry is all made at the same time. With the new modern life style and more Thais living aboard, namya paste was born. To make it like in the old days, all the ingredients are boiled first, fished out of the pot then pounded into a paste.
Now, Namya curry paste is made similar to all the other Thai curry pastes by pounding all the ingredients in a mortar before adding to the coconut milk.
Like all other recipes, Namya recipe is passed down from generation to generation. My recipe came from a family cook that could claim that her Namya made it all the way to the Thai parliament. During one of the many military coups in Thailand in the 70's, her namya made it to the table of the coup leader. However, saying that the namya curry made it to the Thai parliament was a stretch because the general was the only military coup leader who refused the prime minister position after the successful coup.
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