My wife's Curry Kapitan Recipe

The Curry Kapitan served on a plate for our lunch. (8 July 2017)


Today my wife makes Curry Kapitan. You can get a recipe for it from this book, Nonya Flavours, A complete guide to Penang Straits Chinese Cuisine, jointly published by The State Chinese (Penang) Association and Star Publications (M) Bhd, page 102. My wife's recipe below is the "agak-agak version" of the book's recipe. I say this because my wife has a tendency for not measuring anything. She simply picks whatever is available and toss them in with casual abandance.

Ingredients for my wife's Curry Kapitan

The Marinade
- 6 chicken thigh (about 1.5 kg)
- 1 tablespoon turmeric powder
- 2 teaspoons of salt
- enough oil for frying

For Sautéing with Spice Paste
- two big onions, sliced thinly

The Spice Paste
- 20 dried chillies, cut and soak in hot water until soft
- 9 fresh red chillies (if you want extra hot, add bird-eye chilli too)
- 6 cloves of garlic
- 30 medium-size shallots
- 3 cm fresh turmeric
- 3 cm ginger
- 3 cm galangal
- 6 stalks of lemongrass
- 10 candlenuts
- 3 cm x 3 cm x 1 cm of belacan

To be added when cooking
- RM3 (Aug 2017, Penang) worth of coconut milk
- 10 freshly plucked kaffir lime leaves
- 2 tablespoons of brown sugar
- salt and sugar to taste
- 3 tablespoons or more of lime juice

First of all, marinate your chicken thighs with the turmeric powder and salt for at least two hours. We worked on this as soon as we returned from the Jelutong Market this morning. After that, you deep fry the chicken in hot oil until it is brown. Then remove them from the wok and put aside.

Create the spice paste by grinding the shallots, garlic, ginger, galangal, turmeric, candlenuts, lemongrass, the soaked red chillies and belacan. (If you can, toast the belacan to bring out its aroma.)

Next, add cooking oil in the wok and sauté the onions and the spice paste until fragrant. Next, add in the chicken and cook over medium flame for about 5-7 minutes. Add the kaffir lime leaves as you stir the chilli paste, to release the aroma of the leaves. Then add the coconut milk and brown sugar, and continue to cook until the chilli paste releases its oil (that's called "pecah minyak").

I took a photograph of it in the work at this moment.

Finally, add lime juice, mix well, and it's ready to be served as our lunch today. My wife scooped up enough chicken for the two of us to have with bread, while the balance she puts into a black claypot.

My wife's Curry Kapitan while still in the wok (8 July 2017)


The Curry Kapitan in a black claypot (8 July 2017)

Private Guided Tours of Penang

If you are seeking private guided tours of Penang, message Penang Tour Guides at penangtourguides@gmail.com and enquire with them.

 Buy, rent or sell properties in Penang

Do you have a property for sale or to rent out? Are you looking to buy or rent a property? Get in touch with me. WhatsApp me (Timothy Tye) at 012 429 9844, and I will assign one of my property agents to serve you. I will choose the agent for you, according to your property needs. So when you message me, provide me some details of what you need, whether to sell, to buy, to rent or to rent out, and what type of property, is it condo, apartment, house, shop, office or land.

 Latest updates on Penang Travel Tips

Map of Roads in Penang

Looking for information on Penang? Use this Map of Roads in Penang to zoom in on information about Penang, brought to you road by road.

About this website

Dear visitor, thank you so much for reading this page. My name is Timothy Tye and my hobby is to find out about places, write about them and share the information with you on this website. I have been writing this site since 5 January 2003. Originally (from 2003 until 2009, the site was called AsiaExplorers. I changed the name to Penang Travel Tips in 2009, even though I describe more than just Penang but everywhere I go (I often need to tell people that "Penang Travel Tips" is not just information about Penang, but information written in Penang), especially places in Malaysia and Singapore, and in all the years since 2003, I have described over 20,000 places.

While I try my best to provide you information as accurate as I can get it to be, I do apologize for any errors and for outdated information which I am unaware. Nevertheless, I hope that what I have described here will be useful to you.