Gordon Ramsay Thai Green Curry Recipe (Thai Green Curry Fried Rice)
If your idea of Thai green curry starts with a jar of paste and a can of coconut milk, this Gordon Ramsay Thai Green Curry Recipe will flip it on its head — this version is a fried rice. It is ready in 25 minutes, costs roughly $1.75 per serving, and every grain of jasmine rice carries the heat of a fresh, homemade green curry paste.
The dish comes from Ramsay’s Ultimate Home Cooking cookbook and the television episode where he cooked it alongside his son Jack, showing how a proper Thai curry paste is built from scratch rather than spooned out of a jar. Jack does most of the pounding in that episode, and it makes the recipe feel like exactly what it is: home cooking that happens to be very, very good.
The differentiator here is the single technique the whole dish stands on: the fresh paste is fried alone in hot oil for a full 2 minutes before the rice ever touches the pan. Raw green curry paste tastes sharp and grassy; two minutes in shimmering oil mellows it, wakes up the aromatics, and turns the paste glossy and deeply fragrant. Skip that step and you are eating herby rice. Fry the paste first and you are eating something that tastes unmistakably like a green curry — with the texture of the best fried rice.
Cooked this recipe? We would love to see it — send a photo of your finished rice to the Yummy Recipe Ideas community and tell us how spicy you went.
Gordon Ramsay Thai Green Curry Fried Rice Recipe
Recipe by Yummy Recipe Ideas · Course: Side Dish · Cuisine: Thai · Servings: 4 · Prep Time: 15 minutes · Cook Time: 10 minutes · Total Time: 25 minutes · Calories: ~300 per serving · Difficulty: Easy
A vibrant Thai green curry fried rice: fluffy day-old jasmine rice tossed with a homemade green curry paste fried in hot oil, finished with lime and fresh cilantro — ready in 25 minutes for about $1.75 a serving.
Ingredients
For the curry paste:
- 2 large green chillies, roughly chopped
- 1 garlic clove, peeled
- 1 lemongrass stalk, tough outer layers removed, thinly sliced
- 2 kaffir lime leaves, stems removed
- 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
- 1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro (stems and leaves)
- 1 small shallot, roughly chopped
- Juice of 1 lime
- 1 to 2 tablespoons peanut oil or another neutral oil
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
- 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
For the rice:
- 3 cups cooked jasmine rice, chilled and day-old (from about 1 cup dry)
- 1 tablespoon peanut oil or neutral oil
- Lime wedges, for serving
Directions
- Blend the paste: Add the green chillies, garlic, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, ginger, cilantro, shallot, lime juice, oil, salt, and pepper to a small blender or food processor and blend to a fairly smooth paste, scraping down the sides once or twice. If the blades stall, add the oil a teaspoon at a time until it catches.
- Break up the rice: With damp hands, gently crumble the cold day-old rice so the grains separate. Cold, dry rice fries into distinct fluffy grains; warm fresh rice will clump and steam instead.
- Fry the paste first: Heat the tablespoon of oil in a large wok or heavy skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add the paste and fry, stirring constantly, for a full 2 minutes until deeply fragrant and a shade darker. Do not rush this — it is the step that makes the dish taste like green curry.
- Add the rice: Add the rice to the wok and toss well so every grain is coated in the paste. Let it sit undisturbed for 30 seconds at a time so it picks up a little crisping, then toss again, for 4 to 5 minutes total, until the rice is hot through and flecked with golden bits.
- Finish and serve: Taste and adjust with more salt and a squeeze of lime. Serve hot with lime wedges and extra fresh cilantro on top.
Gordon Ramsay Thai Green Curry Fried Rice
Ingredients
Method
- Blend the paste: Add the green chillies, garlic, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, ginger, cilantro, shallot, lime juice, 1 tablespoon of the oil, salt and pepper to a food processor or blender and blitz to a coarse, fragrant paste, scraping down the sides as needed. Add the remaining oil a little at a time if the mixture needs help moving.
- Break up the rice: With damp hands, gently crumble the cold day-old rice so the grains separate. Cold rice fries up fluffy instead of clumping, which is exactly what you want here.
- Fry the paste first: Heat the tablespoon of oil in a large wok or heavy skillet over medium-high heat. Add the green curry paste and fry, stirring constantly, for 2 to 3 minutes until deeply fragrant and slightly darkened. This step cooks out the raw edge and blooms the aromatics.
- Add the rice: Add the rice to the wok and toss well so every grain is coated in the paste. Let it sit undisturbed for 1 to 2 minutes at a time so the bottom crisps, then toss again. Cook 5 to 7 minutes total until heated through with toasty, crisped spots.
- Finish and serve: Taste and adjust with more salt and a squeeze of lime. Serve hot with lime wedges on the side.
Notes
FAQs
Why does Ramsay fry the curry paste for 2 minutes before adding the rice?
Because raw green curry paste and fried green curry paste are two different ingredients. The paste is a bundle of sharp, fibrous aromatics — raw green chillies, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, ginger, shallot, garlic, and cilantro — and straight out of the blender they taste grassy and harsh. Two minutes in shimmering oil does three things at once: the heat tames the raw bite of the chillies and shallot, the fat-soluble flavor compounds in the lemongrass and lime leaves bloom and dissolve into the oil so they coat every grain of rice, and the paste caramelizes just enough to turn glossy and deeply savory. It is the same principle behind blooming spices in Indian cooking or frying tomato paste before a sauce: heat plus fat plus a little time unlocks flavor that water or steaming never will. That is also why the rice must wait its turn — if the rice goes in first, the paste steams instead of fries, and you lose the whole effect. Keep the heat at a steady medium-high and stir constantly; two minutes is enough for fragrance without scorching the sugars in the shallot.
Why does the rice have to be day-old and cold?
This is the oldest rule in fried rice and it applies double here. Freshly cooked jasmine rice is full of surface moisture, so when it hits the wok it steams, sticks, and collapses into a soft porridge that soaks up the paste unevenly. Rice that has rested overnight in the fridge dries out on the surface, and the starches firm up, so the grains fry into separate, slightly chewy pieces that stay distinct and pick up crisp golden edges where they touch the hot wok. Cold grains also stop the paste from cooling the pan and turning everything gummy. If you forgot to plan ahead, spread freshly cooked rice in a thin layer on a baking sheet and refrigerate it uncovered for at least 1 to 2 hours — it works surprisingly well. For the plain version without the curry paste, see our Gordon Ramsay rice recipe, which covers his exact seasoning and cooking method.
Can I use store-bought green curry paste instead of homemade?
You can, and it will still be a very good fried rice — but the honest answer is that the dish loses its headline act. The entire point of this recipe is a paste built from fresh chillies, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, ginger, cilantro, shallot, and lime juice, with a bright herbal heat no jar can match; commercial pastes lean heavier on preserved shrimp paste, oil, and dried spices, so the flavor is deeper but flatter and less green. If you do use a jar, cut it to about 2 tablespoons for 3 cups of rice, still fry it for the full 2 minutes in hot oil before adding the rice, and add a handful of chopped fresh cilantro plus a squeeze of lime at the end to wake it back up. Taste for salt before adding any — most jarred pastes are already salted, so season at the end rather than up front. And if the paste route has converted you to cooking Thai from scratch, keep the theme going with a creamy baked dish like our Gordon Ramsay cauliflower cheese recipe for your next comfort-food night.
How is this different from a regular saucy Thai green curry?
The flavor family is the same, but the delivery is completely different. A classic Thai green curry (gaeng keow wan) simmers the paste in coconut milk into a rich sauce that you spoon over steamed rice — the coconut fat softens the chilli heat into something creamy and mellow. This recipe has no coconut milk and no sauce at all: the paste is fried directly into day-old jasmine rice in a hot wok, so the heat stays sharper and more direct, the herbs stay bright instead of melting into a sauce, and you get the caramelized, slightly crisp texture that only a wok gives. Think of it as the street-food cousin of the restaurant curry — same DNA, opposite temperament. Nutritionally they differ too: at roughly 300 calories per serving with very little added fat, this fried-rice version is a lighter side dish, whereas a coconut-milk green curry with chicken can easily run double that. If you want the saucy original experience, cook the paste in coconut milk instead and pour it over plain rice; if you want maximum flavor with weeknight speed, this is your dish.
How much does this cost to make, and do the leftovers keep?
The cost is one of the best parts of this recipe. With jasmine rice from the pantry, two green chillies, one shallot, half a bunch of cilantro, a lime, and a tablespoon of ginger, the whole batch for four servings comes in around $7 at typical US grocery prices — roughly $1.75 per serving, cheaper than nearly any takeout side you can name. Kaffir lime leaves are the only specialty item; they are inexpensive at Asian markets and freeze beautifully for months, so buy a bag once and you are set for a dozen batches. Leftovers keep well refrigerated in an airtight container for up to 3 days, and they reheat nicely in a hot skillet with a tiny splash of oil — the microwave works too, but the wok revives the crisp texture. We do not recommend freezing the finished fried rice, since the rice grains turn mushy on thawing; the paste, however, freezes perfectly in an ice-cube tray for up to 3 months, giving you instant green curry fried rice whenever leftover rice needs a second life.
About the Author
Yummy Recipe Ideas is a recipe kitchen obsessed with recreating Gordon Ramsay’s best dishes for home cooks — every recipe is tested with US measurements, real grocery-store ingredients, and step-by-step photos so your version comes out right the first time.
