Pork adn Eggplant Curry by bookseller

Curry recipe by way of Fine Cooking magazine, but fairly heavily tweaked:

1 T coconut oil
1 cup sliced onion
3/4 pound pork loin, thinly sliced
3/4 pound eggplant in small, bite-sized pieces
1/2 cup chicken broth
1/2 t fish sauce
1 T brown sugar
1/2 of a 14 oz. can of coconut milk (not "light)
1 heaping T Thai red curry paste
grated zest of 1 lime
fresh lime juice to taste
1 t cornstarch
Garnish: 2 T chopped roasted peanuts or dried coconut or fried shallots/onions; fresh cilantro if you got

1. Shake the coconut milk so the thick and thin parts mix together.

2. Brown the pork, then the onions, and finally the eggplant in the coconut oil over medium heat; remove to a bowl.

3. Deglaze the pan (over slightly higher heat) with 1/4 cup of the coconut milk; simmer 2 minutes or so to thicken.

4. Stir in the broth, curry paste, fish sauce, sugar, lime zest, and remainder of the coconut milk (remember, you're only using half the can in total); simmer 5 minutes. Taste for seasoning (this is the point when I said WHHHHOOOO HOT HOT HOT! and threw in more coconut milk). It will look extremely unimpressive, like dirty dishwater, but it will taste great.

5. In a small bowl, dissolve the cornstarch in 1-2 T of the sauce; stir this slurry into the sauce and bring to a boil, stirring, until the sauce thickens. Taste again; add lime juice as desired (I added the juice of about 1/2 a lime).

6. Add back in the pork, eggplant, and onion, and simmer to heat through. Garnish with peanuts, toasted coconut, chopped cilantro (and bean sprouts, shredded carrots, thinly sliced chilies...all those would be good, too) as desired.

For me, this serves two over a large-ish bowl of mesclun greens (undressed).

Note the pork is much easier to slice when it's partially frozen (and in fact, I wound up making this because the only pork I had was FROZEN frozen, and I knew I'd need to slice it really thin if it was going to thaw in time for anything like dinner).

If diabetes is an issue here, FWIW, instead of sugar I used Locanto/Whey Low in a 2:1 ratio. Worked beautifully. The cornstarch comes out to 1/2 teaspoon per serving, which is 1 gram of carbohydrate. And by serving it over salad rather than rice, of course, it becomes very diabetes-friendly.

The original recipe added 2 cups sliced cabbage to the eggplant; I think that would be a good addition. And this would work with any number of veggies instead of the eggplant -- I plan to mix in some snowpeas for the second round, and maybe some sliced red pepper.

You could certainly make this more complex by adding some thinly sliced lemongrass and/or grated ginger to the simmering sauce, and/or by garnishing with some slivered Thai basil or pea shoots. Very good as is, though. And takes less time to make than it has to type up.

Finally, if you don't have coconut oil (delicious and very good for you) or peanut oil, use unflavored vegetable oil, like canola; don't use olive oil.