Filipino Curry Chicken
Recipe from Chef Tita Joy
This is a creamy, hearty, stew-like (and classic) Filipino main dish, best served with fresh-cooked rice. My understanding is, what makes it Filipino is adding fermented fish sauce ("patis"), the foundation of Filipino cuisine, with coconut milk, to the curry powder and other ingredients. Chef Joy stresses that the recipe is flexible, but that the fish sauce is important.
Yields:
4 servings
Time Required:
- 15 mins. prep. time
- 30 mins. cooking time
- 45 mins. total time
Ingredients:
For cooking:
- 2 Tbsp.1 (30 mL) cooking oil (for sautéing)
- 1 onion, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 lb. 3 oz. (1 kg) chicken (thighs or drumsticks2, bone-in for juiciness)
- 1 Tbsp. (15 mL) fish sauce (can substitute salt)3
- 2 Tbsp. (8 g) curry powder (classic yellow works best)4
- 13.5 fl. oz. aka 1 ¾ cups (400 mL) coconut milk (full-fat canned version)
- 1 bay leaf (opt.)
- 2 lg. potatoes, peeled & cut into small chunks
- 2 carrots, chopped (adj. to preference)
- 1 chilli, diced (opt., if you want spicy)
- 1 bell pepper, chopped (opt., for colour)
- salt (as needed)
- a pinch ground5 black pepper (as needed)
For serving:
- green onions (scallions), chopped, as garnish (opt.)
- a squeeze of calamansi6 juice (opt.)
- jasmine rice7, steamed (opt.)
Preparation:
Heat oil in a pot. Add chopped onions and sauté until translucent. Add minced garlic, and sauté carefully to avoid burning. Add chilli pepper (if using)8. Add chicken pieces, and brown until golden on all (or most) sides. Cover for a bit, to "sweat" everything,
Pour in the fish sauce, and let it sizzle. The dish should now have an enticing aroma.
Sprinkle in the curry powder, and stir for 30 seconds. Pour in the coconut milk, and stir until combined. Lower the heat and let it gently bubble. This step should add a lot of flavour and colour, with the sauce turning a rich gold, and having a silky, not watery texture. Toss in a bay leaf (if using).
Add potato and carrot chunks to the pot, and push them into the sauce. Cover and simmer for about 10-15 mins., stirring occasionally, letting the potatoes soak up sauce. If sauce seems too thick, especially with starchy potatoes, splash in a little water. Don't forget, sauce will thicken as it sits.
Add bell peppers (if using) in last few mins. of cooking, as they cook quickly. Taste the sauce. If it needs more salt, add more fish sauce (or salt), and add black pepper if it seems helpful.
Serve over steamed jasmine rice.
Garnish with chopped green onions (for colour) and a squeeze of calamansi, if desired.
Author's Notes:
The curry tastes even better the next day. Store in an airtight container for up to three days in the fridge, or freeze for longer storage. Substituting different vegetables (beans, peas, even eggplant or squash) works fine: Just adjust cooking time to avoid mushiness.
This dish pairs nicely with egg-fried rice.
Cook's Notes:
Because of a family allergy to coconut, I substitute whole dairy milk, and can only say that also works fine. (The author strongly recommends full-fat, canned coconut milk.)
There seems to be consensus that what makes a dish truly pinoy (Filipino) is inclusion of "patis" (Filipino fish sauce), a salty liquid seasoning made from fermented fish (usually anchovies) with salt, of which the most highly recommended brands are Rufina and Kamayan. It's described as amber-coloured, and the foundation of the national cuisine. As it's what I had in stock, I instead used Red Boat Sauce, made in the USA from a Vietnamese recipe: anchovy and sea salt, fermented. Either provides a lot of umami without a lot of fish flavour.
1 Chicken breast also works, if you prefer lean.
2 Cups, tablespoons, teaspoons, and fl. oz. are as defined in US Customary Units, not to be confused with differing British imperial, "legal", "coffee", Commonwealth of Nations, Canadian, Latin American, Japanese, Russian, or Dutch definitions — further proof that everyone needs the metric system.
3 I'm no expert, but would guess it's worth some trouble to get (perhaps online) East Asian sauce from fermented fish with salt, rather than substituting salt for lack of the former.
4 Author says this isn't fussy, that any brand of mild yellow curry powder, e.g., from an East Asian grocery store, is fine.
5 Your cooking will be improved by acquiring a spice grinder, and thereafter buying/storing only whole spices, grinding only as/when needed. Ground spices go flavourless quickly, even in tightly sealed jars.
6 Calamansi (from the Tagalog "kalamansi") is a delightful citrus fruit, used widely in traditional Philippine cuisine, whose juice, without added sugar, is very sour. Filipino groceries near me offer frozen calamansi juice and also a refreshing, tasty calamansi concentrate pre-sweetened with honey.
7 I find LT Foods Ltd.'s Royal "Chef's Secret" Extra Long Basmati Rice, which I use for biryanis, to serve well here, too.
8 Original recipe didn't say either to dice the chilli or when to add it, so I made some guesses.
Taken from: https://mypinoyrecipes.com/creamy-filipino-chicken-curry-with-potatoes-and-carrots/, as Chef Tita Joy's recipe. Thank you! (That page's copyright notice is toothless as to the recipe itself, having force concerning only non-recipe elements such as photos.)
Collected and re-published at http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/recipes/filipino-curry-chicken.html by Rick Moen <rick@linuxmafia.com> on May 7, 2026. Individual recipes are free from copyright. Share and enjoy!
(If I have any copyright title in my own very minor contributions to this page — not my intention — they were created in 2026 by Rick Moen <rick@linuxmafia.com> and licensed for use under CC0. The image file (photograph) was taken on May 7, 2026, also by Rick Moen <rick@linuxmafia.com> and licensed for use under CC0. I have thereby waived all copyright, compilation copyright, and related or neighbouring rights to this work. This work is published from: United States of America.)