I love the delicate flavour of thia and Malaysian food, the mix of the lemon grass and spices is so fragrant. This dish is based on a prawn laksa but i used chicken rather than prawns which seems to be more traditional. I also added baby corn for extra crunch. Laksa is a Malaysian soup made with vermicelli noodles and has a really fragrant curry paste and spice mix. I made the paste using my kitchenaid power plus blender which I got before Christmas and it’s amazing. Making the curry paste in it was so easy as it’s so powderful. It comes in three great colours I chose the silver one and it looks so stylish in my kitchen next to my mixer. so far I have used it for soup, curry paste and pasta sauce, next I want to try it for nut butter. I highly recommend it. It is one of the worlds most powderful blenders (i think it is actually the most powderful), I recommend taking a trip to the kitchenaid store in London and checking it out. (or one near you). I really love this blender and I have found my self making soup just so I can use it.

recipe adapted from amazing malasian by norman musa

• 150g vermicelli noodles
• 1/2 tsp ground turmeric
• 6 tbsp vegetable oil
• 2 chicken breasts (or tofu for vegetarian)
• 1 1/2 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 tin coconut milk
• 100g spinach
• 6 baby corn
• 100g bean sprouts
• 1 red pepper sliced
• 1lime, juice 

For the spice paste:

• 8 dried chillies, soaked in boiling water for 10 minutes
• 3 shallots
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 2.5cm fresh ginger
• 2stalks lemongrass (use bottom half only)
• 1/2 tsp shrimp paste, dry-toasted (or fish sauce) (leave for vegetarian)

For the ground spice mix:

• 1 tbsp coriander seeds
• 1 tsp cumin seeds
• 1star anise
• 1cinnamon stick
• 1/2 tsp black peppercorns
• 2 green cardamom pods 

1. Puree all the paste ingredients in a food processor until smooth.

2. Put the vermicelli noodles into a bowl and add 1 litre of boiling water. Blanch for 2 minutes, then drain. Transfer the noodles into a bowl of ice-cold water for 3 minutes, then drain again and set aside.

3. In a frying pan, dry-toast the spice mix ingredients on a medium heat for 30 seconds, then transfer to a spice grinder and grinder until fine.

4. In a bowl, mix together thoroughly the blended spice paste, ground spice mix and ground turmeric.

5. Heat a saucepan over a medium heat. Add the oil and sauté the spice paste mix for 2 minutes, until fragrant. Add the chicken  and cook for a few minutes, until it has turned white and is cooked through. Add the salt, sugar and coconut milk, and baby corn and red pepper along with 600ml of water, and bring to the boil.

6. Reduce the heat to low and add the spinach, beansprouts, drained noodles and lime juice. Cook for 2 minutes, then transfer to a bowl and serve.