Easy Thai Shrimp Soup
This post may contain affiliate links. Please see our privacy policy for details.
Skip the take-out and try making this at home – it’s unbelievably easy and 10000x tastier and healthier!
Featured Comment
reasons to make easy thai shrimp soup
- Takeout favorite
- Budget-friendly
- Uses easy-to-find ingredients
- Cold weather comfort food
- Leftovers taste even better
- Super flexible recipe (and can be made vegetarian friendly)
what is red curry paste and where can i find it
Commonly used in Thai dishes, red curry paste is made from a blend of red chili pepper, garlic, lemongrass, Thai ginger and various spices.
Red curry paste is typically used for stir-fry, soups or mixed with coconut milk for curry. It is readily available in most grocery store chains, particularly the Thai Kitchen brand, and online, with some brands containing shellfish (shrimp paste).
tips and tricks for success
- Know your shrimp size. Shrimp size is calculated on number of shrimp per pound. The smaller the number, the larger your shrimp. There are about 40-50 medium shrimp per pound.
- Buy frozen shrimp. For superior quality and freshness, using frozen shrimp is ideal (but avoid the bags with freezer burn), opting for a quick thaw under cold running water.
- Use your favorite protein. This recipe will work well with chicken thighs, chicken breasts, shrimp or tofu.
- Use full fat coconut milk. Although lite coconut milk can certainly be used, full fat coconut milk will yield a much more rich and creamy broth.
- Mix it up. Swap the red curry paste for green, add in more veggies (cabbage, zucchini, mushrooms or bok choy) or use rice noodles in place of rice.
- Stir in more stock with leftovers. When reheating leftovers, stir in more stock as needed as the rice will continue to soak up the broth.
what to serve with thai shrimp soup
Easy Thai Shrimp Soup: Frequently Asked Questions
You can thaw frozen shrimp overnight, transferring it from the freezer to the fridge the day before. For a quick thaw, you can run them under cold water until completely thawed, about 5-10 minutes. Pat them dry as thoroughly as possible to remove any excess moisture.
Yes! Chicken is a great swap for the shrimp, and you can sub chicken stock for the vegetable stock as well.
We personally love Mae Ploy (contains shrimp paste). Thai Kitchen is also great with mild heat, and more readily available at most grocery stores.
Leftovers can be stored in an airtight container in the fridge for 1-2 days.
We do not recommend freezing this as coconut milk tends to separate when frozen.
Easy Thai Shrimp Soup
Ingredients
- 1 cup basmati rice
- 1 pound medium shrimp, peeled and deveined
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 onion, diced
- 1 red bell pepper, diced
- 2 tablespoons red curry paste
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tablespoon freshly grated ginger
- 1 (13.5-ounce) can coconut milk
- 3 cups vegetable stock
- 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice
- 2 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro leaves
Equipment
Instructions
- In a large saucepan of 1 1 /2 cups water, cook rice according to package instructions; set aside.
- Season shrimp with salt and pepper, to taste.
- Melt butter in a large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium high heat. Add shrimp, and cook, stirring occasionally, until pink, about 2-3 minutes; set aside.
- Add onion and bell pepper to the Dutch oven. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 3-4 minutes.
- Stir in red curry paste, garlic and ginger until fragrant, about 2 minutes.
- Stir in coconut milk and vegetable stock; season with salt and pepper, to taste. Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer until slightly thickened, about 8-10 minutes.
- Stir in rice, shrimp, lime juice and cilantro.
- Serve immediately.
Video
Did you make this recipe?
Tag @damn_delicious on Instagram and hashtag it #damndelicious!
What I changed:
1. used chicken stock instead of veggie stock. Made it myself, did not use canned.
2. Added carrots to the onion/pepper mix.
3. Added frozen sea cocktail mix + cooked frozen cold water shrimp.
4. Added 2 cubes of Knorr Culdo De Marisco (it is usually used in Mexican fish/seafood soups)
How I cooked it:
1. Placed frozen chicken thighs in a cold water, boiled, made a stock. Removed chicken, got rid of the bones.
2. While I was making stock, placed butter in a pan, fried onion, bell pepper and carrots (all at the same time)
3. Added red curry paste, stirred
4. Added 1 can of coconut milk, chicken stock, chicken meat from the stock, seafood (all at the same time)
5. Turned heat to low, let it simmer for 10 min.
Added cooked rice, cilantro and lime juice in each bowl.
It is awesome!
Thanks so much for sharing your feedback with us!
I would give it 4 stars, but I needed to add about 2-3 T of brown sugar and 2-3 T of Sriracha sauce to balance the flavors. I also added a couple of teaspoons of fish sauce. I used an immersion blender before adding the shrimp. Very good after a few tweaks.
Thank you Pam!
This looks good. Could I get the recipe?
Of course! The recipe can be found at the bottom of the blog post but you can also click on this link here.
It was pretty good. This was my first time making this recipe and overall I liked how easy it was to make and the base is really good. I felt the flavour fell short, next time I’d add more red curry paste and less veg stock and more coconut milk to get a more creamy soup base.
I added mushrooms and canned baby corn, it was nice to have additional veggies in the soup.
Next time I will also substitute rice noodles instead of rice just to see which is best.
I made this tonight and OMG it is sooooo good. Thank you for sharing this amazing dish.
Incredibly delicious and easy to make. Flavor was better than some we’ve eaten @ restaurants. I think it would be a marvelous soup with cubed chicken. I followed the recipe exactly as given but in the future I would not precook shrimp in order to keep it from getting rubbery. Adding it (or chicken) at same time you add rice and stock should be enough cooking time. Again, MARVELOUS!
So good!!! Loved it! I added some jalapeño and it was amazing! Thank you for such a good recipe.
That Thai shrimp soup was damn delicious, added zucchini and mushrooms and used green curry paste for a little extra spice, thumbs up on that easy and quick soup
Bland. So very bland. Waste of shrimp.
Sorry it didn’t turn out!
This is my favorite soup! Just love the flavor, and it’s super simple to make.
We cooked this tonight and it was delicious! Very filling! I might add a tad more curry next time as I like a little more spice, but the flavors as written were delicious and my house smells amazing.
Loved this! We cut the curry in half and next time may cut it to 1/4 of the suggested amount. We don’t do grains so I steamed some sweet potatoes to have on the side. This was so flavorful and deeeelish!!!
Love this recipe and so do my friends.
I made this Tonite and it was fantastic!!! I tweaked it a little because I wanted to use my instapot because it’s easy. Also I used chicken since that’s what I had. Worked great in the instapot!! I added half the milk the garlic, chicken and broth , and curry to the instapot and pressure cooked it. I used my stovetop to quickly saute the onions and bell pepper with toasted sesame oil. When the insta pot was done I did a quick release, shredded the chicken and added the remaining ingredients (peppers, onions, remaining coconut milk, cilantro, ginger, lime juice and salt). My family loved it!! Thank you so much!
We love that!
I Love this soup! Unfortunately, I live smack in the middle of the Midwest where the only seafood you can get is frozen. I swap out chicken for the shrimp and chicken stock for the vegetable stock. So good (and simple)!
My husband and I loved this soup! He said it was one of the best dishes I had ever made! I used half the curry, my husband has been very ill so I didn’t want to make it too spicy.
Damn Delicious! Have made this twice now, a big hit!
I really enjoy your recipes! If I wanted to double this recipe what adjustments would you recommend or would you just double everything? Thank you.
Yes, it would be best to double everything. 🙂
This really does look Damn Delicious!! I like how the shrimp can be swapped out for tofu, chicken, or pork. Great work on the video’s and food photo’s. Once I started taking experimental photos of recipes I thought turned out well to share on social media I very QUICKLY realized how much work goes into making the food look… well, delicious!! Will have to get your cookbook soon.
My boyfriend and I made this soup and it is so delicious.
Awesome!
I made this soup tonight and it was delicious! It was easy to make and will be my go to soup now!