Thai Red Curry Noodle Soup
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Yes, you can have Thai takeout right at home! This soup is packed with so much flavor with bites of tender chicken, rice noodles, cilantro, basil and lime juice!
It’s been about 6 weeks since our Thailand trip.
And yes, I needed a teeny tiny break from Thai food. But let’s be real. That only lasted like 0.2345 seconds.
So I’m back on the Thai food binge for the foreseeable future, starting with this noodle soup.
Now you know I love a red curry. But I love it even more with rice noodles.
It’s so cozy, it’s so comforting, and it’s so fragrant with all the cilantro, basil and lime juice. Although I always add a little bit of extra lime juice to my bowl for that extra zesty kick!
Thai Red Curry Noodle Soup
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1 ½ pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1/2-inch chunks
- Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 red bell pepper, diced
- 1 onion, diced
- 3 tablespoons red curry paste
- 1 tablespoon freshly grated ginger
- 6 cups low sodium chicken broth
- 1 (13.5-ounce) can coconut milk
- 4 ounces rice noodles
- 1 tablespoon fish sauce
- 2 teaspoons brown sugar
- 3 green onions, thinly sliced
- ½ cup chopped fresh cilantro leaves
- ¼ cup chopped fresh basil leaves
- 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice
Equipment
Instructions
- Heat olive oil in a large stockpot or Dutch oven over medium heat. Season chicken with salt and pepper, to taste. Add chicken to the stockpot and cook until golden, about 2-3 minutes; set aside.
- Add garlic, bell pepper and onion. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tender, about 3-4 minutes.
- Stir in red curry paste and ginger until fragrant, about 1 minute.
- Stir in chicken broth and coconut milk, scraping any browned bits from the bottom of the pot.
- Stir in chicken. Bring to a boil; reduce heat and cook, stirring occasionally, until reduced, about 10 minutes.
- Stir in rice noodles, fish sauce and brown sugar until noodles are tender, about 5 minutes.
- Remove from heat; stir in green onions, cilantro, basil and lime juice; season with salt and pepper, to taste.
- Serve immediately.
Did you make this recipe?
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Just had this for dinner tonight. Made recipe exactly as listed. Added the noodles at the very end and served immediately just like the recipe says. It was excellent and enjoyed by all. Reminded us of our family trips to Thailand. Thank you so much for the great recipe. We will be making it again in the not too distant future! Highly recommend.
It was a hit in my home! Excellent recipe! My home smelled sooooo yummy! My family (Mexican) said this dish (my cooked dish) resembled one of our local Thai Restaurants 🙂 Yay!!!!
Recommendation: Now, the only thing I would recommend is to wet noodles and remove! Or add at the very end because it literally Absorbs all the broth. That way your soup looks very soupy and not just noodles.
i’m pretty confused by this recipe. it’s extremely similar to this one: https://damndelicious.net/2013/06/16/thai-red-curry-soup-recipesfromtheheart-and-a/
but the proportions are very different. this recipe has three table spoons curry paste, a can of coconut milk, and six cups of broth. the other recipe has three table spoons curry paste, a can of coconut milk, and TWO cups of broth/stock.
how can the same amount of curry paste flavor two cups of liquid OR six cups of liquid? is one of these recipes meant to be extremely mild?
Hi Emily! These are simply two different recipes. The difference in the amount of liquids also takes into consideration that one recipe has noodles and the other does not. All of our recipes are tested by us and you can trust the measurements for whichever recipe you decide to go with. 🙂
There is a third curry recipe that has the same amount of curry paste, the same amount of coconut milk, and NO broth or water!
https://damndelicious.net/2018/02/25/easy-thai-red-curry/
you guys seem fixed on the idea of three tablespoons of curry paste.
I made some of these and I prefer the ratio of three curry paste: one coconut milk: two broth
It might be because some packets of Thai red curry paste are three tablespoons inside… i doubt its because they are fixed on the number 3.
Its so easy to make and i added lemon grass to it. I used 3 cups of broth. It just up to everyone preferences. We love it and thanks for sharing.
Who cares about the differences! It’s all about personal preference. If you want to add more/less of any of the ingredients then do it.
I made it yesterday and it was yummy. It took me a long time as the chicken breats had bone in. I had to pick, wash an rip basil. I find taking the leaves off cilantro very time consumingm but it was worth the time spent. There was a lot of chopping but nice to have the fresh vegs. I will add a bit more curry paste to the leftover for a bit more zing.
I made it for lunch and it was sooooo good! The taste was amazing! Thanks for sharing the recipe. Will definitely make this again.
Made this for dinner tonight and it was pretty freaking delicious! Thanks a lot for the recipe!
This is easy to make with pantry items most of us keep it you’ve ever made Thai food. I freeze my Kafir lime leaves so have those too (I added to the recipe).
This recipe is excellent, even better than my favourite take out. Really, give this a try.
I added 1/3 cup of organic peanut butter. Instead of the noodles I cooked some Jasmine rice in a separate pot, and kept the rice apart from the soup. I spooned some rice into each bowl and then ladled the soup over the rice. This means the soup doesn’t needlessly thicken (either with noodles or rice). Any leftovers soup and rice both store well separately.
Anyone who has tasted this thinks it’s fantastic
kaffir is a racial slur. can we call them Makrut leaves?
I just learned this a few weeks ago. Thanks for the reminder.
Thank you, JOANNE. I didn’t know about ‘Kaffir’ being a racial slur. I will use ‘Makrut now.
Delicious and so easy to make!! I used fish instead of chicken and water instead of chicken broth. Added some mushrooms and no sugar! Turned out perfect!!
Exactly what I was looking for! I don’t have chicken broth and don’t want to add sugar!!
This is the greatest Thai curry soup recipe! This is definitely going into our recipe book, it was a hit! I didn’t have curry paste so I subbed 3 tsp red curry powder and added more ginger and the taste was fantastic. I followed another poster’s response and kept the rice noodles separate and they didn’t get mushy with leftovers. Next time I’m going to add mushrooms. Thank you for the amazing recipe!
Amazing!!! Better than the restaurant!
Finally, a good Thai soup recipe that turned out exactly as I was hoping it would! So delicious. I usually use full fat coconut milk in recipes like this, but for this one I used lite, and it was still amazing. The kids finished off every last bit of it. Can’t wait to make it again!
First off, I freakin’ LOVE Thai food! I was excited when I found this recipe because I actually had MOST of the ingredients.
Ok, I had to make my own coconut milk. Easy peasy.
And make my own and curry paste. No problem.
And I thought I had fresh cilantro, but it turned into parsley when I wasn’t looking. So…
I’ll say it quickly. IUSEDDRIEDCILANTRO!! I also cut back on the broth and used the thick pad thai rice noodles so it turned out more like a noodle dish rather than a soup. Still… It. Is. DELICIOUS!!!! And now my house smells like my favorite Thai restaurant! I’ll definitely make this again, when I have fresh cilantro. That’ll take it off the charts!
So yummy! I added more like 4tbls of curry paste including one to the chicken as it was sealing. Also slightly less stock. It had plenty of flavour and I’d be more than happy receiving it from a restaurant! Will % make again! Side note, might be too spicy for some with added paste and less stock but was perfect for us!
I used vegetable broth instead of chicken broth. This was reallyyyy good. I used 8oz of noodles bc I took it as half of the 16oz box. Next time I’ll use only 4oz as the recipe states bc it was more noodley than soupy, but I don’t think you can really go wrong with this recipe. It was still great!
This is the best soup I’ve ever made. I will be making this again !! I added spinach at the same time as the noodles and didn’t have fish sauce but it tasted AMAZING. Wow. New favorite!
it looks amazing and craving it now. gonna make it soon. just wanted to ask if you could post pictures of the items you used. especially the rice noodle and the red curry paste please. thank you. 🙂
Omgeee this was amazing. My 16 year old son has been my taste tester for years because he never says no to spice, authentic foods – pretty much anything. We LOVED this dish. Also the PF Chang’s lettuce wraps amazing!
It was easy and cheap to make, and it looked both amazing and colourful as well as being delicious AF.
The picture looked so good and I followed the recipe to the exact but I found the soup to lack flavor and I was really disappointed
Agreed. Added more salt and lemon juice and it improved it a bit. Soup was too “soupy” and maybe will try adding a bit of starch next time.
Oh my gosh, this recipe was AMAZING. My family of four all raved about it and finished off the entire 6-serving meal in one sitting. Perfectly spicy and warm without being too spicy. I used the Maesri brand of curry paste. I’m definitely adding this to my “favorite recipe” collection. Thank you for sharing it!
can you use the blue elephant red curry sauce to replace the ingredients? just wondering? i have a pouch here.
I hate making this recipe. Why? Because there are 7 in our household and every time i make it its NONE left. They’ll eat 3 bowls in one sitting so i feel like I have to be right back in the kitchen to cook something else and thus not sticking to my budget. Even the picky kid eaters. Other than that tidbit of info, this is a great recipe. Delicious. Impressive. Easy to make. Not to expensive. Comfort food- especially if its chilly. Elegant enough for a dinner party. Be the envy of all the other women who claim they can cook. This recipe does not need any modifications. I did make the mistake once and didn’t have a red bell pepper and used a green one…. that changed the taste… red adds a sweetness to it compared. We like ours more soupy than a bunch of noodles…….. I modify all of my recipes to my liking and I use 8 cups of the broth, add red pepper flakes and shrimp.
Can I omit the fish sauce or is there a good substitute I could use? I’m at looking to make this vegan. Do you think I could use miso broth instead or veggie broth?