For my recent family birthday lunch I cooked for ten, I was thinking of a kind of Thai twist on a Sunday roast.

We had these Thai-inspired baked chicken pieces, roast beef in a marinade of coriander stalks, green peppercorns, and more good things.

Plus roasted crushed new potatoes with ginger, garlic, chilli and spring onions, as well as a big vegetable stir fry with oyster sauce.

And I wanted, of course, a ‘gravy’, to go with it all so made a Thai green curry sauce - and it was so good, especially over the chicken and potatoes. YUM.

Back home in London I decided I should test it again before sharing the recipe but realised I had left the green curry paste in Norfolk.

AHA! Yep, it’s super-simple because I use a ready-made curry paste.

And I have to say that I always have as when I lived in Thailand, no one made their own pastes, we all just got them freshly made from the market. So just get a good brand and don’t feel any pressure to make your own. Hey, most Thai people (to my knowledge) don’t!

Mae Ploy is my favourite brand and I get it from my local Thai supermarket as it’s on at a better price than Sainsbury’s, who also stock it.

OK, let’s get making this sauce then.

Ah, what I meant to say before I went off on a bit of a tangent was that as I didn’t have any green curry paste, I had to make a red curry sauce.

Now traditionally, green curry is made with seafood or chicken. Red curry with pork, or duck, or maybe even beef.

So when I made my red curry sauce, it was to pour over sliced steak, rice and broccoli - and it was so good.

Honestly this sauce is so quick and easy, and just gives a little twist to your roast, or is beautiful to have with rice and vegetables, or just a big plate of veggies, or really with any meat, fish or vegetables that need a little zhuzh-ing up (is that how you spell it?!).

For my birthday lunch I made double the quantity I’m sharing here, but I think this is enough for about four, so that seems a good amount to start with and of course it’s easy to scale up if you’re cooking for more too.

You’ll need:

1 tin coconut milk (full fat, don’t get that reduced fat stuff)

1 heaped tablespoon good Thai curry paste

1 tablespoon light soy sauce

a good dash of fish sauce

2 teaspoons demerera sugar

the juice of one juicy lime

Thai sweet basil (horopha) if you can get it

Pour the coconut milk into a saucepan, add the curry paste, and bring the coconut milk to a simmer, stirring often to combine in the paste.

When it’s simmering, add the soy and fish sauces, the sugar and the lime juice and simmer for six minute or so.

Taste and see if you need to add anything more - perhaps another dash of fish sauce, a squeeze of lime, or a little more sugar.

If you have Thai sweet basil, add a small handful of leaves now, remove from heat and stir to combine in.