Shrimp with Coconut Curry Sauce

This recipe is deceptively easy and fast to make, but the results are a dish with a good complex mix of flavors. The ease of the dish was revealed when I came home from work with lower back pain, and my fiance stepped in to make dinner. He worried it would be difficult, but I joined him in the kitchen (in a chair) and dinner came together really quickly. The hardest thing was probably getting the cans of coconut milk open, since he still hasn't mastered the SafetyCan.

Shrimp with Coconut Curry Sauce
1/4 pound butter
1 large white onion, finely chopped
1 red bell pepper, cut in 1/2 inch chunks
1/2 cup flour
2 Tbspn curry powder
1 cup milk
1 lemon grass
2 cans unsweetened coconut milk
3 cups shelled, deveined, cooked shrimp
Salt & Pepper to taste
chopped green onions
Hot cooked rice

Melt butter in large skillet on medium heat. Add onion and red bell pepper and cook until onion is transluscent. Stir in flour slowly. Add curry powder. Slowly add plain milk, blending into a roux. Add lemon grass whole. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture becomes very thick (which is almost immediate). Add coconut milk, stirring until consistency of thick cream sauce. Remove lemon grass. Add shrimp and salt & pepper to taste. Continue cooking until shrimp are heated through. Serve over hot rice. Sprinkle with green onion.

(adapted from 'Best of the Best from Hawaii Cookbook')