Stir-Fry

Gai Pad Prik

10:56 AM MC 0 Comments

Gai Pad Prik (literally, Stir-fried chicken chilli pepper) Pad Prik is a popular one dish food. This dish can be found everywhere from a street food vendor in Thailand. We consider that one dish food is fast food in Thailand. Most Thai fast food are made from scratch, some are ready made is called Khao Gaeng and the other one is called Arhan Tam Sang, Arhan Tam Sang is the food made from your order.

We normally measure the cost of living in Thailand from the prices of one dish food. Working and white collar class people rely on one dish food. In general, people don’t bring lunch (from home) to work – most of them eat lunch from Khao Gaeng or Arhan Tam Sang shops. Living in a big city like Bangkok, traveling from home to work can take hours because the streets pack with vehicles so people don’t have much time to cook and also food from Khao Gaeng and Arhan Tam Sang shops are cheaper and fresher than you make yourself at home, especially a single person.

(Bangkok is a very big city, over 8 million people living in Bangkok that is an official number but many people register as a resident in other provinces or up countries and we also have people from provinces which are surrounded Bangkok but it is like part of Bangkok because Bangkok grows horizontal – there is no space between so we have millions of commuters each day. We have some subways that run within the city and some more are under construction. Each time I go back to (visit) Thailand and it’s different but Bangkok is always an interesting and exciting city and food is good.)

This dish is pretty much contain all nutrition you need in one dish even it is (Thai) fast food (it takes less than 10 minutes on cooking) it is healthy food.


* You can use any kind of meat in this dish like chicken, beef, pork and seafood. And if you use beef for this dish then you should reduce cooking time by tossing with a flipper a few time then add vegetable or the beef will be tough from overcooking.



3- 4 servings

Ingredients

2                  Small – medium skinless, boneless chicken breasts, slice into ¼ inch thick
2 cloves       Garlic mince
1½ tsp         Soy Sauce
Pinch of salt
Combine chicken, garlic, soy sauce and salt and marinate for 30 minutes.

1                  Small Onion (about 1 cup), cut into ½ inch wedges
1                  Small – medium Red or green Pepper, cut into ½ inch x 1½ inch
2                  Green onion, cut into ½ inch long
2                  Jalapeno Pepper, cut half in lengthwise and from the half cut on an angle into ¼ inch slices.
3 tbsp           Vegetable oil
3 tbsp           Water
1 tbsp           Soy or fish sauce
1 tsp             Oyster Sauce

Instruction

    Veggy cuts
    1. Heat the wok on high heat (for a steel wok) until hot put 2 tbsp oil and add marinated chicken. Tossing and separating chicken with a spatula for a minute and reduce the heat to medium high and stir-frying until chicken is almost cooked.
    2. Add onion, red or green pepper, jalapeno pepper and mix all well and add 1 tbsp oil and 1 tbsp soy or fish sauce and oyster sauce. Stir-frying for 2 -3 minutes or until parts of vegetable soft, add water during stir-frying.
    3. Turn off the heat. Add green onion and mix well. Serve with steamed rice.

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Soups

Tom Kha Gai or Tom Kha Kai

8:31 AM MC 0 Comments


Tom Kha Gai or Tom Kha Kai (literally, chicken galangal soup) is hot, spicy and sour soup. It is one of the most well known and popular soups beside Tom Yum. We can say that Tom Kha Soup and Tom Yum Soup are twins which are hot, spicy and sour. Tom Yum Soup dish itself also has two different versions – one is just a clear soup and the other one is with evaporated milk. The looks of Tom Yum which with evaporated milk is pretty close to Tom Kha which is with coconut milk, they both are creamy-white colour soup but they are not as thick as western style creamy soup.

Even it is only one ingredient different between these two kinds of soup but each one has its own character.  The coconut milk in Tom Kha soup brings the tastes of hot, spicy and sour to a smooth and gentle flavour, because coconut milk has sweetness as its fruit and is creamy from its oil. We don’t add any extra oil or butter into the soup. This soup is really a real tropical flavour food as you can sense the sweetness of coconut milk and the scent of Thai herbs.



*** Medium hot
For 4 – 5 servings

Ingredients

2                  Medium to large size of skinless and boneless chicken breasts, cut into ½ inch thick and 1½ inches long
10 – 12         Mushrooms, cut into half or quarters (depending on the sizes of mushrooms)
60-80g          Galangal, slice into ¼ inch slices
3                   Lemongrass, tear off 1-2 outer sheaths cut on an angle into ½ inch slices
15                 Kaffir Lime leaves
10                 Grape Tomatoes (optional)
2                   Plants of Coriander with roots, cut the roots off the stems – leave 2 inches long stems to the roots and chopped the leaves for garnishing.
3                   Thai fresh chilli peppers, chopped very fine
2                   Shallots, slices
 1 clove          Garlic, mince
1-2 tsp           Nam Prink Pao or chilli paste with soya bean oil (optional)
? tsp              Chicken flavoured broth mix (you can adjust this ingredient, you may start with ¼ - ½ tsp)
¼ tsp             Salt
3½ - 4 cups    Water
1½ cups or 375 ml. Coconut Milk
4 – 5 tbsps     Lime juice
½ tbsp           Fish sauce
1 tsp              Soy sauce

Instruction

Cut chicken on angle
Herbs
  1. Marinate chicken with garlic mince, salt and soy sauce. Leave aside.
  2. Boil water in a pot on medium high heat until bubbling. Add galangal slices, lemongrass slices, kaffir lime leaves and coriander roots; boil until you can smell the scent of the herbs.
  3. And chicken and chicken broth mix, and boil until bubbling then add fish sauce, coconut milk until reach to the bubbling point then add mushroom, chilli pepper, grape tomatoes and shallot slice and boil another minute.
  4. Remove from heat and add lime juice. Discard galangal, lemongrass, kaffir lime leave and coriander roots and garnish coriander leaves before serve. 

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Salads

Yam Tuna or Thai style Tuna Salad

9:35 AM MC 0 Comments

Last two to three weeks I was in Costa Rica with my family for a vacation, during we were there I missed my Thai food. I am just like the most of Thai people who are used to eating hot and spicy food. Spiciness in chilli peppers helps your appetite, in Thailand we will say “Sab” or Yummy when we see spicy and sour food because it makes your mount water, in some cultures people believe that eating a spicy food can stimulate a person’s sexual appetite.

This Yam Tuna dish is very simple and easy to make – no cooking required. You can find the ingredients pretty much every part of the world. The main ingredient is Tuna from a can, I prefer the Tuna in oil one so that the tuna will not be too dry and I remove some extra oil which is floating on the top in a can, and the rest of ingredients are lime juice, chilli pepper, onion or shallots and one of these herbs - mint, dill, coriander and culantro. I used culantro when I made this dish in Costa Rica as it is available and native herb to Mexico through South America. It is interesting we use this herb a lots in Thai food. And for chilli peppers, the only kind of chilli pepper I had in Costa Rica was jalapeño peppers. I simply roasted a jalapeno pepper on the element of a stove to remove a strong flavour in jalapeno peppers and created a little smoky flavour and was incredible to become a good Thai-Latino Tuna salad.

After I had this Yam Tuna in Costa Rica and thought of people, who love Thai food or spicy food, live in any part of the world will have a chance to enjoy a (simple) taste of Thai and would like to share with. It is healthy food and really good for people who don’t have a lots of time on cooking.

  • The tuna in oil, I got in Costa Rica had lot of oil but the tuna in oil from Ottawa was pretty dry so I didn’t have to remove the extra oil. I think it depends on the manufacturers and also the level of sodium too – each brand has different level of sodium.
  • For some people may find that shallot has a strong flavour, then red onion is a good solution.



10 minutes for a whole process.

Ingredients

1 can                    Tuna in oil, 130g.
½ cup                   Shallots or red onion, slice thin.
2 - 2½ tbsp           Lime juice
7 leaves                Mints
1 Fresh Thai chilli pepper, chopped very fine or 1 roasted jalapeno pepper. (The spiciness is adjustable, depend on your favour or the level of spiciness of chillies)
Pinch of salt
Fish sauce            Optional; it depends on the level of sodium in tuna.
3                           Grape tomatoes, cut into half.

Instruction

  1. Open tuna can. Remove some extra oil that floating on the top. Transfer tuna to a bowl. (Break to be smaller pieces if you use solid tuna).
  2. Sprinkle salt on shallot or red onion slices and mix well.
  3. Mix all together tuna, shallot or onion slices, lime juice, chilli pepper and mints. And garnish with grape tomatoes.
  4. Serve with steamed rice or eat as salad, or wrapped each bite with lettuce leaves, and or for sandwiches.

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