Gai Pad Khing or Kai Phat Khing

Gai Pad Khing or Kai Phat Khing (literally, stir-fried chicken with ginger) original this dish is from Taejew Chinese food (Taejew is one of Chinese dialects and it is the biggest group of Chinese in Thailand). This dish is used to be found at Raan Khao Tom which is kind of Taejew Chinese restaurant (literally for Raan Khao Tom, rice porridge shop) but nowadays it is available almost every Raan Khao Khaeng. Raan Khao Khaeng is a short order Thai restaurant, it is a Thai fast food but all the food is made from scratch everyday. Gai Pad Khing is pretty much one of Raan Khao Khaeng’s main dishes.

Chinese immigrants introduced ginger to Thai people through Chinese food in Thailand, when we talk about ginger we will think about some of Chinese dishes that have been known for a long time and became a common food for Thai people, for example - Pad Khing, steamed fish with ginger and as well as a well-known dessert called Bua Loy Nam Khing , is made of sticky rice dough balls in the ginger and brown sugar water. Chinese people use this dessert as part of a wedding ceremony.

Ingredients

2                 Chicken breasts (about 400 g.), cut into ½ inch x 1 ¾ inches

3 cloves      Garlic, chopped fine

¹⁄₆ tsp          Salt

2 tsp            Soy sauce

Marinate chicken with other ingredients above for an hour.

½ cup          Young ginger, shredded

1                  Onion,small, cut into ½ inch wedges

¹⁄₂  cup        Cloud or wood ear or Chinese black fungus, soak in warm water until soft and cut into stripe ½ inch x 2 inches 

Vegetable cuts



3                 Green onion, cut into ¾ inch long

½ tsp           Sugar

1 ½ tbsp      Soy sauce

1 ½ tbsp      Cooking wine

4  tbsp         Oil

6 – 8 tbsp    Water

Instruction

1. Heat a steel wok over high heat, and add 2 tbsp oil until smoke coming up from the wok. Add marinated chicken, stirring and breaking up any lumps until chicken turned pale colour.
2. Add cooking wine and stir and flip a few times with a spatula. Add more oil, ginger, onion, fungus, and stir and flip a few times, and add soy sauce. During this process add 2 -3 times of water. Cook until vegetables wilted.
3. Just before remove from heat, add green onion and mix well. 
4. Serve with steamed rice

   

   On the left is dried fungus and after soak in water the size can be as big as on the right

Gai Hor Bai Toey (Chicken in Pandan Leaves)

Chicken in Pandan Leaves, or Gai Hor Bai Toey, is another popular Thai dish with chicken marinated wrapped in pandan leaves and deep-fried, and serve with sesame sauce. This dish is more a restaurant food from middle class restaurants to high end restaurants because it is more delicate in preparing and appearing.

Pandan leaves or Pandanus Amaryllifolius, and or Bai Toey (in Thai), is a tropical plant and is used widely in Southeast Asian cooking as a flavoring and coloring. In Thailand we use commonly and wildly in dessert more than in savory food. Pandan leaves are available in frozen form at Asian grocery stores.

About 18 pieces

Ingredients

400 - 450 g           or 2 Large chicken breasts (boneless and skinless), cut into approx 1.5 inch chunks.

½ tsp                    Ground pepper

3 roots                  Cilantro (coriander), chopped and pound with pestle

4 cloves                Garlic, chopped and pound with pestle

Pinch of Salt

1 tbsp                    Soy sauce

2 tsp                      Oyster sauce

1 tbsp                    Sesame oil

1 tbsp                    Cooking wine

1 tsp                      Potato starch or corn starch

10                         Pandan leaves, cut into half

Oil for frying

Instruction

1. Marinate chicken with ground pepper, coriander roots, garlic, salt, soy sauce, oyster sauce, sesame oil, patato starch and cooking wine for an hour or more.
2. Wrap each piece of chicken in a pandan leaf until finish all. (see the pictures)** It’s better let some part of chicken being exposed so that part of chicken will get nice brown color.
3. Fry in Oil until cooked or turn golden and put on the plate and serve with sauce. 

The steps of wrapping chicken

1. 

   Secure chicken with toothpicks ( in Thailand pandan leaves are cheap so we use a whole leaf for wrapping one piece of chicken and it's long enough to fold itself without using a toothpick to secure)

Sesame Sauce

4 tbsp Thick sweet soy sauce (there are two kinds of thick soy sauce; sweet and salty) if thick sweet soy sauce is not available, Hoisin sauce can be used as a substitute.

1½ tbsp White vinegar

1 tsp Soy sauce

½ tsp Ginger, chopped very fine

½ tsp Roasted sesame seeds                

Instruction

Sesame Sauce

1. In a pot, heat sweet soy sauce, white vinegar and soy sauce on medium heat until sweet soy sauce dissolved and add ginger. Combine well.
2. Remove from heat and transfer to a sauce bowl.
3. Garnish with sesame seeds.

Moo Yang

Moo Yang (literally, grilled pork)

Last weekend we had some friends came over. One of the dishes that I made was Moo Yang, and some of my friends asked for the recipe so I just post it here.

Moo Yang is pretty common dish in Thailand and we make this dish for a beer party or any relaxing occasion. You can find Moo Yang at a restaurant too but may not exactly be like my recipe.

The weather is warming up; the BQQ season is coming so this dish is perfect for a nice warm sunny day with friends or family. You may like to try something different - Moo Yang with sticky rice.

Ingredients

 1 kg.              Pork loin,(best with pork loin with some fat) slice into ¾ inch thick (from any size you wish)

4 - 5 cloves    Garlic, chopped and pound with a pestle

4                    Big coriander roots, chopped and pound with a pestle

2 tbsp            Honey or Sugar

½ tsp             Salt

2 tsp              Fresh ground black pepper

2 tbsp            Soy Sauce

1 tbsp            Oyster sauce

2 tbsp            Oil

1 tbsp            Cooking wine

Instruction

1. In a bowl, combine garlic, coriander roots, honey or sugar, salt, ½ tsp ground pepper, soy sauce, oil and cooking wine. Mix well.
2. Add pork into the mixer and coat totally, and grind or sprinkle black pepper on each layer of pork totally and cover with plastic wrap or transfer pork to a bowl with a lid. Marinate over night in the fridge.
3. Grill on charcoal or oven both sides until cooked. (If the pork is very dry you can apply some more oil).
4. Cut into the size you wish and serve with steamed sticky rice.

Massaman Curry with Chicken

We assume that Massaman is original from Malayu cuisine. We don’t know when we adopted but this dish has been well known for centuries as there was a famous poem which composed by the second king of Chakri Dynasty of Siam, ruling from 1809-1824 (Chakri Dynasty is the current ruling royal house of the kingdom of Thailand) and in his poem describing how good this dish was and how hot the aromatic cumin was if you had it you would dream of the dish and the cook (a girl who cooked this dish). His reign was known as the “Golden Ages of Rattanakosin Literature” (Rattanakosin was the name of Bangkok)

This piece of the poem of the king Rama ll is in the literature subject of our elementary school so every Thai knows this dish and sense of a romantic sentiment and aromatic spice from the dish though the poem.

Thai Royal Cuisine was the center of Thai food evolution, and has developed and flourished for centuries under the nurturing touch of the female members of the Royal Household, especially during King Rama ll. His wife, Princess Boonrod, was known for her culinary skill and many of the cooks from her kitchen became famous.

Curry Paste

Ingredients

 12               Dried big chillies, soak in warm water until soft, remove seeds and chopped fine

4 tbsp           Galangal, chopped fine (about 1 ½ inches piece of galangal root)

3 tbsp           Lemongrass, chopped fine.

4 cloves       Roasted garlic

4                  Roasted shallots

3 tsp            Coriander seeds, roast and ground

2 tsp            Cumin seeds, roast and ground

1 tsp            Pepper Corn, ground

5                  Cloves, roast and ground

Massaman Curry Paste

4                  Cardamoms (seeds only) roasted and ground

1 tsp            Nutmeg, ground

1 tbsp          Shrimp Paste, roasted

1 tsp            Salt

Instruction

Combine all the ingredients in a mortar and crush with pestle until smooth. This process can be done with a food processer too.

Massaman Curry 

Ingredients

5                 Chicken thigh (or chicken breast, cut into big chunks)

2 cups         Coconut Milk (from can with the thick cream one)

2                 Onion, medium, cut into wedges (about 1 inch thick).

1                 Potato, large, cut into big chunks.

4 -5 tbsp     Massaman Curry Paste

3 - 4 tbsp   Tamarind liquid, from thick liquid (mix tamarind (see picture) with water and knead with hand)

1 sticks      Cinnamon

⅓cup          Peanuts or Cashew Nuts, roasted

3                Cardamoms

2                 Bay Leaves

2 tbsp         Sugar or palm sugar

 ½ tbsp       Salt (this can be adjustable, if you add more water, if the curry is too thick)

1 ½ cup      Water

1 tbsp         Vegetable oil

1 ½ tbsp     Fish sauce

Instruction

1.      Sear chicken thighs on both sides for a few minutes on a wok or frying pan at medium high heat with 1 tbsp oil. And remove from a frying pan, put aside.

2.      Reduce the heat to medium, with the same frying pan, carefully remove all but 2 - 3 tbsp of oil from searing chicken. And add curry paste and 2 tbsp coconut milk, mix well. Stir-frying until fragrant. Add chicken, coconut milk, tamarind liquid, cinnamon stick, cardamom, bay leaves, palm sugar, fish sauce, salt and water.

3.      Transfer the mixer to a pot, and add potato, peanuts and onion. Simmering until chicken is tender (or if you make this dish for the next day then remove from heat before the chicken is too soft and re-heat or simmer again until chicken is loose from the bones before serve. *You can remove all the bones before serve)  Remove from heat and serve with steamed Jasmine rice.  

***If the dried big chillies are not available, can be replaced by the dried small chillies, remove all the seeds. The main spiciness of this curry is from spices, not only from chillies.

Po Pia Tod

Po Pia Tod or Deep fried spring roll. This dish is original from Vietnamese food, as we know Thai food is influenced by many cultures; from trades, religion and neighbouring countries. We can say Vietnam is one of Thailand’s neighbouring countries (considering it is neighbouring country even these two countries don’t share a border), All a long history there were many waves of Vietnamese immigrants and refugees into Thailand from political and religion conflicts in Vietnam. Vietnamese who migrated into Thailand many generations before now they all integrate themselves into Thai society and Vietnamese who migrated during Vietnam divided to be North Vietnam and South Vietnam still maintain and practice their cultures and believes.

 During cool war (Vietnam War) Thai government feared of Vietnamese in Thailand support Thai communist insurgency. I still remember when we were young (during Vietnam war) we often watched free outdoor movies that Thai military brought to our towns and villages, there was a short propaganda movie about Viet Cong before the movies started. I think at that time there was no Thai - Vietnamese wanted to claim themselves as a Vietnamese. When I moved to Bangkok in late 70s,(Bangkok) which is the biggest city and center of economy of Thailand, I had never heard or known of any Vietnamese restaurant until end of cool war. Vietnamese restaurants flourish vigorously in Thailand after Vietnam became one country two systems or economic and political reforms which brought Vietnam into the world economy.

Nowadays Po Pia Tod dish is not only Vietnamese restaurants in Thailand that available; you can find this dish at Thai restaurants and also at street food vendors too.

  

Ingredients

16 - 18          Spring roll wrappers 6x6 inches

2 tsp              flour (mix with some water and cook in microwave for sealing the wrappers as glue)

Filling

300 g.            Pork or Chicken, mince

3 clove          Garlic, chop very fine or pound with pestle

3                    Coriander roots, chop very fine or pound with pestle

2 tsp              Soy sauce

1/6 tsp           Salt

Marinate chicken with all the ingredients above for 30 minutes.

1 cup             Carrot, shredded (1 medium size carrot)

1 cup             Asian cabbage, shredded

¾ cup            Mung Bean vermicelli noodles, soak in lukewarm water until soft and cut into 3-4 inches long, squeeze extra water from vermicelli noodles.

2                    Green onion, chopped

1 tbsp            Soy sauce

1 tbsp            Oyster sauce

½                   Ground pepper corn

2-3 tbsp         water (optional, if the mixer is too dry)

2 tbsp            Oil for stir-frying

Oil for deep-frying

Instruction

1.      Heat the steel wok on high heat until hot Add 1 tbsp oil until hot and add marinated pork or chicken. Use a spatula stir and toss for a few times. Turn the heat down to medium high and breaking up the lumps.

2.      Add the other 1 tbsp oil and add shredded carrot, shredded cabbage, vermicelli noodles, soy sauce, oyster sauce, ground pepper and mix well. Stir-frying until cabbage wilted but not over cook. Add some water if it is too dry. Turn off the heat and add green onion and mix green onion into the mixer.

3.      Let the filling sit until cool. Place (good amount of) the filling with a spoon on a wrapper and fold and seal.(on the package of spring roll wrappers also has the instruction and pictures how to fold spring rolls).

4.      Fry in hot oil until golden brown. Remove from oil and drain on paper towels.

5.      Serve with plum sauce (see recipe below or sweet chilli sauce from a bottle, is available at Asian grocery stores). 

***The filling should not have sauce sitting on the bottom, the wrapper will be broken.

  

Plum Sauce

You can get Plum sauce in a jar at an Asian grocery store. It is pretty thick and sweet. You can make it thinner with some water and vinegar.

¼ cup        Plum Sauce

2 tbsp        Water

1 tbsp        White Vinegar

Pinch of Salt

Mix all well on the heat.