Papaya Salad

One of my favourite meals, which is definately in my Top 10, is Som Tam, otherwise known as Papaya Salad.

The meal is quite simple to make. The main ingredients are shredded green papaya, chopped green beans, tomoato, dried prawns, unsalted roasted peanuts, chillies, garlic and lime juice. These are all pounded together in a mortar using a pestle. The sound it makes is "pok pok". Whenever I hear that sound while walking down the street I always turnaround to look for the som tam stall.


The papaya salad is best served with sticky rice (khao neow) and grilled chicken. That is the way I like it. But you can have fish instead. There is also a recipe which has crab.

When you come to buy Papaya Salad, it is nearly always prepared in front of you. This way you can tell them how many chillies you want! I like mine hot. Papaya Salad with sticky rice from a roadside stall will cost you about 20 baht.

Recipe:

1 medium dark green papaya
4 garlic cloves (kratiem)
6 green Thai chilies (prik khee noo)
2 tomatoes, cut into wedges
1/2 cup chopped green beans, in 1-in (2.5-cm) pieces
2 tablespoons anchovy sauce
1/2 teaspoon sauce
1/4 cup (2 fl oz/60 ml) lime juice or tamarind juice (ma-kaam piag)

How to make:

1. Peel the papaya and rinse with running water to remove the acid. Remove the seeds and shred the papaya with a grater. Set aside.
2. Place the garlic cloves and the chilies in a mortar and mash with a pestle until crushed into chunks. Place the papaya and the remaining ingredients in the mortar and gently combine all ingredients by mixing with the pestle and a spoon. Serve cold.

Or try other tips :

Papaya Salad Ingredients
1. 2 cups shredded green papaya
2. 1/2 cup shredded carrot
3. 1/2 cup sting bean (cut into 1" long)
4. 2 tablespoons fish sauce
5. 1 1/2 tablespoons palm sugar
6. 3 tablespoons lime juice
7. 1/2 cup tomato (wedged)
8. 1/3 cup dried shrimps
9. 1/4 cup peanuts
10. 10 green chilies
11. 5 cloves fresh garlic

Papaya Salad Preparations
1. Use motar and prestle to crush the chilli and garlic, add shrimps, continue crushing.
2. Add sugar, continue beating with the prestle, then add the papaya, carrot, sting bean, fish sauce, lime juice, tomato, and peanuts. Continue beating until all ingredients mixed well.
3. Finally, season with sugar, fish sauce, or lime. The original taste this dish should be the balance taste between sweet, (pepper) hot, salty, and sour.
4. Serve with vegetables (e.g. cabbage, string bean, napa, etc.). Thai people love to eat Sticky Rice with Papaya Salad. In this case, sticky rice can be served together with finished Papaya Salad.

Chicken with yellow rice

There used to be a guy at the top of our soi selling khao mun gai. I used to go there quite often to buy my chicken and rice. He was always quite friendly and was keen to practice his English with me. Then, one day, he was no longer there any more. As this was at the height of the "bird flu" scare I guessed he closed his stall because of dwindling customers. Or, maybe he just wheeled it elsewhere because of the fierce competition from the "chicken guy". This is the muslim man I told you about before who sells fried chicken which not only tastes better than KFC but is also half the price.

Nearly a year has passed now and most people are not so worried about bird flu. You do hear reports about it in the newspapers every now and then, but people tend to ingore it now. After all, it would seem that the majority of people that have died had direct contact with the birds. Either they reared chickens or they were a butcher. So, I was quite excited last week to see a new food shop open around the corner. This not only sold khao mun gai, but also another of my favourites, khao mok gai. It is owned by a muslim family. Their daughter used to be one of my students. This dish is similiar to the chicken and rice I told you about before. However, the rice in this meal has been coloured yellow with the use of turmeric. To cook khao mok gai, you fry some garlic in a pan until golden brown. You then stir in the rice, curry powder, salt and chicken pieces. You then transfer this mixture to an electric rice cooker. You add the chicken stock and cook for about 20 minutes. Quite simple really.

You don't really need to be able to read Thai to buy food on the streets. You can usually work out what they are selling by looking at the ingredients in the glass display cabinet. However, it wouldn't hurt if you could read! In this picture, the top line says khao mun gai tod and khao mun gai. The first one is fried chicken (tod means fried) and the second one is boiled. The second line says khao mok gai tod and khao mok gai. The last line is obviously telling you that a normal plate is only 20 baht (50 cents) and a bit of extra meat (called piset in Thai) is 25 baht.

Spicy Stir-fried pork with long beans

One of my favourite school lunches is similar to this one. It is called spicy stir-fried pork and long beans, or pat prik king moo in Thai. I took this picture at Pornsiri Kitchen in Samut Prakan where I recently spent the afternoon making Thai cooking videos. I didn’t actually eat this one as it was for a customer. (Even other people have to wait these days while I photograph their food first!) It looks a lot spicier than the version we have at school. The recipe in one of my cook books is slightly different. It calls for 300 grams of pork, a quarter of a cup of prik king chili paste, 200 grams of long beans, 1 red spur chili, 3 shredded kaffir lime leaves, 1 tablespoon of palm sugar and 1 tablespoon of fish sauce. You need to cut the pork up into small pieces and then marinate it for 5 minutes in fish sauce. Cut the long beans up into one inch lengths. Blanch them in hot boiling water until nearly cooked. Then loosely tie them. Heat the oil in the wok and then saute the chili paste until fragrant. Add the pork and keep stirring until it is done. Season to taste with sugar and fish sauce. Add the beans and stir well. Garnish with shredded kaffir lime leaves and red chili.

The local food shop version is a little different. After all, it only costs 25 baht (about 60 cents) so you cannot expect too much preparation. First heated up the wok and then add the pieces of pork. Give it a good stir. Add the chili paste and then some chicken stock. Let it cook for a while longer while continually stirring. Season with some sugar and fish sauce. Most food shops will add a touch of MSG. Add more chicken stock if needed. Then add the long beans. Keep stirring. Make sure you don’t over cook them as they are better if still crunchy. And that is about it! If you like, you can download the cooking video of this meal being cooked.

Fried Mackerel with Shrimp Paste Sauce

Fried Mackerel with Shrimp Paste Sauce

As you probably know by now, I live in Paknam which borders the Gulf of Thailand. As you can imagine, seafood features quite heavily in menus at numerous restaurants in this area. Even the roadside stalls sell plenty of dishes which have seafood as their main ingredients. Today I want to tell you about a popular dish in this area called "nam prik pla too". This basically translates as Fried Mackerel with Shrimp Paste Sauce.

As you can see from the above pictures, the meal is served ready cooked. You choose your fish, which raw vegetables you want and even the spicy sauce. This meal costs 15-30 baht depending on the size of your helping. The "nam prik pla too" sauce is made up from dried shrimp paste, garlic, green chili, shrimp paste, fish sauce, lime juice and palm sugar.