Category: Thailand

I just loved the cram packed shop with the shrine at the back.  Asking if I could take this photo was ‘fun’ too as passers by wanted to help and then the 10 or so guys who worked there took it in turns to make sarcastic comments (in Thai so I can only assume) while the camera ticked through the 60 second exposure time.

There is really no point owning a car in Bangkok.  Taking this picture I was there 10 minutes and the traffic didn’t move (except for the motor bikes).  Crossing the road becomes quite easy really, you wait until it snarls up and then start crossing (watching for motor bikes in between the cars).  Even if the cars do move these guys are the most polite drives you will ever meet.  They stop to let you cross rather than lean on the horn.

All over the streets you see various business models with regards to street food in Bangkok. This is clearly the upper end of the models with seats, people doing the dishes (behind) and more than 2 staff members. They start at about 6 pounding the paste and cooking in preparation for the day ahead.

The charcoal goes on a ‘tray’ just above the air hole (in picture) and the hole is used to fan the fire or just provide oxygen.  If wood is used they put the wood in the hole and burn from there.

Wat Maha Pruettharam Worawihan, is a third grade royal monastery of Worawiharn. The original name of the temple, Wat Tha Kwian (Cart Harbor) in earlier times derived from a legend telling about King U-Thong of the Ayutthaya era. He had escaped from a cholera epidemic which was ravaging the area. He traveled by a kwian (cart or wagon) and came to park his wagon in the area. Another story is that this area was the resting place for travellers who journeyed in kwian. Later in 1852 A.D. ( 2395 B.E.), King Mongkut (King Rama IV) named the temple Wat Ta Khien (the name of the miracle tree) and jointly built a new temple with his son, Prince Chulalongkorn (who became King Rama V). The temple was renovated and raised to a royal temple and King Rama IV renamed it Wat Maha Phruettharam in honor of the first senior lord abbot whose name was given to him by the king: Phramaha Pruttacharya. There are many interesting objects in the temple such as the Ubosot (Ordination Hall) doors, windows and gables decorated with stucco mouldings in the form of Maha Mongkut (the royal crown) which was the circular royal seal of King Rama IV, and the gables of the Wiharn (Hall of Worship) display stucco mouldings in the form of Chunla Mongkut (mini royal crown) which was the circular royal seal of King Rama V. The mural paintings inside the Ubosot are a set showing the Buddhist Pilgrims.

If you look at the full sized image there is inset glass (assumption) that is reflecting different different colour of light.  It was amazing just before sun set.

Day 4

Yellow curry paste (Nam Prik Gaeng Massaman)
Yellow curry with chicken (Gaeng Ka Ri Gai)
Chicken Satay with Satay sauce (Gai Satay)
Hot and sour Prawn Soup (Tom Yum Goong)
Stir-Fried Egg Plant with chicken and basil (Pad Ma Keau Yaw)
Papaya Salad [Cabbage] (Som tam)

Yellow curry paste (Nam Prik Gaeng Massaman)

1. In a stone mortar and pestle pound cinnamon and nutmeg until they are a powder. Add coriander seeds, and cumin and pound thoroughly until they are a fine dust.
2. Add lemongrass, garlic, turmeric, and shallots to mortar and pound until there isn’t any obvious sinew.
3. Add dried chillies and salt pound unit pieces of chilli cannot be made out from the rest of the matter (again not an easy task, right arm starting to feel it now).
4. Add shrimp paste and pound to mix in the paste.

NOTES:

Only use the white bit of the lemon grass. The rest can be used for a kick arse tea
To keep; stir fry for a couple of minutes, let cool and put in a container in the fridge. It will keep for a few months
The finer you chop stuff up the less pounding. Chop stuff fine, it takes less effort.

Yellow curry with chicken (Gaeng Ka Ri Gai)

(oops… forgot to take a photo).  It was nice

Extra coconut cream to wet chicken if required

1. Put oil in wok and add curry paste, cook until paste has started to integrate with oil
2. Add coconut cream. Stir until fat separates (oil on top around bubbles. You may need to stop stirring for this to show up)
3. Add chicken and stir until nearly cooked. If mix becomes too dry add more coconut cream
4. Add coconut milk, onion, fish sauce, and sugar. Taste and season to taste.
5. Add potatoes
6. Remove from heat and serve with Jasmine rice

NOTES:

Boil potatoes until they are al dente. You can use a pinch of salt and turmeric in the water to give the potatoes a great colour and make them more visually appetising in the curry.

Chicken Satay with Satay sauce (Gai Satay)

Extra coconut cream to wet chicken if required

1. Slice the chicken in 4mm slices and place in marinade
2. Allow to site while the remaining of the dish is prepared (about 30 minutes)

Satay Sauce

1. Put oil in wok and add curry paste, cook until paste has started to integrate with oil
2. Add coconut cream. Stir until fat separates (oil on top around bubbles. You may need to stop stirring for this to show up)
3. Add coconut milk and bring to the boil
4. Add all other ingredients of the satay. Taste and season as required

Cook chicken

1. Thread the chicken along the skewer so that the skewer is ‘hidden’ by the chicken.
2. Place the skewers on a frying pan and rotate every few minutes until they are browned. If you are preparing on a bbq ensure you soak the skewers first

NOTES:

To slice the chicken you can use any part of the chicken that is long enough. Get the chicken as cold as you can without it being frozen solid. Slice the chicken in 4mm slices and thread the skewers down the middle of the meat once it has been marinaded.

Another tip is to cut it and dump it in the marinade or just coconut milk straight away. As it defrosts the chicken will take in the marinade and become unbelievably moist (assuming you don’t kill it when you cook it)

Hot and sour Prawn Soup (Tom Yum Goong)

1. Bring chicken stock to a boil
2. Add ginger, lemongrass, kaffir leaves, onion and coriander root bring to a boil and taste
3. Add mushrooms, tomatoes, fish sauce, chilli paste, sugar, coconut milk and tamarind paste and taste. Adjust if required
4. Just before removing from heat add the lime juice. Turn off heat and taste once more. Adjust as required and reheat quickly (if required)

NOTES:

Coriander root added to this dish by putting it under a knife and whacking the knife to flatten it and increase the surface area. The root should (not a disaster if its not) be pulled out so it needs to remain reasonably intact.

Stir-Fried Egg Plant with chicken and basil (Pad Ma Keau Yaw)

1. In a hot wok with oil add garlic/chilli paste, cook until ‘fragrant’ (30 seconds max)
2. Add meat and cook appropriately
3. Add stock and bring to the boil, if it starts to dry out add more stock at any point from now. Remember it’s not a soup so there should be a thick ‘season’ on the salad
4. Add the eggplant. Cook until the eggplant becomes ‘droopy’ (like cabbage when it is just cooked)
5. Add chilli and stir in
6. Add seasoning and taste, adjust as necessary
7. Add basil
8. Serve

Here’s what a Thai eggplant looks like (the photo’s crappy because I took it with the point and shoot.  You’d think I’d know how to use one of those!!):

Papaya Salad [Cabbage] (Som tam)

1. In a clay mortar with wooden pestle combine garlic and chilli and smash
2. Add green beans, and shrimp, smash into garlic and chilli
3. Add peanuts and cashews and roughly smash together
4. Combine papaya and carrots and give a little bash but not too much
5. Add seasoning and taste
6. Add lime juice and skin from which juice was extracted and smash. Taste once again.
7. Add tomato and give it a couple of swipes to show who’s boss and serve
8. Serve with green beans and cabbage.

Massaman curry paste (Nam Prik Gaeng Massaman)
Panang curry with chicken (Gaeng Panang Gai)
Spicy chicken salad (Larb Gai)
Stir-Fried Chicken with hot basil (Gai Pad ka Prao)
Fried sweet noodles with pork (Sen Yai Pad See Eeaw)

Massaman curry paste (Nam Prik Gaeng Massaman)

1. In a stone mortar and pestle pound cinnamon and nutmeg until they are a powder. Add coriander seeds, cumin and peppers and pound thoroughly until they are a fine dust.
2. Add lemongrass, galangal, kaffir lime, and coriander root to mortar and pound until there isn’t any obvious sinew.
3. Add dried chillies and salt pound unit pieces of chilli cannot be made out from the rest of the matter (again not an easy task, right arm starting to feel it now).
4. Add shrimp paste and pound to mix in the paste.

NOTES:

Only use the white bit of the lemon grass. The rest can be used for a kick arse tea

To keep stir fry for a couple of minutes, let cool and put in a container in the fridge. It will keep for a few months

Massaman curry with chicken (Gaeng Massaman Gai)

Extra coconut cream to wet chicken if required

1. Put oil in wok and add curry paste, cook until paste has started to integrate with oil
2. Add coconut cream. Stir until fat separates (oil on top around bubbles. You may need to stop stirring for this to show up)
3. Add chicken and stir until completely cooked. If mix becomes too dry add more coconut cream
4. Add coconut milk, potatoes, onion, fish sauce, sugar, tamarind juice, and peanuts. Taste and season to taste.
5. Plate up and garnish with cinnamon, bay leaf and cardamom

NOTES:

Boil potatoes until they are al dente. You can use a pinch of salt and turmeric in the water to give the potatoes a great colour and make them more visually appetising in the curry.

Spicy chicken salad (Larb Gai)

1. Make the seasoning by mixing together the lime and sugar and ½ the fish sauce. Retain the rest of the fish sauce if require once tasted the salad.
2. In a wok, bring the stock to the boil
3. Add chicken and stir until cooked
4. In a large bowl mix chicken, seasoning, spring onions, shallots, coriander, chilli pepper and most of the toasted rice
5. Season and taste. Add more fish sauce/seasoning if required

NOTES:

To toast sticky rice you put the rice in a frying pan without any oil. You toast the rice until it is very brown, don’t worry about the occasional burnt one. Once it is toasted you put it in the mortar and pestle and grind it until it mostly resembles a medium coffee grind

Stir-Fried Chicken with hot basil (Gai Pad ka Prao)

1. Combine garlic and chillies in a mortar and pound to rough paste
2. In a hot wok with oil add garlic/chilli paste, cook until ‘fragrant’ (30 seconds max)
3. Add meat and cook appropriately
4. Add long beans, baby corn, onion and chicken stock. Stir until tender
5. Add seasoning and taste, adjust as necessary
6. Add basil and take off the heat.
7. Serve

Fried sweet noodles with pork (Sen Yai Pad See Eeaw)

1. Heat oil. Put in garlic. Cook until fragrant (about 60 seconds. Don’t brown)
2. Add Egg. Cook until white is quite set and then scramble.
3. Add pork. Cook until fully cooked (don’t overcook).
4. Add carrots and corn. Cook for 60 seconds
5. Add noodles, kale and seasoning. Mix in to get brown colour through the noodles. Taste and season as required.
6. Add dark soy and mix colour through as required.

Serve with Sugar, chilli powder and lime.

Deep fried chicken in tamarind sauce(Gai tord sot makham)

1. Spread tapioca flour on plate.
2. Coat chicken well in tapioca flour. Shake off excess
3. Deep fry chicken until golden brown
4. Separate out the onion sections and deep fry.

Tamarind Sauce

1. Combine all ingredients in bowl
2. Place in wok on medium heat and heat until sugar is dissolved and mix starts to thicken.
3. Taste sauce and season to taste. Chicken stock can be added to reduce salt flavour

Serve with onion on top and sauce as an accompaniment.

Is it bad that I know that this must be advertising Krispy Kreme?

looks like ginger, smells like lemon grass and tastes like a very soft ginger (not sharp).

Yep, their baby corn is about the size of a pen.  you chop the end off as close to where the corn starts as you can and peel away the remaining leaves.

Sweet chilli from yesterday….

Soooo easy and so good. No artificial colours or thickeners..

It is 1 part White vinegar, 1 part (by volume) sugar, ½ part water and 1/8 part salt, ½ part finely chopped chilli and ¼ part finely chopped garlic… OK easier…

1. Cook together vinegar, sugar, water and salt. Heat on a medium heat until the mixture thickens. Take care not to overdo it and allow it to start to caramelise. Take off heat and taste mixture at this point, add liquid as per taste.
2. Add chilli and garlic. Heat a little more to cook garlic and remove from heat… DONEJ

Penang curry paste (Nam Prik Gaeng Penang)

In a stone mortar and pestle pound coriander seeds, cumin and peppers thoroughly until they are a fine dust.

Add lemongrass, galangal, kaffir lime, and coriander root to mortar and pound until there isn’t any obvious sinew (quite a while, they say a good wife can do this quickly and for a while, not my words!!)

Add dried chillies and salt pound unit pieces of chilli cannot be made out from the rest of the matter (again not an easy task, right arm starting to feel it now).

Add shrimp paste and pound to mix in the paste.

NOTES:
To roast coriander seeds and cumin seeds you just put them on a flat tray in the oven. They are done when you can smell them roasting.
Soak the red spur chillies in warm salted water for 10 min before chopping them.
Only use the white part of the lemon grass. The green can be used to make a lemon grass tea.
Galangal ginger is not ginger and can’t really be substituted. It looks like ginger but doesn’t really have the same flavour
Kaffir lime is not lime. It has a skin like the outside of a brain. You only need about 2cm of a strip
Coriander root is literally that. You can get it from Coles where it is attached dirt and all to the fresh coriander. You chop off the root at the point where the green starts
To keep stir fry for a couple of minutes, let cool and put in a container in the fridge. It will keep for a few months

Panang curry with chicken (Gaeng Panang Gai)

I have to apologise for this pic.  It is a crop of another pic.  I have no idea why I didn’t take another shot but… I didn’t.  Live and learn.

Extra coconut cream to wet chicken if required

1. Put oil in wok and add curry paste, cook until paste has started to integrate with oil
2. Add coconut cream. Stir until fat separates (oil on top around bubbles. You may need to stop stirring for this to show up)
3. Add chicken and stir until completely cooked. If mix becomes too dry add more coconut cream
4. Add coconut milk and eggplants. Season with fish sauce and sugar; bring to boil on medium heat. Taste and season to taste.
5. Stir in sweet basil leaves, kaffir leaves and red chillies for about 1 minute. Taste and season to taste
6. Remove from heat and serve with Jasmine rice

NOTES:
To cut the Kaffir leaves tear off the stalk carefully so most of the leaf is still intact. Tightly roll the leaf like (I imagine) a cigar and then thinly slice the cigar rolls, don’t slice any further.

Thai eggplants are a green ball about the same size as a large lime. The fresher the plant the longer the leaves extend down from the stalk. The fresh fruit should have white seeds however brown seeds are not a disaster. Once cut put the eggplant in water until needed otherwise it will turn brown.

Coconut cream is the first squeeze of the coconut once it has been ‘torn’ from the husk. The milk is just the cream with chicken stock (preferred) or water added.

Pomelo Salad (Yam Som-o)

1. Prepare the sauce by mixing the chili, fish sauce, lime juice and sugar. Taste and adjust to taste. Set aside
2. In a bowl add Pomelo, prawns, dry shrimp, spring onion and red onion. Toss to combine. Add sauce and toss well.

NOTES:
The Pomelo is a great fruit that is the size of a grapefruit with sweet individual nodules inside. If you can get hold of it you remove the skin and all of the pith. The fruit then falls apart. The only similar taste would be a mix of green apple and a pink lady apple. This would work well but, if you can get it, get the Pomelo; it is a really delicate apple flavour that doesn’t have the fibrous feeling in the mouth of apple. If you are using it the chunks should be about the size of your thumb (assuming you are not minus your thumbs).

Thai Fried Rice (Khao Pad)

1. Make the seasoning by combining all ingredients and putting to one side
2. In a hot wok with oil add garlic, cook until ‘fragrant’
3. Add egg. Allow to fry in the English way until the white has cooked then scramble.
4. Add brown and red onion, carrot and tomato. Cook until the onion has softened
5. Add rice. Push the rice down into the wok to get full contact with the heat. Scrape the goodness from the bottom of the wok and fold in. Once a little of the moisture of the rice has been taken out add the seasoning (oyster sauce, fish sauce, sugar and pepper)
6. Stir in the seasoning taste and adjust to taste
7. Add kale heat for about 1 min…. Done

NOTES:
All the Kale is used. The thick stem is pealed like asparagus up to the first ‘branch’. Cut that at a 45 degree angle in 3mm slices. Take off the stems/branches remove the leaves by tearing the steam from the leaf. Coarsely chop the leaves (about 2 cm squared) and, if you like, chop the stems to add also (not required).

This is supposed to be using all the stuff you didn’t use last night (especially rice). You can put anything you want in and season up to taste just remember to keep the crunch in the vegies and add the accordingly. To prepare the rice here they use a rice cooker. The rice is cooked by a measurement basis 1cm of rice in the cooker equals 1cm of water over the top of the rice. Really easy and cheap to get a rice cooker. Just need 30cm squared on my bench to put it (given I don’t like anything on my bench permanently)

Thai Fish Cakes (Tord Man Pla)

These are a fairly crappy example but they’re mine.  the issue here was not enough pounding and the mixture wasn’t sticky enough.  they should have puffed up but didn’t due to my lack of pounding (take from that what you will).

1. In a mortar combine fish and red curry. Pound until completely combined
2. Add yolk and pound until the mixture creates the suction to keep the pestle from lifting (not a short time but makes a difference)
3. Add Kaffir, sweet basil, bean, salt and sugar. Mix well to combine.
4. oil your hands and make into 3cm balls.  Place on an oiled plate and ‘squash’
5. Deep fry until cooked through (turning constantly once they start to float), remove from oil. Allow to cool and serve with sweet chilli sauce (start of this day)

Fishcakes are plated up on an oiled plate.. another mistake I made, I didn’t make them into balls, I think Chef is going to stop talking to me.

Stir fried chicken with cashews (Gai Pad Med Ma-Muang)

1. In a wok hot wok with vegetable oil add garlic. Cook until fragrant
2. Add chicken and cook through
3. Add baby corn, mushrooms, onion and chicken stock
4. Add soy sauce, chili paste, oyster sauce and sugar. Taste and season to taste
5. Add spring onion, spur chili and cashew nuts, stir quickly and remove from heat. Taste and season further if required (back on heat)
6. Serve with rice

NOTES:
The baby corn here is about ¼ way between our full grown corn and the baby corn we get. I have no idea where to get what they have here so go with the Aussie one and triple the amount.

Sort of looks like a lemon leaf. There are two joined together. You remove the stalk and tear up to use.

The not lime lime

Next to the lime in this pic are the leaves. The little pea things at the top are the pea eggplants.