Cook This: Three recipes from Sabai, including minimalist pad thai

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Our cookbook of the week is Sabai: 100 Simple Thai Recipes for Any Day of the Week by Pailin Chongchitnant. Read an interview with the author.

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Jump to the recipes: salad rolls with spicy garlicky dip, old-school pad gaprao, and minimalist pad thai.

The first recipe Vancouver-based author Pailin Chongchitnant shared with us from her second book, Sabai, is one of her relatively recent discoveries. On a visit home to Bangkok several years ago, her mom would pick up salad rolls with spicy garlicky dip on her way home from work.

“I just thought they were so cute, and so healthy and so good,” says Chongchitnant, laughing. “It’s a salad roll like I’ve never seen before in Canada, too. Usually when you think salad rolls, you’re thinking of those things in Vietnamese restaurants and there’s a peanut sauce or something. And this was totally different.”

Thai food culture moves quickly, and the rolls have already started to fall out of fashion, she adds. Chongchitnant is happy to have immortalized them in the book so they can always be enjoyed. “It’s still one of my favourite ways to eat vegetables, because I don’t really like to eat raw vegetables. It’s not really my thing, but I can eat a ton of these.”

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(To see the rolling technique in action, check out the video on Chongchitnant’s YouTube channel, Pailin’s Kitchen.)

While the salad rolls are a contemporary addition to Thai cuisine, the second recipe, pad gaprao, is a classic. “A true staple of the Thai diet,” the one-dish meal is popular in Canada as well as Thailand, but the modern version has become more and more complex, says Chongchitnant.

Today, pad gaprao is made with oyster sauce, soy sauce and vegetables such as long beans and onions, she explains. The older version is more streamlined, with no vegetables and a simple fish sauce seasoning. Though it’s easier to make, it has started to disappear in favour of more elaborate contemporary variations.

“Nowadays in Thailand, there’s this wave of people who want to go back to old recipes, the old ways of doing things. So that’s a new trend, which is kind of ironic. It’s a trend of going back to traditional foods. And so this started coming on the radar and I thought, ‘Well, this is so much simpler than the other one. So let’s put this down.’ And also as a way to preserve it. Again, if it ever falls out of fashion, we will always have this as a reference.”

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(In Sabai, Chongchitnant follows her old-school pad gaprao with a vegan version featuring mushrooms, tofu and holy basil.)

The third recipe Chongchitnant shared with us, minimalist pad thai, is not a recipe she expected to include in a book dedicated to simple, everyday Thai cooking. Mostly because pad thai is not meant for home cooking — it’s a dish most people order out.

“I’ve always told people, pad thai is not a beginner-friendly dish. If you’re a beginner, this is not something you should start with. But everyone wants to make it. And I’m like, ‘OK, OK. If you want to make it, fine. Let’s figure out a way to simplify it so that it’s not quite as complex, but it still tastes good and I can still feel good calling it pad thai.’”

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The hard part about making pad thai, aside from gathering the ingredients, is getting the right noodle texture (see Avoiding Soggy Noodles, below). “So, in that sense, it’s still something you need to get good at.” The cooking itself can be done in five minutes, once you have all your ingredients prepped. (If you’d like to try the full-on version, check out Chongchitnant’s video.)

For her minimalist take, Chongchitnant narrowed down the ingredients to what she considers the absolute essentials — all of which can be found at an Asian supermarket such as T&T. She doesn’t even make traditional pad thai regularly at home, and doesn’t order it at most Thai restaurants either.

“It is not easy to do well, and a lot of restaurants will take a lot of shortcuts because the fully loaded version is tedious. It’s got a lot of ingredients, so a lot of restaurants will just pare it down so far and make too many substitutions where it’s not pad thai any more for me. So, with this recipe, I really wanted to be like, ‘OK, let’s pare it down, but this is as far as I’m willing to go,” she says, laughing.

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SALAD ROLLS WITH SPICY GARLICKY DIP

Cooking time: 30 minutes

Spicy garlicky dip:
1 clove (5 g) garlic
1/2 to 1 Thai chili
1/4 + 1/8 teaspoons (1.5 mL) table salt
1/4 cup (60 mL) mayonnaise
1 1/2 tbsp (22 mL) sweetened condensed milk
1 1/2 tbsp (22 mL) lime juice

Salad rolls:
7 sheets of 8-inch (20 cm) round Vietnamese rice paper
4 to 5 cups (70 to 90 g) baby salad greens
14 (3-inch/8 cm long) strips of protein of your choice (see note)
1 cucumber, cut in 3-inch (8 cm) sticks
1 carrot, thinly julienned (I use a julienne peeler)
Any other veggies or herbs you like (bell peppers, avocado, beets, sprouts, cilantro, mint, Thai basil)

For the dipping sauce:

Step 1

Using a mortar and pestle, pound the garlic, chili and salt into a fine paste. Add the mayo, condensed milk and lime juice; stir until combined. Taste and adjust the seasoning as needed. The sauce will keep in the fridge for at least 1 week.

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For the salad rolls:

Step 2

Cut a rice paper circle in half with scissors. Prepare a large bowl of hot tap water (as hot as you can stand dipping your hands in).

Step 3

Dip a piece of halved rice paper in the water for 8 to 10 seconds, then put it on a clean work surface, the flat edge facing either to the left or right. Let it sit for another 10 to 15 seconds, until it has absorbed all the water around it and the sheet has softened. Fold about 1 inch (2.5 cm) of the rounded side toward the centre, so that you now have two straight sides.

Step 4

In your hand, stack about 4 leaves of baby salad greens, with the stems facing the same direction. Lay the salad stack on the rice paper, about 2 inches (5 cm) above the edge closest to you, making sure the tops of the leaves are sticking out about 1/2 inch (1.2 cm) over the left side of the rice paper. Repeat with another stack of greens, placing it on the right side of the paper in the same way.

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Step 5

Place the protein and all the other vegetables on top of the greens, centring them horizontally so that they will cut evenly when you cut the salad rolls in half.

Step 6

Pick up the edge closest to you, fold it over the filling and roll it away from you, keeping the salad roll as tight as you can. You will end up with a salad roll with two open ends. Cut the roll into two pieces and place each piece, cut side down, on a serving plate. Repeat with the remaining rice paper circles, greens, protein and vegetables.

Step 7

Serve the salad rolls at room temperature with the dipping sauce. If not serving right away, keep them well wrapped with plastic wrap or in an airtight container, to prevent drying.

Makes: 28 pieces

Do-ahead: The dip can be made up to a few days in advance. The salad rolls can be made a few hours in advance and kept well wrapped with plastic wrap or in an airtight container at room temp.

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Note: For the protein, my favourites are ham, roast chicken, shrimp, imitation crab and firm or pressed tofu (especially the marinated kind). Anything that you like in a sandwich will work here. Cut them into sticks about 3 inches (8 cm) long and about the thickness of a thick-cut french fry.

Too Lazy to Wrap?

Serving a lot of people and don’t want to spend time wrapping? I am with you 100 per cent. You can make your guests do the work by setting out the ingredients and a couple of bowls of hot water for a “make your own salad rolls” party. Or you can do even less work and serve the sauce as a dip for a veggie platter — the best part is the sauce, anyway!

OLD-SCHOOL PAD GAPRAO

Pad Gaprao Moo Kai Dao

Cooking time: 10 minutes, plus 5 to 10 minutes if frying eggs

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2 to 3 Thai chilies, or as many as you can handle
1/3 cup (40 g) chopped mild red peppers (see More Than Just Heat below)
7 cloves (35 g) garlic
Oil for frying eggs (optional)
4 eggs (optional, see note)
2 to 3 tbsp (30 to 45 mL) neutral oil
1 lb (450 g) lean ground pork
2 tbsp (30 mL) fish sauce
2 tsp (10 mL) granulated sugar
1 1/2 cups (22 g) holy basil or Italian basil leaves (see note)
Jasmine rice, for serving

Step 1

Using a mortar and pestle, pound the Thai chilies until fine, then add the mild red peppers and garlic and pound into a rough paste.

Step 2

If you’re making fried eggs, make them now. In a small non-stick frying pan, heat about 1/3 inch (8 mm) of oil over medium-high heat. Test the temperature of the oil by adding a little piece of vegetable scrap, like the garlic or pepper, and it should bubble excitedly right away. Once the oil is hot, add 1 egg. The white should bubble up right away. Using a spoon to occasionally baste the top of the egg with oil to help it cook faster, cook for about 1 minute for a runny yolk, or 2 minutes for a set yolk. You want the white crispy and browned, so if it’s not browning, turn up the heat. Remove the egg from the pan and drain on paper towel; repeat with the remaining eggs.

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Step 3

Place a wok on medium heat, then add the oil and garlic-chili paste. Stir for about 2 minutes, until the smallest bits of garlic start to turn golden.

Step 4

Turn the heat up to high, add the ground pork, then quickly toss to mix with the garlic-chili paste. Add the fish sauce and sugar, and keep tossing and breaking up the pork until it is fully cooked.

Step 5

Turn off the heat, then add the holy basil and cook just until wilted. Taste and adjust the seasoning with fish sauce and sugar as needed.

Step 6

Plate and serve with jasmine rice. If serving as a one-dish meal, place the rice on a plate, spoon the pork over it, and top everything with the fried egg.

Serves: 4

Notes: Pad gaprao is typically paired with a fried egg when served as a one-dish meal. If serving as part of a multi-dish Thai meal, you can omit the egg.

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You might be tempted to use Thai basil instead, but Italian basil is actually the better substitute.

More Than Just Heat

I usually say you can make things as spicy as you want, but for the real pad gaprao experience, you should make it as spicy as you can handle! But it’s not just about the heat, as chilies also provide flavour that’s important to this dish. This is why we use mild and hot chilies; the mild ones add the needed chili flavour without making the dish too spicy. Red bell pepper will work, but preferably something smaller and less watery. The seeds and pith can be removed to reduce heat.

MINIMALIST PAD THAI

Cooking time: 15 minutes

Sauce:
3 tbsp + 1 tsp (40 g) finely chopped palm sugar, packed
3 tbsp (45 mL) water
4 tbsp (60 mL) tamarind paste, store-bought or homemade (recipe follows)
2 tbsp (30 mL) fish sauce

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Pad thai:
4 oz (115 g) dried rice noodles, medium size, rehydrated (see note)
3 to 4 tbsp (45 to 60 mL) neutral oil
8 to 10 medium to large shrimp, about 21/25 count, peeled, deveined and patted dry
5 cloves (25 g) garlic, chopped
1/3 cup (40 g) thinly sliced shallots
2 large eggs
2 1/2 cups (150 g) bean sprouts
8-10 stalks garlic chives, cut in 2-inch (5 cm ) pieces (see note)
1/4 cup (35 g) unsalted roasted peanuts, coarsely chopped, divided
1/2 lime, cut in wedges
Roasted chili flakes (optional)

For the sauce:

Step 1

Melt the sugar in a small pot over medium-high heat. Once melted, let it cook for a bit longer, until the colour becomes a deeper caramel but not quite dark brown. Once this colour is achieved, immediately add the water; it will splatter aggressively and the sugar will harden. Turn the heat down to medium and swirl it around until most of the sugar is dissolved.

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Step 2

Turn off the heat and stir in the tamarind paste and fish sauce. Don’t worry about a few stubborn chunks of sugar; they’ll have dissolved by the time you need the sauce.

For the pad thai:

Step 3

Using scissors, cut the soaked noodles roughly in half so it’s easier to mix them with the veggies. Place all your prepped ingredients by the stove, ready to go.

Step 4

Place a wok or large non-stick skillet on high heat and pour in just enough oil to coat the bottom. Once the oil is very hot, lay the shrimp down in one layer and let them sear without moving them until at least halfway cooked, about 2 minutes. Flip and cook on the other side until they are done. Turn off the heat and transfer the shrimp to a bowl, leaving all the oil and any juices behind.

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Step 5

Add a bit more oil to the pan if needed so that you have about 3 tablespoons (45 mL). Having enough oil is important to make sure that the noodles don’t clump together.

Step 6

Add the garlic and shallots, and turn the heat to medium. Stir until the shallots are translucent, about 2 minutes.

Step 7

Turn the heat up to the hottest it can go, and add the noodles and sauce. Toss together until most of the sauce has been absorbed. At this point it will look like there aren’t nearly enough noodles, but don’t panic, the dish will bulk up with the veggies and proteins.

Step 8

Push the noodles to one side of the pan to create space for the eggs, then break the eggs into the pan. Scramble slightly just to break the yolks, then move the noodles on top of the eggs and let the eggs continue to cook for another 30 to 45 seconds, until they are mostly cooked. Flip the noodles and then toss to break up the eggs.

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Step 9

Give the noodles a quick taste to check their doneness. If they’re too chewy, add a splash of water and keep tossing for 1 minute or so to allow the water to absorb.

Step 10

Add the shrimp back to the pan, along with any juices, and toss to mix. Turn off the heat and add the bean sprouts, garlic chives, and half of the peanuts. Use tongs to mix just until everything is evenly distributed. Plate immediately — you want the bean sprouts to be as fresh as possible, so don’t let them linger in the hot pan unnecessarily.

Step 11

Top with the remaining peanuts and serve with wedges of lime. Add some roasted chili flakes for heat, if desired.

Serves: 2

Do-ahead: Make the sauce in advance; it can be kept in the fridge indefinitely. Soak the noodles in advance, drain and refrigerate for up to 3 days.

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Notes: For quick-soak noodles, submerge them in hot off-the-boil water for 3 minutes, then immediately drain and rinse under cold water. If you have time, soak the noodles for 1 hour in room temperature water and then drain; you can do this in advance and keep them in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days. This timing is for medium-size Erawan-brand rice noodles; you may need to adjust if using a different brand.

Garlic chives are a key flavour in pad thai and they’re available at most Asian grocery stores. If you can’t find the dark-green ones, look for yellow ones. In a pinch, 2 to 3 green onions will work instead, but chop them smaller, as they are stronger-tasting.

Avoiding Soggy Noodles

Most recipes in my book serve four, but for pad thai I recommend you stir-fry the noodles in batches of two servings. Crowding the pan, especially with a low-BTU home stove, can result in soggy noodles because steam gets trapped under all the food and your noodles end up simmering in liquid longer than they should. If you’ve got a powerful stove and a large wok, you may be able to get away with a larger batch, so use your judgment here. You can also try reducing the amount of water in the sauce, or omitting it altogether, if you feel like you might be crowding the pan.

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HOMEMADE TAMARIND PASTE

Nam Makaam Piak

Cooking time: 20 minutes plus 20 minutes soaking

1/2 pound (225 g) seedless tamarind pulp (see note)
2 cups (500 mL) hot water

Step 1

Use your hands to pull apart the tamarind block into small chunks and place them in a large, heatproof mixing bowl.

Step 2

Pour the hot water over the tamarind and let it sit until it’s cool enough for you to handle, at least 20 minutes. You can let it sit for as long as you need at this point — the longer it sits, the easier the next step will be.

Step 3

Use your hand, preferably gloved if you don’t want tamarind stuck in your nails, to squeeze and scrunch the pulp to loosen it from the fibres. You should end up with something that has the consistency of a smoothie.

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Step 4

Once you can feel that most of the pulp has been released from the fibres, strain the tamarind mixture into a pot through a sieve, but avoid a fine-mesh sieve, as the paste will be thick (Asian noodle strainers work great for this ). Push as much of the liquid through as possible, and scrape the bottom of the sieve occasionally.

Step 5

Gradually pour about 1/2 cup (125 mL) room temperature water over the remaining fibres in the sieve while using your hand to mix it all around. This will rinse off any last little bit of tamarind still stuck in the fibres.

Step 6

You can use the tamarind paste right away for cooking, but for storage, cook it over medium-high heat until it boils, stirring constantly, because it is quite thick and can bubble and jump at you if you don’t stir. Allow it to bubble for 4 to 5 minutes to ensure that it is thoroughly heated through before turning off the heat.

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Step 7

Transfer the hot tamarind paste to clean 1-cup (250 mL) mason jars. I like using the smaller ones so each jar will not be open for as long. Close the lids while the paste is still hot and let cool at room temperature before moving to the fridge for storage. You can also freeze the paste in ice cube trays and then store the cubes in freezer bags.

Makes: about 2 cups (500 mL)

Note: Buy tamarind pulp that comes in a rectangular block, and it should be a product of Thailand. Do not use tamarind pulp from whole pods, as those are sweet tamarind meant for eating, not cooking.

Recipes and images excerpted from Sabai: 100 Simple Thai Recipes for Any Day of the Week by Pailin Chongchitnant. Copyright ©2023 Pailin Chongchitnant. Photographs by Janis Nicolay. Published in Canada by Appetite by Random House®, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher. All rights reserved.

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Our cookbook of the week is Sabai: 100 Simple Thai Recipes for Any Day of the Week by Pailin Chongchitnant. Read an interview with the author.

Article content

Jump to the recipes: salad rolls with spicy garlicky dip, old-school pad gaprao, and minimalist pad thai.

The first recipe Vancouver-based author Pailin Chongchitnant shared with us from her second book, Sabai, is one of her relatively recent discoveries. On a visit home to Bangkok several years ago, her mom would pick up salad rolls with spicy garlicky dip on her way home from work.

“I just thought they were so cute, and so healthy and so good,” says Chongchitnant, laughing. “It’s a salad roll like I’ve never seen before in Canada, too. Usually when you think salad rolls, you’re thinking of those things in Vietnamese restaurants and there’s a peanut sauce or something. And this was totally different.”

Thai food culture moves quickly, and the rolls have already started to fall out of fashion, she adds. Chongchitnant is happy to have immortalized them in the book so they can always be enjoyed. “It’s still one of my favourite ways to eat vegetables, because I don’t really like to eat raw vegetables. It’s not really my thing, but I can eat a ton of these.”

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(To see the rolling technique in action, check out the video on Chongchitnant’s YouTube channel, Pailin’s Kitchen.)

While the salad rolls are a contemporary addition to Thai cuisine, the second recipe, pad gaprao, is a classic. “A true staple of the Thai diet,” the one-dish meal is popular in Canada as well as Thailand, but the modern version has become more and more complex, says Chongchitnant.

Today, pad gaprao is made with oyster sauce, soy sauce and vegetables such as long beans and onions, she explains. The older version is more streamlined, with no vegetables and a simple fish sauce seasoning. Though it’s easier to make, it has started to disappear in favour of more elaborate contemporary variations.

“Nowadays in Thailand, there’s this wave of people who want to go back to old recipes, the old ways of doing things. So that’s a new trend, which is kind of ironic. It’s a trend of going back to traditional foods. And so this started coming on the radar and I thought, ‘Well, this is so much simpler than the other one. So let’s put this down.’ And also as a way to preserve it. Again, if it ever falls out of fashion, we will always have this as a reference.”

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(In Sabai, Chongchitnant follows her old-school pad gaprao with a vegan version featuring mushrooms, tofu and holy basil.)

The third recipe Chongchitnant shared with us, minimalist pad thai, is not a recipe she expected to include in a book dedicated to simple, everyday Thai cooking. Mostly because pad thai is not meant for home cooking — it’s a dish most people order out.

“I’ve always told people, pad thai is not a beginner-friendly dish. If you’re a beginner, this is not something you should start with. But everyone wants to make it. And I’m like, ‘OK, OK. If you want to make it, fine. Let’s figure out a way to simplify it so that it’s not quite as complex, but it still tastes good and I can still feel good calling it pad thai.’”

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The hard part about making pad thai, aside from gathering the ingredients, is getting the right noodle texture (see Avoiding Soggy Noodles, below). “So, in that sense, it’s still something you need to get good at.” The cooking itself can be done in five minutes, once you have all your ingredients prepped. (If you’d like to try the full-on version, check out Chongchitnant’s video.)

For her minimalist take, Chongchitnant narrowed down the ingredients to what she considers the absolute essentials — all of which can be found at an Asian supermarket such as T&T. She doesn’t even make traditional pad thai regularly at home, and doesn’t order it at most Thai restaurants either.

“It is not easy to do well, and a lot of restaurants will take a lot of shortcuts because the fully loaded version is tedious. It’s got a lot of ingredients, so a lot of restaurants will just pare it down so far and make too many substitutions where it’s not pad thai any more for me. So, with this recipe, I really wanted to be like, ‘OK, let’s pare it down, but this is as far as I’m willing to go,” she says, laughing.

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SALAD ROLLS WITH SPICY GARLICKY DIP

Cooking time: 30 minutes

Spicy garlicky dip:
1 clove (5 g) garlic
1/2 to 1 Thai chili
1/4 + 1/8 teaspoons (1.5 mL) table salt
1/4 cup (60 mL) mayonnaise
1 1/2 tbsp (22 mL) sweetened condensed milk
1 1/2 tbsp (22 mL) lime juice

Salad rolls:
7 sheets of 8-inch (20 cm) round Vietnamese rice paper
4 to 5 cups (70 to 90 g) baby salad greens
14 (3-inch/8 cm long) strips of protein of your choice (see note)
1 cucumber, cut in 3-inch (8 cm) sticks
1 carrot, thinly julienned (I use a julienne peeler)
Any other veggies or herbs you like (bell peppers, avocado, beets, sprouts, cilantro, mint, Thai basil)

For the dipping sauce:

Step 1

Using a mortar and pestle, pound the garlic, chili and salt into a fine paste. Add the mayo, condensed milk and lime juice; stir until combined. Taste and adjust the seasoning as needed. The sauce will keep in the fridge for at least 1 week.

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For the salad rolls:

Step 2

Cut a rice paper circle in half with scissors. Prepare a large bowl of hot tap water (as hot as you can stand dipping your hands in).

Step 3

Dip a piece of halved rice paper in the water for 8 to 10 seconds, then put it on a clean work surface, the flat edge facing either to the left or right. Let it sit for another 10 to 15 seconds, until it has absorbed all the water around it and the sheet has softened. Fold about 1 inch (2.5 cm) of the rounded side toward the centre, so that you now have two straight sides.

Step 4

In your hand, stack about 4 leaves of baby salad greens, with the stems facing the same direction. Lay the salad stack on the rice paper, about 2 inches (5 cm) above the edge closest to you, making sure the tops of the leaves are sticking out about 1/2 inch (1.2 cm) over the left side of the rice paper. Repeat with another stack of greens, placing it on the right side of the paper in the same way.

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Step 5

Place the protein and all the other vegetables on top of the greens, centring them horizontally so that they will cut evenly when you cut the salad rolls in half.

Step 6

Pick up the edge closest to you, fold it over the filling and roll it away from you, keeping the salad roll as tight as you can. You will end up with a salad roll with two open ends. Cut the roll into two pieces and place each piece, cut side down, on a serving plate. Repeat with the remaining rice paper circles, greens, protein and vegetables.

Step 7

Serve the salad rolls at room temperature with the dipping sauce. If not serving right away, keep them well wrapped with plastic wrap or in an airtight container, to prevent drying.

Makes: 28 pieces

Do-ahead: The dip can be made up to a few days in advance. The salad rolls can be made a few hours in advance and kept well wrapped with plastic wrap or in an airtight container at room temp.

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Note: For the protein, my favourites are ham, roast chicken, shrimp, imitation crab and firm or pressed tofu (especially the marinated kind). Anything that you like in a sandwich will work here. Cut them into sticks about 3 inches (8 cm) long and about the thickness of a thick-cut french fry.

Too Lazy to Wrap?

Serving a lot of people and don’t want to spend time wrapping? I am with you 100 per cent. You can make your guests do the work by setting out the ingredients and a couple of bowls of hot water for a “make your own salad rolls” party. Or you can do even less work and serve the sauce as a dip for a veggie platter — the best part is the sauce, anyway!

OLD-SCHOOL PAD GAPRAO

Pad Gaprao Moo Kai Dao

Cooking time: 10 minutes, plus 5 to 10 minutes if frying eggs

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2 to 3 Thai chilies, or as many as you can handle
1/3 cup (40 g) chopped mild red peppers (see More Than Just Heat below)
7 cloves (35 g) garlic
Oil for frying eggs (optional)
4 eggs (optional, see note)
2 to 3 tbsp (30 to 45 mL) neutral oil
1 lb (450 g) lean ground pork
2 tbsp (30 mL) fish sauce
2 tsp (10 mL) granulated sugar
1 1/2 cups (22 g) holy basil or Italian basil leaves (see note)
Jasmine rice, for serving

Step 1

Using a mortar and pestle, pound the Thai chilies until fine, then add the mild red peppers and garlic and pound into a rough paste.

Step 2

If you’re making fried eggs, make them now. In a small non-stick frying pan, heat about 1/3 inch (8 mm) of oil over medium-high heat. Test the temperature of the oil by adding a little piece of vegetable scrap, like the garlic or pepper, and it should bubble excitedly right away. Once the oil is hot, add 1 egg. The white should bubble up right away. Using a spoon to occasionally baste the top of the egg with oil to help it cook faster, cook for about 1 minute for a runny yolk, or 2 minutes for a set yolk. You want the white crispy and browned, so if it’s not browning, turn up the heat. Remove the egg from the pan and drain on paper towel; repeat with the remaining eggs.

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Step 3

Place a wok on medium heat, then add the oil and garlic-chili paste. Stir for about 2 minutes, until the smallest bits of garlic start to turn golden.

Step 4

Turn the heat up to high, add the ground pork, then quickly toss to mix with the garlic-chili paste. Add the fish sauce and sugar, and keep tossing and breaking up the pork until it is fully cooked.

Step 5

Turn off the heat, then add the holy basil and cook just until wilted. Taste and adjust the seasoning with fish sauce and sugar as needed.

Step 6

Plate and serve with jasmine rice. If serving as a one-dish meal, place the rice on a plate, spoon the pork over it, and top everything with the fried egg.

Serves: 4

Notes: Pad gaprao is typically paired with a fried egg when served as a one-dish meal. If serving as part of a multi-dish Thai meal, you can omit the egg.

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You might be tempted to use Thai basil instead, but Italian basil is actually the better substitute.

More Than Just Heat

I usually say you can make things as spicy as you want, but for the real pad gaprao experience, you should make it as spicy as you can handle! But it’s not just about the heat, as chilies also provide flavour that’s important to this dish. This is why we use mild and hot chilies; the mild ones add the needed chili flavour without making the dish too spicy. Red bell pepper will work, but preferably something smaller and less watery. The seeds and pith can be removed to reduce heat.

MINIMALIST PAD THAI

Cooking time: 15 minutes

Sauce:
3 tbsp + 1 tsp (40 g) finely chopped palm sugar, packed
3 tbsp (45 mL) water
4 tbsp (60 mL) tamarind paste, store-bought or homemade (recipe follows)
2 tbsp (30 mL) fish sauce

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Pad thai:
4 oz (115 g) dried rice noodles, medium size, rehydrated (see note)
3 to 4 tbsp (45 to 60 mL) neutral oil
8 to 10 medium to large shrimp, about 21/25 count, peeled, deveined and patted dry
5 cloves (25 g) garlic, chopped
1/3 cup (40 g) thinly sliced shallots
2 large eggs
2 1/2 cups (150 g) bean sprouts
8-10 stalks garlic chives, cut in 2-inch (5 cm ) pieces (see note)
1/4 cup (35 g) unsalted roasted peanuts, coarsely chopped, divided
1/2 lime, cut in wedges
Roasted chili flakes (optional)

For the sauce:

Step 1

Melt the sugar in a small pot over medium-high heat. Once melted, let it cook for a bit longer, until the colour becomes a deeper caramel but not quite dark brown. Once this colour is achieved, immediately add the water; it will splatter aggressively and the sugar will harden. Turn the heat down to medium and swirl it around until most of the sugar is dissolved.

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Step 2

Turn off the heat and stir in the tamarind paste and fish sauce. Don’t worry about a few stubborn chunks of sugar; they’ll have dissolved by the time you need the sauce.

For the pad thai:

Step 3

Using scissors, cut the soaked noodles roughly in half so it’s easier to mix them with the veggies. Place all your prepped ingredients by the stove, ready to go.

Step 4

Place a wok or large non-stick skillet on high heat and pour in just enough oil to coat the bottom. Once the oil is very hot, lay the shrimp down in one layer and let them sear without moving them until at least halfway cooked, about 2 minutes. Flip and cook on the other side until they are done. Turn off the heat and transfer the shrimp to a bowl, leaving all the oil and any juices behind.

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Step 5

Add a bit more oil to the pan if needed so that you have about 3 tablespoons (45 mL). Having enough oil is important to make sure that the noodles don’t clump together.

Step 6

Add the garlic and shallots, and turn the heat to medium. Stir until the shallots are translucent, about 2 minutes.

Step 7

Turn the heat up to the hottest it can go, and add the noodles and sauce. Toss together until most of the sauce has been absorbed. At this point it will look like there aren’t nearly enough noodles, but don’t panic, the dish will bulk up with the veggies and proteins.

Step 8

Push the noodles to one side of the pan to create space for the eggs, then break the eggs into the pan. Scramble slightly just to break the yolks, then move the noodles on top of the eggs and let the eggs continue to cook for another 30 to 45 seconds, until they are mostly cooked. Flip the noodles and then toss to break up the eggs.

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Step 9

Give the noodles a quick taste to check their doneness. If they’re too chewy, add a splash of water and keep tossing for 1 minute or so to allow the water to absorb.

Step 10

Add the shrimp back to the pan, along with any juices, and toss to mix. Turn off the heat and add the bean sprouts, garlic chives, and half of the peanuts. Use tongs to mix just until everything is evenly distributed. Plate immediately — you want the bean sprouts to be as fresh as possible, so don’t let them linger in the hot pan unnecessarily.

Step 11

Top with the remaining peanuts and serve with wedges of lime. Add some roasted chili flakes for heat, if desired.

Serves: 2

Do-ahead: Make the sauce in advance; it can be kept in the fridge indefinitely. Soak the noodles in advance, drain and refrigerate for up to 3 days.

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Notes: For quick-soak noodles, submerge them in hot off-the-boil water for 3 minutes, then immediately drain and rinse under cold water. If you have time, soak the noodles for 1 hour in room temperature water and then drain; you can do this in advance and keep them in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 days. This timing is for medium-size Erawan-brand rice noodles; you may need to adjust if using a different brand.

Garlic chives are a key flavour in pad thai and they’re available at most Asian grocery stores. If you can’t find the dark-green ones, look for yellow ones. In a pinch, 2 to 3 green onions will work instead, but chop them smaller, as they are stronger-tasting.

Avoiding Soggy Noodles

Most recipes in my book serve four, but for pad thai I recommend you stir-fry the noodles in batches of two servings. Crowding the pan, especially with a low-BTU home stove, can result in soggy noodles because steam gets trapped under all the food and your noodles end up simmering in liquid longer than they should. If you’ve got a powerful stove and a large wok, you may be able to get away with a larger batch, so use your judgment here. You can also try reducing the amount of water in the sauce, or omitting it altogether, if you feel like you might be crowding the pan.

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HOMEMADE TAMARIND PASTE

Nam Makaam Piak

Cooking time: 20 minutes plus 20 minutes soaking

1/2 pound (225 g) seedless tamarind pulp (see note)
2 cups (500 mL) hot water

Step 1

Use your hands to pull apart the tamarind block into small chunks and place them in a large, heatproof mixing bowl.

Step 2

Pour the hot water over the tamarind and let it sit until it’s cool enough for you to handle, at least 20 minutes. You can let it sit for as long as you need at this point — the longer it sits, the easier the next step will be.

Step 3

Use your hand, preferably gloved if you don’t want tamarind stuck in your nails, to squeeze and scrunch the pulp to loosen it from the fibres. You should end up with something that has the consistency of a smoothie.

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Step 4

Once you can feel that most of the pulp has been released from the fibres, strain the tamarind mixture into a pot through a sieve, but avoid a fine-mesh sieve, as the paste will be thick (Asian noodle strainers work great for this ). Push as much of the liquid through as possible, and scrape the bottom of the sieve occasionally.

Step 5

Gradually pour about 1/2 cup (125 mL) room temperature water over the remaining fibres in the sieve while using your hand to mix it all around. This will rinse off any last little bit of tamarind still stuck in the fibres.

Step 6

You can use the tamarind paste right away for cooking, but for storage, cook it over medium-high heat until it boils, stirring constantly, because it is quite thick and can bubble and jump at you if you don’t stir. Allow it to bubble for 4 to 5 minutes to ensure that it is thoroughly heated through before turning off the heat.

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Step 7

Transfer the hot tamarind paste to clean 1-cup (250 mL) mason jars. I like using the smaller ones so each jar will not be open for as long. Close the lids while the paste is still hot and let cool at room temperature before moving to the fridge for storage. You can also freeze the paste in ice cube trays and then store the cubes in freezer bags.

Makes: about 2 cups (500 mL)

Note: Buy tamarind pulp that comes in a rectangular block, and it should be a product of Thailand. Do not use tamarind pulp from whole pods, as those are sweet tamarind meant for eating, not cooking.

Recipes and images excerpted from Sabai: 100 Simple Thai Recipes for Any Day of the Week by Pailin Chongchitnant. Copyright ©2023 Pailin Chongchitnant. Photographs by Janis Nicolay. Published in Canada by Appetite by Random House®, a division of Penguin Random House Canada Limited. Reproduced by arrangement with the Publisher. All rights reserved.