Welsh Girl In Thailand
I fell in love with Thai food many years ago and we even honeymooned in Thailand, I’m certainly no expert on Thai cuisine but I do know what I like to eat. The Thai dishes I make are inspired by those I ate in Thailand and I try to replicate the flavours as closely as I can.
Whilst in Thailand I undertook a one day cookery course which ignited a fire within me to try more Thai cooking when I got home and I have ever since. I found a delightful little Chinese supermarket in Swansea, which stock lots of Thai ingredients, even fresh vegetables and herbs and I’ve shopped there ever since.
Sometimes Thai recipes can seem a little daunting because there are lots of new ingredients, but Thai cooking is so popular these days you can find most items in your usual supermarket, and the recipes themselves are usually very straight forward.
Pad Thai
Ingredients
1 tbsp Dried Shrimp
150g dried rice noodles
Vegetable oil
2 eggs
2 garlic cloves
180g fresh prawns
220g beansprouts
2 spring onions
4 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp ketchup
2 limes
½ tsp easy chilli or chilli flakes
1 tbsp palm sugar
2 tbsps peanuts
Fresh coriander
Method
1. Grind the dried prawns to a fine powder, I use my nutrabullet, but you could use a pestle and mortar.
2. Put the noodles in a dish and cover with boiling water, leave for about 15 minutes while you get the rest of the ingredients ready, test by tasting, they should be al dente but edible. When ready drain them and coat them in a little oil.
3. Heat 1 tbsp of oil in a frying pan, lightly beat the eggs, add to the pan, keep swirling the pan until the egg is spread thinly, removed from the heat whilst still soft to prevent over cooking. Once cool enough slice into thin slices, set aside.
4. Mince the garlic, slice the spring onions into 1cm pieces, crush the peanuts and chop about 3 tbsp of coriander.
5. Mix together the shrimp powder, fish sauce, ketchup, juice of 1 lime, chilli and sugar and mix to make a sauce.
6. Heat some oil in a wok, add the garlic and the prawn, as soon as the prawns turn pink remove them and set aside.
7. Add the noodles to the wok, followed by the egg strips, bean sprouts, spring onions and finally the sauce, stirring constantly over a high heat. Once everything is heated through add the prawns.
8. To serve, sprinkle over the peanuts and coriander leaves, I serve mine with a wedge of lime.
Top Tip
This recipe used prawns, but prawns can easily be substituted for chicken, pork or tofu, or you could just add some extra veggies.
