Darwin's Thai Kitchen

I love Som Tam, It is a uniquely Thai salad. Spicy and cool. Made with green papayas. It goes best with sticy rice and barbequed chcken or fish. Also great by itself. I am also experimenting with some fusion.

What you need:

Mortar and Pestle
Large Spoon

Ingredients:

3 cloves of garlic with the skin peeled off
2-4 small Thai chillies (start with 2)
1/2 Tablespoon coconut sugar
30 centimeters of long green beans cut into 4cm pieces
1 tablespoon dried dehydrated shrimp soaked in warm water for 10 minutes
2 tomatoes
2 cups grated green papaya
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 1/2 tablespoon fish sauce
2 tablespoons skinned dried peanuts

How to make it so:

1. Peel the green papaya shed into strips and keep
2. Peel the garlic cloves and place in mortar
3. add chillies in mortar and pound with pestle
4. add coconut sugar, green beans, and shrimp. Pount again with pestle. Be careful not to splash chillie juice in your eyes.
5. add tomatoes and gently pound with pestle.
6. add papaya
7. add lime juice, fish sauce, and peanuts.
8. use spoon to circulate the ingredients into middle of mortar while pounding with pestle for 1-2 minutes.
9. serve and enjoy

get some sticky rice, and chicken or fish. Excellent accompanied by a cold beer. I personally use 3 chillies but if you are not used to them maybe a godo idea to start slow and build up. I hope you try this wonderful dish. Enjoy.

This is a great Thai dish, with a flavor all its own. It is just spicy enough. I love to cook this and to eat it.

What do you need:

Ingredients:

2 Tablespoons Soya Bean Oil
4 Cloves garlic crushed and chopped with skin on
2-4 Small chillies crushed
200 Grams chicken cut up into bite size chunks
soak in hot water about 10 minutes
1 1/2 Tablespoons fish sauce
2 Tablespoons Oyster sauce
2 Teaspoons granualted white sugar
10 Small leaves Thai Holy Basil
30 Large leaves Thai Holy Basil

What to do with all this wonderful stuff:

1. Take a small bowl and marinade the chicken with the fish sauce, oyester sauce, sugar, and small holy basil leaves. Get all this stuff interacting well, oh means mix together thoroughly.

2. On medium heat place wok and with oil in it on heat.

3. Add the garlic to the wok, when you smell the garlic a cooking, add the marinaded chicken. Fry the chicken untit it turns white. Add the remaining holy basil leaves and chillies, Cook to your liking.

4. Now you can serve it. Thais like to eat it with rice. I don't like a lot of rice so I eat it with stir fried or steamed vegetable.

5. Sit down to eat and enjoy your meal.

P.S.

Holy Basil Batman!!!! This basil is a natural mosquito repellent. WOW. There is a method to the culinary madness besides just great taste. Actually I learned about the other traits of holy basil when learning survival tactics and techniques in the military.

This is one of my favorite Thai dishes I hope you try it and enjoy it.

What you will need:

1/2 cup thin rice noodles (after soaked in water)
1/3 cup bean sprouts
1 tablespoon garlic slice garlic chives
1 tablespoon dried shrimp, deep fried
1 tablespoon sweet pickled radish, chopped
3 tablespoon oil
3 fresh shrimps, shelled and deveined
1 egg
1 tablespoon crushed peanunts
1 tablespoon bean curd, sliced into 1/2 inch cubes
1/3 cup water

For your seasonings:

1 tablespoon fish sauce
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon tomato sauce
2 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon chili sauce
1 teaspoon chili powder

For garnish is you want:

bean sprouts
spring onions
lime

How to bring it all together:

1. Heat oil in pan, add fresh shrimp, bean curd and noodles. Stir well for 3-5 minutes then add water. Cook and stir until the noodles are tender.

2. Add the seasonings, bean sprouts and garlic. Beat in the egg, then add dried shrimp and peanuts. Continue to heat and stir until the liquid is gone but the noodles are still moist and tender.

3. Serve hot and garnish with bean sprouts and spring onions, use the limes to squeeze on your meal.

This recipe is for a single dish so adjust accordingly for how many you are cooking for, I highly recommend you give this one a try. You'll be glad you did.

note: you can subsitute pork or chicken for the shrimp

Sticky rice with mangoes is a delectible seasonal Thai dessert. Available during the yellow mango season.

What you need:

double steamer
cloth filter
pandanus leaves

Ingredients:
2 cups sticky rice (glutinous rice)
2 cups thick coconut milk
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
3 ripe yellow mangoes (cut into slices)
1 tablespoon mung beans (roasted)
1 tablespoon corn starch
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar

Put it all together:
You have to plan this ahead of time because you need to begin by soaking the rice in water 3-5 hours.

1. Rinse and drain the rice twice. Soak it in water 3-5 hours.

2. Bring water to boil in double steamer. Fold some pandanus leaves inside a white cloth filter. The leaves provide fragrance to the rice. Place the rice on the cloth in the upper part of the steamer. Steam for 20 minutes then turn rice over and steam an additional 15 minutes.

3. Boil seasonings over medium heat then drain through a cloth filter. Then leave to cool.

seasonings: (included in ingredients)
1 1/2 cup thick coconut milk
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt

4. Add hot sticky rice to seasonings. Cover and allow to cool for about 1 hour.

5. The remaining ingredients less the mangoes are heated together to a boil. Drain through cloth filter and use for topping.

6. Roast the mung beans in a frying pan and sprinkle on the rice after topped with sauce.

7. Place mango slices on plate beside rice, top rice with sauce and sprinkle with mung beans.

mmmm mmmm good, now is the season so making the most of it. A refreshing dessert. This recipe makes 3-4 servings.

When cooking, the ingredients don't just magically appear, unless you buy the recipe in a box or can and just add water.

After I decide what it is I want to cook I make a list of everything I need. If I don't have it already, it's off to the market. I could buy most everything at the Tesco/Lotus walking distance from my home but my market of choice is Nong Bua Market here in Ubon Ratchathani.

The reason I prefer the market is the vendors are friendlier. I suspect some of this is due to that fact that their income depends on how many sales they make, whereas Lotus clerks get paid the same no matter what.

I love the interaction and joking going on as I make my way through the market finding the spices or produce I need to make my dinner. If I can't find what I want soemone is always willing to help me and point me in the right direction too.

I think we have lost a bit of our humanity with the impersonal methods we have today. Buy my own ingredients for something also makes sure I know what is in my dinner. If you have the chance you should try this and do some shopping at your local farmers market or whatever they call it in your area. Happy cooking and shopping.

Often when we travel to a foreign country and order a meal it's not always necessarily our favorite meal. many times it is a dish we know what it is and how to pronounce it. Example. When coming here to Thaiand as a soldier I have a colleague who couldn't speak Thai and didn't know what the Thai names of the food meant.

But he learned about Fried Rice with Chicken. In Thai it is Khao Pad Gai, pronounced ( Cow Pot Guy). Every meal 3 times a day he would order this. So he earned himself the nickname Cow Pot Guy when we were in Thailand.

What you need:

rice cooker
wok

The Ingredients:

2 Tablespoons soy bean oil
4 Cloves garlic crushed and chopped (leave skin on)
200 Grams skinless chicken breast cut in small cubes
1 Egg beaten
4 Cups cooked rice cooled
2 Tablespoons fish sauce
1 Teaspoon sugar
1/2 Teaspoon Thai chilli powder
2 Spring onions sliced finely
1/2 Lime
1 Teaspoon shrimp floss

for garnish

sliced cucumber
spring onions

Put it all together:

1. beat egg and put aside in separate bowl
2. heat oil in wok on medium heat and fry garlic til you can smell it.
3. Add chicken and stir for 3-4 minutes
4. Add the egg and stir until egg is half cooked
5. Add rice and keep stirring
6. Add sugar, fish sauce, chilli powder, shrimp floss, and spring onions.
7. Cook for a bit longer until the rice is well mixed and the coloring is even.
8. After turn off heat squeeze lime over rice and mix in well.
9. Serve hot with the condiment mixture below.

condiment:

2 Tablesoons fish sauce
4 Cloves garlic, crushed and chopped with skin removed
1/4 Teaspoon sugar
2 Birds eye chillies finely sliced
2 Tablespoons lime juice

mix together and place in small bowl to pour over rice

Makes about 2-4 servings depending on how hungry you are. Become a Cow Pot Guy tonight.