Anyone cooking Thai at home outside LOS?

[markle]

I cook Thai at home most of the time and I was wondering if anyone is interested in swapping hints, tricks etc.

[Pharcyde]

Hi Markle,

 

I can do only a few dishes. Mostly its the Pat Kapow Gai, moo nam tok, or a bowl of tom yam. The occasional curry is edible too.

 

I have a problem of hitting the correct taste with the sauce of the Kapow dish. Last time I tried to use dark soy sauce instead of the "white" soy sauce. It improved, but its still not the "spot on" taste.

What kind of sauces do you guys mix in the wok to get the original taste?

 

Tanks

PS

 

 

 

 

[Torneyboy]

Hi

Cooking Thai the secret is in the fresh ingredients IMO.

 

My Thai wife owns a Thai Restaurant ii Sydney and cooks at home many dishes...i watch but no way i can do these dishes.

 

Dash of this dash of that...not a measure in sight.... tasting all the time and add more.

 

Leave it to her.

 

I help chop up some things but that is as far asx i can go with Thai Food ::

[jasmine]

[color:"red"] correct taste with the sauce of the Kapow dish. Last time I tried to use dark soy sauce instead of the "white" soy sauce. [/color]

 

May I suggest that you mix the dark soy sauce with fish sauce. Lots of times, the Kapow dish, the soy sauce is added just for the color. My mother said once that the secret of Kapow is the pepper mixture, not the sauce. Her pepper consist of onion. garlic and a pinch of tamarind which gives a little sharp taste without it being sour and a pinch of sugar.

 

Jasmine

[mongatu]

I don't use soy sauce at all in that dish. Just sliced shallots, minced garlic, minced ginger, sliced green and red chilis, a little fish sauce, all to taste, and about two tsp. brown sugar, plus the thai basil and chicken of course. Seems to come out pretty close to what I got in LOS.

[Pharcyde]

Hi Jasmine,

You said,

"Her pepper consist of onion. garlic and a pinch of tamarind which gives a little sharp taste without it being sour and a pinch of sugar."

 

So all these ingredients are pounded and mashed together, right?

 

I have just started to pound garlic and a few "prik ki nuu", and that I put into the wok. Seems to help with the taste. And ok, next time Ill try and add a little tamarind too.

 

As Mongatu mentioned that he adds ginger aswell...hmmm...never seen that happen...but then the Kapow comes in many versions.

 

Ill try.

 

Tanks

PC

 

...and what about the meat, do you guys marinate it beforehand? My girl keeps on telling me that it has to be marinated, but when I order it on location they always just pull the meat straight out of the ice-box and into the wok.

 

[jasmine]

[color:"red"] So all these ingredients are pounded and mashed together, right?

 

[/color]

 

Not mashed smoothly, She barely crush the peppers, but the garlic and onion are mash quite smoothly. She also cooks the onion and garlic first until alsmost brown, before adding pepper.

 

It is true, ones can add ginger and cut-up long green beans which is very similar to the Phad Kee Mow".

 

I never marinate any meat but my mother will stir fry the meat first to be added to the pepper/onion/garlic mixture. The stir fry does not use oil in this case, it is like pre-cook the meat with its own juice in a hot pan, try it, the meat turns out quite flavorful by itself and when you do the Kaprow, you need only one table spoon of oil then.

 

On stirrfrying vegetable. a trick that I learn from my family's Chinese cook is adding a small amount of sliced ginger and using the left-over oil from frying fish. These 2 ingredients make the vegetable taste good.

 

By the way, be careful with the tamarind because too much will make the food taste bitter, in fact I don't use it but I use a small amout of lemon juice with the same result.

 

Well, you make me hungry!

 

Jasmine

[Pharcyde]

Jasmine,

Thanks for the tips. I will cut and paste them into my cook-book.

 

Cheers.

Pc