This dish is very common in Thai, Cambodian, and Lao cuisines - with slight differences.  It is one of my favourite dishes. It is super tasty and I would strongly recommend it to anyone. 

For the ingredients you will need: 

1 1/2 tablespoon of Thai red curry paste
2 eggs
200 ml of coconut milk
150 g of sliced squid
100g FINELY minced pork
1 cup of basil ( preferably Thai basil if you can find some)
1 red chilli
4 kaffir lime leaves
5 choi sam
2 tablespoon of fish sauce
1 tablespoon of oyster sauce
1 tablespoon of sugar

The coconut cream that goes on top of it at the end, and for that you will need:

100 ml of coconut milk
1 tablespoon of rice flour or corn flour 

Start off by chopping up the chilli and kaffir lime leaves in a strip fashion, and pull the basil leaves off the branch. Set aside.

Now we can start making the mixture. Start off by beat up the 2 eggs. Add the curry paste, mix well and make sure there is no lumps left. Then add the coconut milk, fish sauce, oyster sauce, and sugar. Taste and adjust the taste to your liking.

Now you can put in the pork. Mix really well until a smooth mixture is achieved. Use you hand if you have to. We use finely minced pork because we want the mixture base to be as smooth as possible. Then add the squid, red chilli, and basil. Fold well, don’t mix too hard as you don’t want to bruise anything, and set the bowl aside. 

I’m using Choi Sam here because it was the only thing I could find in the Chinese supermarket at the time, but most people will use cabbage instead. All you do here is chop them up, quite large. And for the cabbage slice them in a strip fashion.

Par-boil the vegetable. Choi Sam here took literally seconds. I didn’t even need to do this step come to think about it now since it can be easily cooked.

Place the boiled vegetable at the base of the containers that you will use. 

Fill up the bowls with the mixture like so..

You can use tin-foil and be as creative as you like. Here, I made them into little boats. :D

Then steam them for a good 20-30 minutes depending on the size of the bowl.

Once done set it aside for a bit to firm up.

While waiting heat up a pot, add the coconut milk and rice flour/corn flour. Keep stirring because coconut milk is very easy to burn. Mix it until the mixture thicken.

To plate up, put the coconut cream on top of the soufflé, sprinkle some red chilli and kaffir lime leaves on top. And there you have it. Surf and turf, Thai style.  

Enjoy cooking! :)

For the ingredients you’ll need:

• 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 pint sour cream
• 1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 (15 ounce) can tomato sauce
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 tablespoon chilli/paprika powder
• 1 cup chopped green bell pepper
• 3 clove garlic, minced
• 8 (10 inch) flour tortillas
• 1 (12 ounce) jar fajitas sauce

First, stir-fry chicken breast with onions and peper until cooked and soften. My fajitas sauce came with an additional Mexican seasoning so I added that as well.

Once the chicken is cooked add the sauce, chilli powder, and sour cream.

Now, we can start wrapping…

Top them with some grated Cheddar.

Pop them into the oven at 175C (350 degrees F) for  20 minutes.

And there you have it, Chicken Enchilada! Serve with salad and a spoon of sour cream if you wish.

Enjoy cooking!

Today, I’ll be making Simple Doughnuts, or the Americans know it as a doughnut hole. :)

For the dry mixture, you will need…
1) 100g of plain/cake flour
2) 1 teaspoon of baking powder 

Mix the two together in a sieve to prevent any lumps of flour. 

In the liquid part of the mixture, you will need…

1) 1 tablespoon of melted butter
2) 2 tablespoon of sugar
3) 2 tablespoon of milk
4) 1 egg 

Add the liquid into the dry mixture bowl.

Mix well with a spatula/whisk. Start off from the middle and work your way outwards to prevent any lumps of mixture.

Heat up a pot of oil. To test if the oil is hot enough, drop a small droplet into the pot and if it float with bubbles appear around it then the oil is ready.

Deep fry them until golden brown, keep turning them to get a uniform colour.

Rest them aside to get rid of any excess oil. 

While waiting for the doughnuts to cool, put sugar into a sandwich bag. In another bag, mix sugar and chocolate/coco powder together. 

Put the doughnuts into each bag. Shake them around until all the doughnuts are well coated. 

And there you have it, Simple Doughnuts! A warm, cosy, and easy to make snack. Serve with a cup of hot beverage to help you get through a winter evening. :D

Have fun cooking! :)

Finally, it’s X’mas break! It’s time for me to get back into cook-like-crazy mode. 
I’ve been craving for Japanese foods for the whole term and could not afford to eat in a restaurant since it’s so expensive here in the U.K., neither did I have had time to prepare them myself. So, it’s the first thing I jumped onto after exams. :)

Okay, let’s start with the Teriyaki marinate/sauce. There are a lot of recipe out there but I made it using…

1) 1/4 cup of soy sauce
2) 1/4 cup of cold water
3) 1/4 cup of mirin (Japanese sweetener) 
4) 2 tablespoon of sugar (preferably brown, but does not have to be)

This is for 2 chicken thighs. 

I’m using 2 chicken thighs here. De-boned and skin is left on.

Rub some sea salt on to the chicken. 

Marinate the chicken in the sauce and left it in the fridge for an hour or two.

For the rice, I’m (of course) using the Japanese rice. The grains are shorter and fatter than Thai Jasmine rice that I usually use. 

After the rice is cooked, we add a mixture to it. The mixture is made up of..

1) 30 ml of (sushi) vinegar
2) 30 ml of mirin
3) 1 tablespoon of sugar

This is for 500g of rice.

What I’m making here is a cucumber roll, smoked salmon&chive roll, and seafood stick roll.

To cook the Teriyaki Chicken, pan-fried the chicken with a little oil in a shallow pan until golden brown. Turn both sides until cooked thoroughly. Add the marinate liquid in and simmer until the sauce is reduced and thickened. And, that is done! Easy,right? :)

Chopped up the chicken pieces, served with the remaining of the Teriyaki sauce.

Now, you can enjoy it, together with Miso soup and Edamame (boiled soy bean). :D

Enjoy cooking! :)

Ginger has been with Thai culinary for many centuries. There is no clear evidence of when and/or where it comes from. It may had been existing in Thailand all along. Many centuries ago, China was the only one country where ginger was grown widely, almost at a commercial scale. This is because of its natural ability to help with a lot of health problem. For example, if you feel bloated in the stomach or have constipation then take about 50g of ginger root, crush it, bring to boil with two cups of water. Sweetener can be added if you prefer. Drink this 3 times a day. It works like magic! Nowadays, ginger are globally grown with the top producers be China, India, Australia, Taiwan, Fiji, and Thailand.

ขิง เป็นพืชที่อยู่คู่ครัวไทยมาช้านาน ไม่มีบันทึกหรือข้อมูลอะไรที่บ่งบอกได้เเน่ชัดว่าขิงได้ถูกนำเข้ามาจากต่างชาติหรือว่าเรามีอยู่เเล้วในประเทศมาตั้งเเต่เเรก บันทึกลายมือบนศิลาจารึกจากช่วงยุคสุโขทัยนั้นได้กล่าวถึงเเค่ เเฟง เเตง เเละน้ำเต้า ในส่วนของพืชผัก ต่อมาในสมัยอยุธยา สยามเรามีการติดต่อกับชาวต่างชาติมากขึ้น ทั้งประเทศตะวันตกเเละตะวันออก ซึ่งช่วงสมัยนั้นประเทศจีนเป็นประเทศเดียวที่มีการปลูกขิงกันอย่างกว้างขวาง เป็นเพราะสัพคุณที่สามารถรักษาโรคได้ต่างๆนาๆ

ถ้าจะว่าขิงได้ถูกนำเข้ามาในไทยก็คงจะเป็นช่วงสมัยอยุธยา เเต่ก็อย่างที่ได้เกลิ่นไปก่อนหน้านี้ว่าไม่มีบันทึกหลักฐานอะไรบ่งบอกเเน่ชัด ปัจจุบันชิงได้ถูกใช้อย่างกว้างขวางในทุกๆประเทศ ประโยชน์ของขิงก็มีมากมาย ยกตัวอย่างง่ายๆก็เช่น เเก้เจ็บคอ ขับเสบหะ เเก้ท้องอืด ท้องเฟ้อ ท้องผูก เป็นต้น

สมัยก่อนคนไทยจะไม่นิยมกินเนื้อสัตว์กันเท่าไหร่ จะกินปลากันซะมากกว่า เเละจะใช้เเคริ่องเทศสมุนไพรต่างๆนาๆเพื่อเป็นการดับกินคาว นี่เป็นเหตุที่ทำให้อาหารไทยเรามีสมุนไพรอยู่มากมาย  

This is a stir-fry dish. In Thai; ‘Gai’ means chicken, ‘Pad‘(the ‘a’ here sounds like ‘u’ in the word ‘but’) means stir-fry, and ‘Khing’ means ginger.  

Ingredients:

       300g chicken

       30g ginger root

       2 bird-eye chillies (I use one big chilli here)

       4-5 closed cup mushroom 

       4 cloves of garlic

       3 spring onion (or 1/2 onion)

       1 Tablespoon(Tbsp) sunflower oil

       1 Tbsp light soy sauce

       1 Tbsp white sugar

       3 Tbsp oyster sauce

       All checked? Let’s roll!     

Slice up mushrooms and set it aside. 

Then peel and wash the ginger root. Slice it up into thin flat pieces like in the photo at the top, this will make it easier to chop them into fine strings. Like so…

Put this in to a bowl of water and add a half teaspoon of salt. This will help the ginger to stay fresh at all time, it also preventing ginger going brown. 

Slice up the chillies and spring onions in a long strip fashion. Just try tilting your knife a little, making an angle away from you. 

Chop up the cloves of garlic.

Now, let’s move on to the chicken.

You can use any parts of chicken you want, but I personally love cooking with chicken leg and thigh. The meat in this part of chicken is very soft, tender, and very succulent. I also leave the skin on just so it adds that extra juiciness. I love food too much to be a health-freak. Plus, this cut of chicken is cheaper than most ready-meat you’ll find on supermarkets’ shelves. The de-boning part is probably what put most people off, but if you don’t find it to be a problem then you have my respect. 

Chop up the chicken like so.

Now, the cooking starts off with heat up the oil in a pan. 

The garlic then goes into the pan. Once the garlic turns a little bit yellow, add the chicken. The mushroom can be added when the chicken is al most cooked. 

After the mushroom soften up a little start adding soy sauce, oyster sauce, and sugar. Add a little bit of water if the whole thing looks too dry. Then TASTE IT!Make any addition as you wish until the taste pleases you.

Add ginger, chillies, and spring onion. Stir around for a minute or so then take it off the heat. 

Now, plate up time!

And there you have it, Gai Pad Khing. Serve with a plate of warm fluffy rice. Enjoy! 

Have fun cooking!

This dish is a spicy and sour pork salad. It is usually served cold along with cold fresh vegetable. This is a simple recipe and very easy to make. If you love a bit of the south-east Asian heat, then you will enjoy this! 

Ingredients: 

    2-3 Chillies. I use bird-eye chillies here.

    1 and a half lime 

    2-3 cloves of garlic

    2 pork chops (any other part will do also)

    1 whole cucumber (or fresh lettuce or cabbage) 

   1 tbsp sea salt

    1/2 Tbsp normal white sugar

    1 Tbsp light soy sauce

    3 Tbsp Thai fish sauce

Let’s start off by chopping your vegetable into chunks, place in a bowl/plate, cover them with cling film then send it straight back to the fridge.

Now we can get on with the main bit. Start of with the making of the salad dressing. 

Chop chillies and garlic cloves into chunky bits before place them into a bowl along with the sea salt.

The soy sauce, fish sauce, sugar, and lime were added. Also add about 2 tablespoon of water to the bowl.

Food processor was used to blend the mixture together. Remember to TASTE. Cooking is all about tasting. If it’s too spicy add a bit of sugar and/or water. If it’s too salty then add some water. Keep going, if needed to, until you get the taste that pleases your palette. But also bear in mind that this dish should hit you with the heat of chillies first, follow with the sourness and sweetness with a bit of saltiness at the back of your tongue.

The dressing is now done and can be left on the side bench while we crack on with the pork. 

Chop up the pork, if you can, try to slice the meat quite thin. A trick here is to spot the lines of the muscle pattern on the meat; to make sure that the meat won’t be hard any dry then make a cut in the opposite direction of the lines. Once all being sliced up, add some soy sauce to the pile of meat and marinate it for a little while. 

Now heat up the water in a pot. Only throw in the meat once the water is boiling. Take it off the heat as soon as all the meat turn white. You do not want to over cook them as they can be very dry and unpleasant to eat. Drain well and allow the meat to rest for 3-5 minutes.

All of the components of our dish is now ready. Let’s plate these baby up!

And now, the dressing sauce.

And…

Here we have it! Moo Ma now. This dressing sauce can also be used with steamed fish. It’s equally delicious, I promise. 

Enjoy cooking!

Let’s start off the brand new blog with RICE. Rice is the main source of carbohydrate in Thai cuisine in the same sense as pasta to Italian cuisine and potatoes to British cuisine. Rice is very important in Thai culinary art, it also is one of Thailand’s main export agricultural products. From studying recorded history, I found out that rice has been along with Thai civilization for over 5,500 years now. One of the evidences was that a pottery from an early age of the civilization was found to be made from husk of rice mixed with mud clay.

Today, most westerners will, at least, have heard of Thailand’s famousJASMINE RICE. For me, jasmine rice is the best when it comes to Thai cuisine. It has a distinctive pleasant aroma to it. It’s a long-grain rice, comparing to basmati and Japanese sushi rice the grain size is half-way between. Not too long, neither too thin nor too wide. Some say it has a nutty aroma and a subtlepandan-like flavour. 

ข้าว สำหรับชาติไทยนั้นเป็นพืชอาหารประจำชาติที่มีตำนานประวัติศาสตร์มายาว นานปรากฏเป็นร่องรอยพร้อมกับอารยธรรมไทยมาไม่น้อยกว่า ๕,๕๐๐ ปี ซึ่งมีหลักฐานจากแกลบข้าวที่เป็นส่วนผสมของดินใช้เครื่องปั้นดินเผาที่บ้าน เชียง อำเภอโนนนกทา ตำบลบ้านโคก อำเภอภูเวียง อันสันนิษฐานได้ว่าเป็น เมล็ดข้าวที่เก่แก่ที่สุดของไทยรวมทั้งยังพบหลักฐานเมล็ดข้าวที่ขุดพบที่ถ้ำ ปุงฮุง จังหวัดแม่ฮ่องสอนโดยแกลบข้าวที่พบนี้มีลักษณะของข้าวเหนียวเมล็ด ใหญ่ที่เจริญงอกงามในที่สูง 

ข้าวหอมมะลิไทยเป็นพันธุ์ข้าวที่ปลูกที่ไหนในโลกก็ไม่ได้คุณภาพดีเท่ากับปลูกในไทย บ้างว่ามีกลิ่นหอมคล้ายใบเตย และเป็นพันธุ์ข้าวที่ทำให้ข้าวไทยเป็นสินค้าส่งออกที่รู้จักไปทั่วโลก 

Now, this is how I would cook my rice.

And of course I’ll be using Thai jasmine rice.

Rice of all kind have to be washed first, always. Most people tend to just ignore this step, but if you pay enough attention to the taste of the cooked rice you may be able to spot how much of a difference this makes. It does not matter how premium and/or expensive your rice is, it still needs to be washed. So, WASH YOUR RICE!

Run cold water through the sieve and use you hand(s) to gently rub all the grain to get rid of any deposited dust. Keep doing this until the water run clear, but it does not need to be totally clear. Just as soon as it becomes less cloudy. It really is your own judgement call. If you are using old rice, it is advised that you soak the rinsed rice in water for about 30 minute, which will make the rice grains less brittle and prone to breakage. 

Drain well before put in a pot.

Put some cold water into the pot. The ratio is 1 cup of rice to 2 cups of water. Now, I would like to share some little trick most Thai people use to measure amount of water. Yes, that’s right. My finger. Haha. I know you might doubt this way of measuring but I guarantee you it works!

Ever since I could remember anything I saw my grandmother measure out water this way. It seems to work with all size of pot as I have tried  before. As you can see in the photo above, put your finger into the water and use the bed or rice as a base, then try to get the water level to be just under the first line(from finger tip) of your finger. You may get it off by a little for the first few times, but if you measure it this way more often you will know exactly how far up your finger the water level needs to go to for you to get that perfect pot of fluffy rice. 

Then I just pop the pot into my awesome rice cooker. If you don’t have one then don’t panic. After the water is added put the pot on heat. Bring it to boil. Once it starts boiling turn the heat right down and keep it simmer at low heat for about 15-20 minutes with a lid on at all time. 

Eureka! There you have it, the perfect fluffy rice. Enjoy!