Thai Foodcast

About The Recipe

Pad Thai is a very common dish in Thailand, and can be found throughout the country. Like a lot of foods in Thailand, the best Pad Thai can be usually be found at the street vendors. Pad Thai's combination of succulent shrimp on a bed of noodles, surrounded by crispy fresh vegetables makes it a favorite dish with westerners too.

The real secret though to Pad Thai is the sauce, the sour of the tamarind paste should not be overwhelmed by the sweetness of the palm sugar. Add in the fish sauce, and you have a sauce that's equal parts sweet, sour, and salty, perfectly balanced together. This is where Pad Thai's signature taste comes from.

Personal tastes being what they are, Pad Thai is usually served with additional lime, chili, peanuts, chives and sprouts on the sides so that people can flavor the dish to their preferences. A quick tip: if you are one of those people who don't like things "too fishy", we'd recommend leaving out the dried shrimp in this recipe.

Please keep in mind Pad Thai is not really "easy Thai food", in that there are a lot of ingredients and prep time, and the proportions have to be just right. If you are just starting out cooking Thai food, you may be better off starting with one of our other recipes. But so many people asked us how to make this recipe we thought we would share our version, please let us know how you like it.

Recipe Info

• Serves: 2-3
• Preparation Time: 20 Minutes
  
• Cooking Time: 20 Minutes

• Wok
• Sauce Pan
• Spatula

• 4 tablespoons of cooking oil
• 3 cloves of garlic
• ½ lb Rice noodle (also called Rice Sticks).
• 6 medium sized Shrimp
• ½ cup firm Tofu
• 2 Eggs
• ¼ Cup Dried Shrimp (optional)
• 1 cup of Bean Sprouts
• ½ Cup Chives or Green Onion
• ¼ Cup Ground Peanuts
• 1 tsp. of Ground Chili Pepper (optional)
• ¼ Cup of Water
• ¼ Cup of Tamarind Sauce
• ¼ Cup Fish Sauce
• ¼ Cup Palm Sugar

Purchase Asian Ingredients for this Recipe Online Here.

Preparation

• Soak the noodles in warm water about 15-20 min or until soft.
• Chop the garlic into small pieces.
• Dice the tofu into small cubes.
• Cut chives into 1" long pieces.
  
• Chop the roasted peanuts.

Cooking

Making the Sauce

• Turn the stove to the medium heat, and place sauce pan on burner.
• Heat the pan, and add the Tamarind Sauce, Fish Sauce, and Palm Sugar and stir until the sugar is dissolved.
• When the sauce starts to boil remove from the heat and set aside.

Making Pad Thai

• Turn on the stove to the high heat, and place your wok on the burner.
  
• Add the oil.
• When the oil is hot add the garlic.
• Fry garlic about 1 min but don't let it turn to yellow or brown.
• Add the Tofu and stir.
• Add Dried Shrimp, if you can't find it or don't like a fishier taste, you can skip it.
  
• Stir for about 30 seconds.
• Add Fresh Shrimp.
  
• Stir until the shrimp is pink and cooked through.
• When the Shrimp is cooked, reduce the heat to medium.
• Add the Noodles, and stir it together.
• Add the Water to soften the noodles.
• Add the sauce that we already pre-made, stir it until the noodles are soft, about 2 minutes.
• Add the Eggs , and stir for about 30 seconds, until the Eggs start to cook.
  
• Add Ground Peanuts and stir it all together
• Add Bean Sprouts and Chives
• Stir it all together for about 1 min and then it's done!

Serve