Pork and Spring Onion Dumplings ( Giew Num )

These are boiled dumplings with pork and spring onion, the strongest taste is the fresh onion taste. They can be served as a starter or as a snack and can be frozen if needed. If you freeze them, they should be cooked from frozen, simply cook them a minute or two longer to allow them to defrost.

Ingredients for 2 People
100 gms Wheat Flour
1 Egg
1 Teaspoon Oil
150 Pork Mince
1 Teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoon Light Soy Sauce
1 Teaspoon Pepper
3 Garlic Cloves
2 Sprigs Coriander Leaves
2 Spring Onions (approx 20 gms)

Preparation
1. Whip the egg, put into the flour and add the oil.
2. Mix these together and knead them a little to form a dough.
3. Leave the dough for 5 minutes to rest it, this makes it easier to work with.
4. Into a food process, put the pork, add the garlic, the spring onion, the light soy sauce, the salt, pepper, and coriander leaves.
5. Blend until the filling is well mixed.
6. Pinch off small pieces of dough, and roll them on a flat oiled surface into small circles (approx 6cms diameter).
7. Put the meat filling into the middle of the pastry, and fold the pastry over and crimp the edges to form a closed dumpling.
8. Boil a pan of water, drop the dumplings into the boiling water and cook for 4 minutes.

Pork Mushroom Parcels - Chow Mei ( Khanom Jeap )

Another Thai variant of a Chinese dish. These are pork mushroom and carrot parcels, we called them 'Dim Sum' but our Chinese friends say the correct name for this type of starter is 'Chow Mei'. Served as a starter or a snack, each parcel is approximately 3cms across.

Ingredient for Pastry
200 gms. Wheat Flour ( Enough for 40 )
2 Tablespoons Oil
1 Teaspoon Salt
1 Teaspoon Sugar
2 Eggs

Ingredient for Filling
100 gms Pork Mince
3 Shitake Mushrooms
2 Carrots
1 Spring Onion
30 gms Coriander Leaves
1 Egg
2 Teaspoons Salt
2 Tablespoons Oyster Sauce
4 Garlic Cloves
2 Tablespoon Cassava Starch (Or corn starch)

Preparation for Pastry
1. Put the salt, sugar, and flour into a bowl and mix it.
2. Beat the eggs together and mix into the flour.
3. Knead it until it forms a dough.
4. Set the dough aside for 20 minutes, it should be covered with a damp towel to prevent a skin forming.

Preparation for Filling
1. Soak the shitake mushroom for 5-10 minutes.
2. Chop shitake mushroom, carrots, spring onions, coriander leaves, and garlic,into small pieces. It is easier to blend it in a food processor.
3. Add the blended mix into the pork mince and add the egg, salt, oyster sauce and cassava starch, and mix well.

Assembly
1. Cut the dough into very small balls.
2. On a slightly oiled or floured surface, roll the dough into small circles (approximately 6cms diameter).
3. Spread the filling evenly over the dough.
4. Lift up the edges into of the dought to form the sides - this will squeeze the filling into the centre.
5. For best results pleat the edges of the pastry to form pleated sides of the parcels.

Cooking and Storing
Add this point you can freeze them on a floured tray, or cook them straight away.
To cook them, place them in a Chinese steamer and steam for 10 minutes.

Isan Suki ( Jaew Hon Jeap Joom )

I've done Thai suki-yaki before, this is the simpler Isan variant, which uses a tom-yum pan, and plenty of meat. The main elements of this dish are a meat plate, a vegetable plate, a soup and 3 seasoning sauces. The meat is cooked in the soup, together with the vegetables at the table.
To cook this dish, the soup pan needs to get hot. If that is not possible, then you should precook the meat and vegetables before bringing them to the table. The best option of all is a tom-yum pan without the centre hole (not like the one shown in the photograph), together with a proper charcoal or oil burner. You can then cook the meat on the centre plate to brown it first, them move it to the soup. Unfortunately for me, I only have a regular tom-yum pan and have to make do with cooking the meat in the soup.

Ingredients for Meat Plate
500 Pork Meat (or your preference)
100 gms Pork Liver
2 Tablespoons White Wine
1 Tablespoons Toasted Sesame Seeds
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce

Preparation For Meat Plate
1. Clean the pork meat and pork liver.
2. Slice them very thinly and mix with the white wine, light soy sauce and sesame seeds.
3. Leave to marinade for at least 30 minutes.

Ingredients for Sweet Chilli Sauce
5 Tablespoons Sweet Chilli Sauce
4 Bird Chillies
3 Garlic Cloves
2 Tablespoons Fish Sauce

Preparation Sweet Chilli Sauce
1. Peel the garlic.
2. Put the garlic, chillies, sweet chilli sauce and fish sauce into the blender and blend until it's well mixed.
3. Alternatively pulp them in a Thai mortar.

Ingredients for Green 'Seafood' Sauce
5 Bird Chillies
4 Garlic Cloves
2 Tablespoons Vinegar
1/3 Teaspoons Sugar
2 Teaspoons Lemon Juice
2 Tablespoons Fish Sauce

Preparation for Green Sauce
1. Peel the garlic.
2. Put all the ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth.
3. Alternatively pulp them in a Thai mortar.

Ingredients for Sukiyaki Sauce
6 Tablespoons Sweet Chilli Sauce
2 Tablespoons Vinegar
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
1 Tablespoon Sugar
30 ml Sesame Oil
2 Tablespoons Toasted Sesame Seeds
2 Tablespoons Chopped Coriander
5 Garlic Cloves

Preparation for Sukiyaki Sauce
1. Peel the garlic.
2. Put everything in a blender except for the toasted sesame seeds.
3. Blend everything together.
4. Add the sesame seeds on the top as a garnish.

Ingredients for Soup & Vegetable Plate
800 ml Water
1 Chicken Stock Cube
30 gms Chinese Radish
40 gms Celery
40 gms Carrot
40 gms Chinese Cabbage
40 gms Coriander Leaves
40 gms Spring Onions
40 gms Cauliflower
40 gns Glass Noodle

Preparation
1. Clean and slice all the vegetables and put onto the vegetable serving plate.
2. Boil the water with stock cube, add the chinese radish and bring to the boil to form a stock.
3. Light the burner in the serving pan.
4. Empty the stock into pan.
5. Each person takes some of the meat and vegetables and cooks it in the sauce for 5 minutes.
6. Once cooked, they remove it into their plate and dip the meats into the sauces to their own tastes.

Note: if you don't have a hot burner, hot enough to cook the meat, then cook the meat and vegetables in the stock by simmering it for 3-5 minutes before serving it.

Thai Spicy Chicken Pizza ( Pizza Karpow Kai )

Yes the title is correct! Thailand has influences from other countries and although not very common, we do have pizza! This is my own special recipe for Thai pizza. The main part of the pizza is Kaprow Kai - you can see this recipe elsewhere on this site, it is a spicy chicken mince and as a result the pizza is very unusual, with no tomato and a very different flavour. Use a mild cheese like gouda or cheddar so as not to smother the flavour of the mince.

Ingredients for 2 people
200 gms Wheat Flour
1 1/2 Tablespoon Yeast
1/2 Tablespoon Sugar
1 Teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoon Oil
80 ml Water

Ingredients for the Topping
150 gms Chicken Mince
1 Tablespoon Oyster Sauce
1 Tablespoon Fish Sauce
1 Tablespoon Light Soya Sauce
4 Red Chillies
2 Garlic Clove
2 Tablespoon Oil
4 Basil Leaves
1 Teaspoon Sugar
200 gms Cheese (Gouda or Cheddar)

Preparation of Base
1. Sift the flour into large mixing bowl.
2. Mix the yeast with 1 tablespoon of water and add to the flour.
3. Mix the sugar, salt, and oil, into the flour then add the rest of the water and kneed it until the flour is well mixed and soft.
4. Form the dough into a ball and cover with a wet towel to prevent a skin forming on the dough.
5. Leave for 30 minutes to let the yeast work and the dough rise.

Preparation For Spicy Chicken
1. Chop the chillies and garlic and fry in the oil.
2. Add the chicken mince and stir fry for 2 minutes.
3. Add the fish sauce, light soya sauce, oyster sauce, and sugar, and fry for 2 minutes.
4. Turn off the heat and add the basil and stir.

Preparation For Pizza
1. Preheat the oven to 170 degrees celsius.
2. Roll the dough into a pizza shape.
3. Put the base into the oven for 10 minutes to part cook it, this is important, the oil in the chicken will soak the bread base unless it is precooked.
4. Add the spicy chicken topping to the pizza and cook for a further 5 minutes.
5. Grate the cheese over the pizza and put it back in the oven cooking until the cheese is cooked (about 10 minutes).

Spicy Caramelized Eggs ( Kai Look Kui )

This is a side dish of quails eggs in a spicy sugar-caramel sauce. In Thailand we normally use larger duck or even chicken eggs, but for the best ratio of sauce to egg the smaller quails eggs are perfect.

Ingredients for 2 People
7 Quail Eggs
Oil for Frying
3 Red Chillis
2 Garlic Cloves
1 Teaspoon Chopped Coriander Leaves
1 Tablespoon Chopped Onion
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
2 Tablespoons Fish Sauce
1 Tablespoon Vinegar
1 Tablespoon Sugar

Preparation
1. Boil the eggs for 5 minutes, remove them and place in cold water. Peel off the shell and cut in half.
2. Put oil in the frying pan and fry the quail egg halves until they are brown, remove and put on the serving plate.
3. Slice the chilli and the garlic and put in frying pan with 1 tablespoon oil, fry for a minute to release the flavours.
4. Turn the heat to medium, add the light soy sauce, fish sauce, sugar and vinegar and fry until the sugar caramelizes and the sauce thickens and becomes brown.
5. Pour the sauce over the eggs.
6. Add the raw chopped onion over the eggs, together with the chopped coriander leaves.

Spicy Fish ( Pa Chorn Sam Rort )

A sour-spicy salty fried fish dish, fried fish dishes are a staple of Thai cuisine, we love the crunchy texture of the fish coupled to spicy chillies!

Ingredients
200 gns Fish (Hake Cod etc.)
Oil for Deep Frying
5 Red Chillies
3 Garlic Cloves
2 Tablespoons Vinegar
2 Tablespoons Fish Sauce
2 Tablespoons Sugar
2 Tablespoons Oyster Sauce
1 Tablespoon Light Soy Sauce
2 Tablespoons Oil

Preparation
1. Clean the fish and slice into 3 cm thick slices. Dry then take to deep fry until the fish is golden and crunchy, then set aside.
2. Pound the garlic with the chilli in a Thai mortar.
3. Put oil into a frying pan, and heat it over a medium heat.
4. Add the pounded garlic, and chillies and fry until the smells are released.
5. Add all the ingredients and cook until the sugar is dissolved.
6. When serving pour the sauce over the fish.

Rice & Chicken Ball Soup (Koatum Gai)

This is a simple soup consisting of mostly rice with chicken mince balls. Flavour with fresh sliced ginger, fried garlic and dry flaked chilli if you want to add some spice.

Ingredients for 2 People
150 gms Thai Fragrant Rice
100 gms Chicken Breast
800 ml Water
5 Garlic Cloves
1/2 Teaspoon Pepper Corns
1 Chicken Stock Cube
50 gms Coriander Leaves
20 gms Ginger Root
1 Teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoons Fish Sauce

Serve With
Fried Garlic
Dried Flacked Chillis
Sugar
Vinegar

Preparation
1. Boil the water with chicken stock cube.
2. Mince the chicken together with the garlic, salt, and pepper corns in a blender.
3. Form into balls of meat with a teaspoon and drop into the boiling water.
4. Add the rice into the boiling pan and simmer for 15 minutes - stirring frequently.
5. Add the fish sauceand cook for a further 5 minutes.
6. Slice the ginger into fine slices and add to the soup.
7. When you serve the soup add the fried garlic, chilli flakes, sugar, a little vinegar and some coriander. Each guest can choose the flavourings they want to use.