My new favorite Thai dish

Cafe Society
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Met Mrs. solost for lunch at our favorite Thai restaurant yesterday. I had been stuck in a bit of a rut between either Pad Thai or a red curry like a Gang Dang.

But while idly browsing YouTube the other day I had seen a video by a westerner living in Thailand about the go-to dish that Thai people typically make for themselves and eat (he claimed that Pad Thai is more for the tourists; Thai people seldom eat it themselves). The dish was Pad Kra Pao.

So I saw it on the menu and tried it. Delicious! And so simple to make. It’s definitely going to get into the dinner rotation in the solost household. The most difficult thing will be locating some fresh Thai Holy Basil. I might have to get a couple plants and grow it myself.

Here’s what looks like a decent recipe for it:

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The local Thai place has 'pad basil’ on their menu (#17). Your link looks tastier.

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Yeah, the pad basil at your place doesn’t look like it’s spicy enough. Pad kra pao needs some Thai chiles or an acceptable substitute to give it the proper kick.

Also it looks from the pic that they’re using sweet basil, and I understand that Thai Holy Basil is key to the right flavor.

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Good choice, anything with thai basil in it gets a thumbs up from me.

If your local place has it and you fancy a change one of my personal favourites is laab gai. which is a minced chicken dish that I like with more chilli than is medically advisable.

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Felicity Cloake in her " How to cook the perfect …" series in the Guardian did it about 18 months ago. Great series in which she checks out all the different versions of a recipe to come up with the best way to do it.

How to make the perfect pad kra pao, or Thai stir-fry – recipe

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I almost always get the yum beef salad (yum nua) from the local place. It has marinated beef with lime juice, red onions, green onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, and as much chiles as I like (I order 5-star). They also have larb gai, but I’ve never tried it.

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That’s what I would picture as a common Thai dish, akin to an American burger or dog with condiments. It wouldn’t matter which peppers it’s made with to me and while I’m sure it is best when made with holy basil it’s probably still good with any flavorful variety.

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This recipe calls for fish sauce which the recipe in the OP did not. I was under the impression that most Thai dishes used fish sauce.

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The recipe in the OP uses only oyster sauce, the oyster sauce is optional in the other one. I’ve seen both fish and oyster used together in many Thai dishes. The recipe in the OP also calls for both light and dark soy sauce, the other recipe makes soy sauces optional. These are matters of personal taste, not simply in terms of flavor, but other concerns like the quality of the sauce produced in the dish or just simplicity in minimizing the number of ingredients.

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Never had it at a Thai restaurant but I found the recipe online and made it at home several times. It was a good option when I was doing Keto- I sustituted crushed toasted almonds for the toasted rice.

Never claimed the recipe I posted was the best- it seemed like a good representative example recipe that I found online. It used Thai characters in the title so I assumed it was reasonably authentic :blush:

If and when I make it I’ll most likely add fish sauce.

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Just checked out this recipe and it does appear superior to the one I posted. I like the idea of trying it with beef as well- I had the chicken version yesterday- pad kra pao gai- and I bet beef is as good or better. A shrimp or seafood version would be interesting as well.

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When my friends and I are looking for any recipe the first question is always, “Has Felicity Cloake done this?” And she often has. So any recipe search in Google begins, “Felicity Cloake perfect…”

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Yes this is one of my go-to dishes. I usually make it with minced chicken but my wife is pescatarian, so maybe I’ll try it with shrimp next time. I don’t add egg or birds eye chili because nobody in my house can handle the heat, but if it’s for me I definitely do!

Luckily we have an Asian market nearby that has holy basil and my pantry always has fish sauce…

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I made it for dinner last night. Yummy. I used the Felicity Cloake recipe as a jumping-off point, with some changes both from necessity and my own choice. Green beans? Uh, no.

I settled for Italian basil, since I was not going to find Thai holy basil at the grocery and the FC recipe said that Italian is actually closer to holy basil than the other Thai basil, so is an acceptable substitute. Appently then, I according to the FC recipe, I made a pad bai horapa.

I also could not get Thai chiles on short notice, so I used several Jalapenos along with crumbled-up dried red chiles to get the heat profile where we all like it. The Thai place I got the Pad Kra Pao from on Friday also used Jalapenos, so maybe local Thai places have trouble sourcing true Thai-style chiles as well.

I also did not include the egg, since the restaurant version did not have the egg, and I was basically trying to emulate that version.

For the sauce I used 2 tblsp fish sauce with 1tblsp each soy and oyster sauce. This made the fish sauce a little too fish sauce-forward, so next time I will go with equal parts fish, soy and oyster sauce. Per the FC recipe:

…to quote Punyaratabandhu, “it must be pointed out that purists maintain that oyster sauce and soy sauce — two ingredients that are almost always added to pad kra pao — should not be used … However, chances are the pad kra pao which you have fallen in love with isn’t made by purists.”

As mentioned I was trying to emulate the restaurant version I had on Friday, which didn’t seem too fish sauce-forward; not some platonic ideal ‘pure’ version of it.

Other deviations from the FC recipe:

I used brown sugar instead of 'caster sugar"-- not even sure what that is.

The FC recipe states:

Rosa’s add sliced lime leaves to their version, which lend a wonderful fragrance to the dish, but it’s one that distracts from the basil, so I’m going to leave them out.

I think a little acid from citrus balances the salty umami of the sauce, the sweetness of the sugar and the heat of the peppers nicely, so I added a little lime juice. Maybe when I make it in future with real Thai holy basil I’ll leave it out, but I think it worked well in yesterday’s version.

In any case, a big success and a definite addition to the solost meal rotation! Definitely want to try a beef and a seafood version, and will have to be on the lookout for a source of holy basil.

Looking forward to having the leftovers for lunch! :yum:

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Caster sugar is just white sugar with a finer grind than regular white sugar.

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Yep. The Thai holy basil chicken (or whatever protein) is my default Thai order, served as spicy as the restaurant is willing to make it (I think this dish is perfect for that kind of treatment) with a fried egg to finish.

Also, this is my go-to Thai dish at home, as well, and why I grow as many peppers and Thai basil plants as I can. If I’m lucky, I can find a holy basil plant (grapao [or any of a thousand transliterations] as is proper for this dish), but I’m happy just using Thai sweet basil (horapa) or cinnamon basil. (I grow any combination of those in the summer, though it’s been a few years since I’ve gotten my hand on holy basil.)

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Hmm a local Thai place has Pad Bai Gra Pow on the Grub hub. I’m thinking that is just a different transliteration.(no picture) Unfortunately that place still has 4 months left on the “screwed last order up so bad I’m giving you a full year before I try again” probation.

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Yep. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen “bai”, but chicken is “kai” or “gai” typicall on Thai menus, and then the second half is all over the place. The ks might be k, kh, g; the p might be ph or b, the r might come in the first syllable, the second syllable, or in both. The ao might also be ow. It may be one word or two words. And probably some variations I’m forgetting.

ETA: Oh, bai might refer to the leaf of the Holy Basil, not a typo for gai/kai or something.

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Bai might not really be meant to be chicken. This It’s one of those places that orders the menu by curry/sauce and main veggies, but has the meat/protein on a secondary menu all under the single name.

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Yeah, I got that sense when I looked around to see if “bai” meant anything, and if seems to mean something like “leaf”.