“Blue Elephant”

Bangkok

I owe everything I know about Thai cooking to this restaurant. Of course, I’ve learned more over the years. But the wonderful Khun Nooror Somany Steppe laid the foundation for me in 1998 at her excellent cooking school !


Pad Thai – a favorite recipe among tourists




Ingredients:

2 shrimp

1 egg

80 g rice noodles

1 1/2 tbsp. vegetable oil

1 clove of garlic

1 small shallot

20 g tofu

20 g finely chopped peanuts

(20 g sweet turnips, finely chopped)

5 g dried shrimp

20 g spring onions

40 g bean sprouts




Seasoning:

1 tbsp sugar

1 tbsp fish sauce

1 tbsp vinegar

1/2 tbsp tamarind juice

1 clove of garlic




Garnish:

Coriander leaves

a few deseeded chillies, to taste

1/2 lime

1 small shallot










Preparation


Finely chop the garlic and shallot. Heat the oil in a wok. Briefly fry the garlic and shallot until fragrant. Add the shrimp, tofu, and sweet preserved radish, stirring constantly. Crack in the egg and stir it through. Add the noodles and keep stirring until they’re soft. Briefly stir in the seasoning. Finally, add the dried shrimp and chopped peanuts. Mix well. Gently fold in the bean sprouts and sliced spring onion. Serve garnished with lime, a little chili powder, and coriander leaves.

Drizzle the lemon juice over the Pad Thai.

You can also season it to taste with Prik Nam Pla (recipe below).

Mango sticky rice - World-class!

This most famous Thai dessert is my absolute favorite! It simply showcases a distinctive feature of Thai cuisine: the combination of sweet and salty flavors, something unknown in our dessert cuisine.



COLLABORATIONS

Mango Sticky Rice Recipe (serves 2)

If you want to make this recipe at home, there’s just one problem: ripe yellow mangoes can be quite hard to find here. They’re also expensive, as they have to be flown in. You can find mung beans and sticky rice in any Asian grocery store.



01

Ingredients

  • 200g sticky rice
  • 400 ml creamy coconut milk
  • 100g sugar
  • 1/2 tsp. salt
  • 2 tbsp dried yellow mung beans
  • 2 ripe yellow mangoes

 

02

Preparing sticky rice and mung beans


1. Rinse the sticky rice thoroughly in a bowl of warm water, repeating until the water runs clear. Soak the rice in water for about 6 hours or overnight.


2. Soak the mung beans in warm water. Then pat them dry and lightly toast them in a pan over low heat until golden.


3. Drain the rice through a fine-mesh sieve and steam it in the sieve over a pot filled three-quarters full with water for 20 minutes, covered. Turn the rice over and steam for another 10 minutes.

 

03

Topping

Briefly heat 100 ml coconut milk with 30 g sugar and 1/4 tsp salt, then mix it into the sticky rice.

Warm the remaining coconut milk with the sugar and salt. Keep stirring in one direction, or the coconut milk will curdle!


04

Arranging the mangoes

Peel the mango thinly, then slice across it with a knife. The pit is very flat, so you’ll get two halves that are easy to cut into thick slices. Put the sticky rice on a plate, with the mango beside it. Pour the coconut cream over the sticky rice and sprinkle the toasted mung beans on top. Ready to serve!

Tom Kha Gai

"Baan Rim Paa"

Phuket

New text

Tom Kha Gai 

Ingredients:


2 cups coconut milk

2 tsp sliced Thai ginger (galangal)

1/2 tsp turmeric

1 tsp lime juice

2 tbsp. finely chopped shallots

2 stalks lemongrass

1 cup chicken breast, cut into pieces

1 cup coconut cream

1 1/2 tbsp. chillies, deseeded (!) and halved

1 1/2 tbsp. fish sauce

1 tbsp finely chopped coriander

 

   

 

  

  

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Preparation:

   

Heat the coconut milk, then add the galangal, turmeric, lemongrass cut into 5 cm pieces, and shallots. Add the chicken pieces. Simmer for 15 minutes, stirring.

Then stir in the coconut cream and chilies. Bring briefly to a boil. Stir in the lime juice and fish sauce. Finally, sprinkle coriander over the soup and serve!

 

   

 

 

   

   

 

 

 

Pad Krapao

This is one of the most popular Thai street food dishes. At a street stall, it costs about 40 baht, or €1.10. The name roughly translates as “fried holy basil.” It’s a special kind of fried rice, and one of my favorites! I learned to cook this recipe at the wonderful Blue Elephant restaurant in Bangkok!!


Ingredients (1 serving)


100 g minced pork

5 tbsp. chicken stock

3 tbsp vegetable oil


Seasoning paste:

2 cloves of garlic

2g (3 small pieces) Thai chilli

1/4 tsp shrimp paste

1 shallot

Vegetables:

1 kaffir lime leaf

10 Thai “Holy Basil” leaves (available at Asian grocery stores)

15 g red chillies, deseeded

20 g baby corn

1 Thai long bean or green bean

Seasoning:

1 tsp fish sauce

1 tsp light soy sauce

1 tsp oyster sauce

1 tsp sugar

1


Preparation


Pound the garlic, chili pieces, finely chopped shallot and shrimp paste in a mortar until you have a smooth paste.

Heat the oil in a wok, add the seasoning paste and stir for 1 minute, until fragrant. Add the minced pork and stir quickly until cooked through. Mix in the baby corn, chillies and kaffir lime leaf, then pour in the chicken stock. Finally, stir in the seasoning (mix the ingredients beforehand). Add the basil and remove from the heat.

Serve. You can also briefly fry a few Holy Basil leaves first and remove them. Add them to the dish when serving.

P

Chilli dip “Prik Nam pla”

You’ll find this chilli dip on every table in a Thai restaurant. Since not everyone can handle the same level of heat, it’s easy to adjust the amount to suit your taste. But this dip is also salty, sour and sweet all at once. And it’s very easy to make at home!

Recipe:

3 garlic cloves, finely chopped

3 shallots, finely chopped

5 chillies, finely chopped

2 tsp sugar

2 tbsp lime juice

4 tbsp. fish sauce (available at Asian grocery stores)

Mix everything together and you’re done. Keeps in the fridge for two weeks!

Khanom krok

Kanom Krok is a traditional Thai coconut pudding snack that’s very popular in Thailand and sold everywhere as street food.

Taste

Kanom Krok snacks are golden brown and crispy on the outside, soft and pudding-like on the inside. They taste fantastic—sweet and wonderfully fragrant.

Ingredients

Traditionally, they’re made with rice flour, sugar and coconut milk. Freshly made coconut milk is best, or at least use coconut milk of the highest quality. It makes all the difference to the taste.


 

  

Duck Curry

This wonderful recipe from the "Blue Elephant Restaurant" in Bangkok is one of my favorites! It’s not very well known and is fairly easy to prepare.


Ingredients (4 servings)


200 g duck breast

160 g fresh pineapple, finely chopped

8 cherry tomatoes

24 grapes

4 cloves of garlic

4 coriander roots/stems

4 tbsp sunflower oil

4 tbsp red curry paste

1 tsp. toasted coriander seeds and cumin

1000 ml coconut milk

4 tbsp fish sauce

4 tsp sugar

4 kaffir lime leaves, finely chopped (available at Asian grocery stores; they also freeze well)

20 Thai basil leaves

4 red Thai chilies

4 tbsp coconut cream

Preparation


In a mortar, pound the garlic cloves together with the coriander roots and stems. Heat the oil and fry the garlic and coriander paste, toasted coriander and cumin seeds, and curry paste, stirring continuously, for about 3 minutes, until fragrant. Slowly add the coconut milk and heat through. Slice the duck breast, skin-side down, and add it to the pan along with the pineapple and halved cherry tomatoes. Cook for 1 minute. Fold in the halved grapes and very finely sliced kaffir lime leaves. Thinly slice the halved and deseeded chillies and add them to the pan. Done! Finish by garnishing with Thai basil.