Khao chae

Cooked rice rinsed until the water runs clear and served in scented iced water, with side dishes.

Pork, Shellfish, Egg. Not vegetarian — contains pork, shellfish, shrimp paste.

Ingredients

the rice and water

• 400 g jasmine rice
• 1.5 litres water, for the scenting
• 2 handfuls jasmine flowers, or 3 pandan leaves
• ice, to serve

shrimp paste balls

• 3 tablespoons shrimp paste
• 200 g dried shrimp, pounded
• 4 shallots, chopped
• 40 g galangal, chopped
• 3 tablespoons palm sugar
• 2 eggs, beaten, for coating
• oil, for frying

on the side

• 6 sweet stuffed peppers
• 4 tablespoons sweet shredded pork
• 1 white radish, carved or sliced
• 6 spring onions
• 1 cucumber, in batons

Method

1. THE RICE IS RINSED AFTER COOKING UNTIL THE WATER RUNS CLEAR. That is the step that makes this work and the one that sounds wrong: cook the rice, then wash the cooked grains in cold water, rubbing gently, two or three changes, until the water is no longer cloudy. Unrinsed, the starch clouds the scented water within a minute and the whole bowl goes grey.
2. Cook the rice slightly firmer than usual -- it has to survive rinsing and then sit in cold water.
3. SCENT THE WATER COLD, OVERNIGHT. Boil and cool the 1.5 litres first, then float the jasmine on the surface in a covered bowl and leave it 8 hours. Heat destroys the scent, so flowers must never be steeped warm.
4. Lift the flowers off rather than straining, so no petals end up in the bowl.
5. If jasmine is unavailable, bruised pandan gives a different and perfectly good scent; what cannot be substituted is scenting it at all.
6. Shrimp paste balls: pound the dried shrimp, shallots and galangal to a paste, fry it with the shrimp paste and palm sugar 8 minutes until thick and dry enough to roll.
7. Cool, roll into 2 cm balls, dip in beaten egg and fry until gold.
8. Chill everything separately and keep the water very cold.
9. TO SERVE: rice in the bowl, ice on top, cold scented water poured over. The side dishes go on their own plate and are eaten BETWEEN mouthfuls of rice, never dropped in -- they are salty and strong and would ruin the water they are meant to contrast with.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Thailand · All recipes