Phat mi Khorat

Thin noodles fried dry with a fermented fish sauce, darker and plainer than pad thai.

Pork, Fish. Not vegetarian — contains fish, fish sauce, pork.

Ingredients

• 300 g thin dried rice noodles
• 300 g pork, in thin slices
• 3 tablespoons fermented fish, strained
• 4 tablespoons palm sugar
• 3 tablespoons tamarind paste
• 2 tablespoons dark soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons fish sauce
• 6 garlic cloves, chopped
• 4 tablespoons oil
• 150 ml water
• 100 g beansprouts, raw, to serve
• 4 spring onions, in lengths

Method

1. FERMENTED FISH IS THE SEASONING, AND IT IS STRAINED FIRST. Boil it in a little water, strain, and use the liquid only; the solids carry bone. That liquid is what makes this taste of itself rather than of the pad thai on this site, which is built on tamarind and dried shrimp and is far brighter.
2. SOAK THE NOODLES, NEVER BOIL THEM. Warm water 20 minutes until pliable with a pale core.
3. NO EGG AND NO PEANUTS, which is the other half of the difference from pad thai. This is plainer, darker and sweeter.
4. Make the sauce first: strained fish liquid, palm sugar, tamarind, dark soy and fish sauce warmed together until the sugar dissolves. Taste it -- sweet, sour, deeply savoury.
5. Hot pan, oil, garlic 15 seconds, pork 3 minutes.
6. Drained noodles in with half the sauce and the water.
7. FRY THEM UNTIL THE PAN IS DRY AGAIN, 4 to 5 minutes, tossing. The noodles should take up all the liquid and begin to catch. If there is sauce pooling, keep going.
8. Rest of the sauce in and cooked off the same way.
9. They should end up dark brown, glossy and separate, not wet.
10. Spring onions for the last 30 seconds. Serve with raw beansprouts on the side rather than stirred through.

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