Here we are again but you can’t actually see us this time, with just a bit of fun revolving loosely around Thai culture.

In case you didn’t know…. Songkran (Thai New Year) was last week and unfortunately we were unable to make a video this year but if you want to know what it is all about take a look at this post  SonKran 2551 it really is a great fun video of our last years Songkran.  We were a little tipsy, she was anyway!!

The weeks leading up to Songkran were marred by civil unrest which made the main news all around the world. It did no good for tourism in Thailand as foreign nationals were advised not to come to Thailand.

Basically, it  started last year some time before Christmas the “Yellow Shirts” as they were know, closed the Main Bangkok airport you may remember (amongst other things), in an effort to oust the PM.  It worked and a new one was installed.

The “Red Shirts” who had been surprisingly quiet then get angry over the new PM and the way he was chosen so they start protesting to get him ousted and just before Songkran disrupted the SE Asia Summit Political event.

Well I have photographic evidence that Thai Politics are now on a cordial and even Keel …

On to more serious matters:

Following my recent TickerTack and subsequent recuperation we did a little travelling with some friends from the UK.

Anyway we won’t bore you with the holiday snaps.  “Whew!” I can hear you sigh!

It’s just not our style is it? ……

We’re going to bore you with our holiday videos instead!!

In Nakhon Ratchasima where we live;  The King of Thailand keeps (just a few) race horses, we thought you might like to see them in the bath!

Sorry we couldn’t film the Horses racing but we did manage to get some rare footage below

Thailands Racing Pigs

Truth is stranger than fiction and to prove it look what we saw at the zoo.  Edited highlights including Thailand’s famous “Racing Pigs” ~ “Feeding Tigers with Piglets” and the “Elephants Day Off”!

Have fun in Your Kitchen

Warmest Regards

Jules and the voice that must be obeyed!

Comments and questions below please

Mackerel Salad

Lovely Mackerel Salad, what can say?  She’s trying my patience with yet another fish recipe and yet again its another winner!

I stuck a couple of chillies into it looking like the devils horns (joking around for the photo) which is a bit misleading really.  This fantastic Mackerel salad when done properly, is not overly spicy at all.  In spite of containing four finely chopped Thai chillies (besides the two horns) it a lovely balanced salad chock full of aromatics and fried broken fish, in this case Mackerel but you can use practically any fish of your choice for this recipe.

In the members top tips section we explain how to do this which fish are best and vary the meal quite considerably also including a few short cuts.

If you are a Thai cooking newbie, if you are a regular “Thai Foodie” or even a seasoned chef, you’re going to learn something from Khwanjai’s Thai Cooking School

Sign up for Khwanjai’s Trial Thai Cookery Course Your first step to mastering Thai food, it’s a 7 recipe Banquet course plus a few special bonus’s

Warmest Regards

Jules and ‘er Ladyship

Here’s Where you’ll find the Full Mackerel Salad Recipe

Below is a basic, quick guide to the recipe together with this tiny preview video

Thai Mackerel Salad Recipe

Ingredients:
Mackerel
Lemon Grass
Thai chillies
Toasted Peanuts
Spring Onions
Coriander
Ginger
Lime
Shallots
Fish sauce
Sugar
Chicken stock

How to Make Mackerel Salad

Prep:
Chop the Lemon Grass and chop the Chillies
Spring Onions cut into small logs
Chop coriander – Shallots
Fry the fish for 2 minutes either side and remove to cool

Putting it all together:

Break the fish meat into a large mixing bowl removing bones
Squeeze in the juice of 2/3 lime and the fish sauce, chicken stock and sugar
Add the lemon grass, ginger, chillies and shallots and mix
Lastly add coriander and spring onions and mix again
Serve on a bed of lettuce with the toasted peanuts scattered on top
Done!

Serving Suggestion:
Add a couple of chillies for those that want it a bit more spicy!  It’s a nicely balanced salad, so it doesn’t taste spicy even with four chillies mixed in!

If you like this salad take a look at our other Thai Salad Recipes or maybe you’d like to see some Thai Sea Food Recipes

Thanks for visiting, feel free to bookmark this page or leave a comment below

Lettuce and Eggs Stir Fry

Wow!  What a surprise this recipe is….  Lettuce Sweet and Salty with Scrambled Eggs.  I had never tasted it before we made the video tutorial and frankly, as we were making it, I wasn’t looking forward to it!  The pickled lettuce that forms practically half of the recipe looked particularly un-appetising prior to being cooked.  In fact when I review the video tutorial (clip below) as I hold up the pickled lettuce it resembles a shrunken head!

The recipe has its origins in Northern Thailand in the Isaan region and has a rich salty sweet flavour with a lovely oyster sauce after taste.   Much more enjoyable when eaten with rice and although can be eaten as a snack meal, it is more usually added to the table as a compliment to some other main courses.  I give a few examples in the recipe below

If you are a bit new to Thai cooking, if you are a regular “Thai Foodie” or even a seasoned chef, you’re going to learn something from Khwanjai’s Thai Cooking School

Sign up for Khwanjai’s Trial Thai Cookery Course Your first step to mastering Thai food, it’s a 7 recipe Banquet course plus a few secret bonus’s

You can also sign up for Khwanjai’s Cooking School here http://thaifood-tv.com/thai-cooking-classes

Warmest Regards

Jules and ‘er Ladyship

Here’s Where you’ll find the Full Lettuce Stir Fry Recipe

Below is a basic, quick guide to the recipe together with this tiny preview video

Lettuce and Eggs Stir Fry

How To Make Lettuce Stir Fry

Ingredients:
Pickled Lettuce
Eggs
Garlic
Oyster Sauce
Chicken Stock
Sugar
Fish Sauce
Oil

Prepare Thus:
Cut lettuce into shreds
Course chop garlic

Cooking:
Add oil to a hot wok adding the chopped garlic and stirring briefly
Next add eggs and scramble with the garlic
Add shredded pickled lettuce and stir
Add sugar, chicken stock plus the fish and oyster sauces
Continue stirring about a minute and serve

Serving Ideas:
Here’s a great recipe to have as a snack on its own with lovely Jasmine rice, but really its a recipe to add to the table to compliment some other dishes such as Tom Yum Goong or Chicken Coconut Soup.

Something barbecued such as BBQ Spare Ribs with Garlic or our BBQ Fish Recipe or Pork One Sun Recipe would be great too

Thanks for visiting, your comments welcome below

Prawn and Asparagus Stir Fry

Another classic Prawn Stir Fry Recipe this time with fabulous Asparagus.  Interesting vegetable is asparagus….  Thais call it “Normai Falang” which directly translates to “Bamboo Foreign”, I had never noticed before but the stem of asparagus does look a little like young bamboo stalks.  As usual Thais give it a devastatingly simple and descriptive name.

Okay, back to the Prawn and Asparagus stir fry recipe at hand, the abbreviated recipe is below with links to the full recipe.  Frankly, it’s such a simple recipe, there is not much between the full and abridged versions.  A very quick and easy recipe to make with little preparation needed apart from shelling and gutting the Prawns.

Khwanjai shares a really neat trick in the full video tutorial for getting super crunchy “fully cooked” veggies which woks for all crunchy veggies, not just asparagus!

As you will also see “Moo Daeng”, (our mother cat) is in the background scavenging for the prawn shells, she is joined later on by one of her offspring!  Oh the joys of living in rural Thailand!

If you are a bit new to Thai cooking, if you are a regular “Thai Foodie” or even a seasoned chef, you’re going to learn something from Khwanjai’s Thai Cooking School

Sign up for Khwanjai’s Trial Thai Cookery Course Your first steps to mastering Thai food, it’s a 7 recipe Banquet course plus a few special bonus’s

You can also sign up for Khwanjai’s Cooking School here http://thaifood-tv.com/thai-cooking-classes

Warmest Regards

Jules and ‘er Ladyship

Here’s Where you’ll find the Full Prawn and Asparagus Stir Fry

Below is a basic, quick guide to the recipe together with this tiny preview video

Prawn Stir Fry with Asparagus

How to Cook a Prawn Stir Fry

Ingredients:
King or Tiger Prawns
Asparagus
Garlic
Seasoning Sauce
Oyster Sauce
Sugar
Chicken Stock
Oil

Preparatum:
Peel and gut the prawns
Skin and crush garlic
Cut Asparagus into short logs

Cooking:
Blanch the asparagus first
Stir fry the garlic very briefly
Sdd prawns – stir fry until cooked
Add asparagus and a little water
Now add seasoning sauce and oyster sauce, sugar and chicken stock
Stir together briefly and that’s it

Serving Suggestion:
Serve with some lovely Jasmine rice as a meal on it’s own or as we would have it….

Stick it on the table next to Khwanjais Chicken Red Curry and maybe a delicious Thai Omelette or the delicious (soufflé like), Steamed Eggs plus you could add (while you have the prawns out) Tom Yum Goong (Spicy Sour Prawn Soup) the idea being to have a series of dishes that contrast and compliment each other!  Take a look at our comprehensive Thai Cooking School Video Library

Finish the banquet off with a big bowl of fresh crunchy veggies such as lettuce, cucumber, coriander, green beans, Thai green egg plants and so on!

Thanks for visiting, feel free to bookmark us…

Fish Soup Recipe

What a fantastic Fish soup this is, everyone that has seen a few of my video logs will know I’m not a big fan of fish!  But this soup is awesome, predominantly spicy sour with a million other flavours up for grabs, okay maybe not a million, but definitely a burst of flavours which seems to get better the more you eat.

In this fish soup recipe you can use pretty much any fish you like providing it is not strong flavoured, we used a Snake Head fish so named because the head looks like a snakes head… Doh!

It looks like a breed of catfish with out any whiskers crossed with an eel and tastes a bit like either.  That’s not the point though.  It’s basically a fairly meaty bland flavour which is a marvellous foil for the spicy sour soup and carries it deliciously.

There are a couple of other weird and wonderful Thai ingredients in this recipe, one of them is Kachai which is a “Rhizome” often referred to as “Lesser Siamese Ginger” unfortunately it isn’t readily available fresh in western countries although it can be obtained in jars (in brine) or frozen usually pre shredded.  It’s doesn’t taste like ginger so don’t even think about substituting

The other is Radish or “Sweet Radish” to give it its full Thai name, often confusingly translated by Thais as Turnip.  I’m here to tell you it tastes like our old friend the Red Radish but not quite so pungent.  In the full tutorial we explain how best to use substitutes for these ingredients

If you are a bit new to Thai cooking, if you are a regular “Thai Foodie” or even a seasoned chef, you’re going to learn something from Khwanjai’s Thai Cooking School

Sign up for Khwanjai’s Trial Thai Cookery Course Your first step to mastering Thai food, it’s a 7 recipe Banquet course plus a few secret bonus’s

You can also sign up for Khwanjai’s Cooking School here http://thaifood-tv.com/thai-cooking-classes

Warmest Regards

Jules and ‘er Ladyship

Here’s Where you’ll find the Full Fish Soup Recipe

Below is a basic, quick guide to the recipe together with this tiny preview video

Thai Fish Soup Recipe

(Gaeng Som)
How To Make Fish Soup

Ingredients:
Fish of choice
Sardine
Chinese Lettuce
Cauliflower
Carrots
Green Beans
Shallots
Kachai
Radish
Red Curry Paste
Chicken Stock
Tamarind Puree
Palm Sugar
Salt
Fish Sauce
Cooking Oil

Prepare Thus:
chop fish into chunks
slice carrots and radish, leave to one side
dice the shallots
chop Chinese lettuce into squares
green beans into logs and Cauliflower into flat florets

Using a Pestle and Mortar
first in to the mortar is the Kachai, pound to a soft woody pulp
now the shallots, pounding until fully mixed and…
add the red curry paste, continue pounding until fully mixed
add the sardine, and continue pounding until fish is completely mixed in and that’s that part completely done!

Cooking:
drop the chunks of fish into a wokful of hot oil – deep fry, turning every 2-3 minutes until golden brown, great tip in video to stop fish sticking to the wok
simultaniously boil a pan of water and add the contents of the mortar stirring well
chicken stock, salt, fish sauce, tamarind pureé,  palm sugar are next and stir again, taste test and adjust as required.
Like with the flavour?
add carrot and radish and leave to boil for 2-3 minutes check for taste again
add the remaining veggies all together and bring back to boiling
The fish should be cooked so it’s time to add the deep fried fish to the soup, stir it in 2 or 3 times and simmer for 3 minutes
That’s it … Done!

Serving Ideas:
Fantastic soup is almost always eaten with rice, it deserves a fantastic rice which is of course Jasmine rice.  The amount we made for this Fish Soup Recipe is really enough for 4 people when served as compliment to other Thai dishes.

What would you have with it?

Try our delicious Sweet and Sour Chicken Recipe or several of our Stir Fry Recipes for that matter.  Another useful addition which will also compliment is our Recipe for Omelette – Thai Omelet and we often have BBQ Pork Ribs also giving you a nice varied range of texture and flavours that all go together nicely

Thanks for visiting

Egg Soup

Hello, Jules here, reporting from our Kitchen battleground, competing with more than the usual array of distractions which almost drive me to distraction every time I try to make one of these blessed videos.

Anyway, the reason for this missive is thus:  Egg Soup short and sweet -simple to make and its amazing how good it tasted for something that is so simple to master with only a few ingredients.

As usual a short recipe is blow and links to the full recipe also.  In this video I attempt to discuss Thai soups, this style of soup and its role in Thai cuisine

If you are a bit new to Thai cooking, if you are a regular “Thai Foodie” or even a seasoned chef, you’re going to learn something from Khwanjai’s Thai Cooking School

Sign up for Khwanjai’s Trial Thai Cookery Course Your first step to mastering Thai food, it’s a 7 recipe Banquet course plus a few secret bonus’s

You can also sign up for Khwanjai’s Cooking Classes Online here http://thaifood-tv.com/thai-cooking-classes

Warmest Regards

Jules and ‘er Ladyship

Here’s Where you’ll find the Full Egg Soup Recipe

Below is a basic, quick guide to the recipe together with this tiny preview video

Egg Soup Recipe
(Kai Nam)
How To Make Egg Soup

Ingredients:
2 large eggs
pork or chicken
spring onions
shallots
garlic (shown fried in photo)
celery leaves
glass noodles
chicken stock
pepper
seasoning sauce
oil

Preparation:
finely chop lean pork or use ground/minced pork
chop spring onions and shallots
chop the garlic and deep fry
beat eggs and add all ingredients together – except for the pepper, fried garlic and celery

Cooking:
cook the Omelette Thai Style first and cut into portions
pour two or three cups of boiling water over the omelette adding thai seasoning sauce
add the celery, stir briefly and it’s done
serve

Serving suggest:
Pour into a nice serving dish and serve two portions. Sprinkle freshly fried garlic on top and some pepper of your choice, white, black, red etc.

Apart from making a lovely light snack lunch (and healthy) this egg soup recipe is usually added as part of a banquet to compliment something spicy or something dry so here’s a couple of great recipes this egg soup recipe compliments nicely….

Try Pork BBQ Spare Ribs and our Pork Red Curry will go great with Egg Soup.

How about Fried Chicken Red Curry and a side order of Thai Sweet Chicken and Khwanjai’s fantastic Sweet and Sour Pork Recipe, another great combination.