One afternoon, as lunch approached I was wondering what to whiz up that would be healthy and quick. I settled on a home-made Thai-inspired (I wouldn’t call it authentic lest I was chided by a Thai friend) pad thai. The most important thing in the pad thai in my opinion is the sauce that flavours it.
Total time: 15 mins
Ingredients
80g wide Thai rice noodles, cooked and drained
1 egg, beaten
1/2 small red pepper, sliced thinly
1 celery stick, sliced thinly (on a bias)
1 green onion, sliced thinly (on a bias)
1/4 red onion, sliced thinly
2 tbsp peanuts, roasted on a dry pan
2 tbsp vegetable/soy bean oil
Shrimp (optional – buy the deveined type with their tail on)
Pad thai sauce
1 heaped tbsp peanut butter
1 tbsp soya sauce
1 tsp garlic chili sauce (vietnamese does just fine)
1 tsp fish sauce (this stuff smells but man does it taste good!)
1 tbsp brown sugar
Juice of 1 lime
1/2 tsp sesame oil
Mix the ingredients together and taste to see if there’s balance between sweet, sour, salty and spicy.. if you feel you need a bit of this or that, add it in!
Instructions
Heat the oil in a wok until it’s really hot.. fry the vegetables on high heat for about 2 minutes.. add in the eggs and scramble. If using shrimp, fry for a minute or so. Add in the noodles, pour on the sauce and stiry fry for another 2 minutes or so. Serve piping hot.