Pad Kra Pao with Egg
MIDWEEK MEALS - Serves 2
One of the easiest and quickest stir fries any man can whip up. With a few main ingredients and condiments you’ll already have stacked up in your pantry, a spare 30 minutes and some guy name Bob is your uncle.
INGREDIENTS
500g mince pork, beef, or chicken (You can do what I do here which is chop up 500g of skinless chicken breasts with a cleaver. You get better texture that way.)
3 large cloves of garlic, peeled
5 bird’s eye chilies (or however many you can tolerate)
1 large French shallot, peeled and roughly chopped
2 tbsp vegetable oil
1 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp thin/light soy sauce
1 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp dark sweet soy sauce (kecap manis)
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1 cup holy basil leaves( or Thai basil if you can’t find holy basil)
METHOD
In a mortar, pound together the garlic, chilies, and shallot until you get a coarse paste.
Heat up pan and add vegetable oil over medium-high heat. Add the paste to it and fry until fragrant.
Add the meat to the skillet and break it up with the spatula into small pieces.
Add the remaining ingredients (except the basil leaves), correcting seasoning as needed.
Once the meat is cooked through, check the amount of liquid in the pan. If it’s too dry, add a little bit of water or sodium-free broth.
Before taking the pan off the heat, add the basil leaves to the mixture and give it a couple of stirs. We only want to wilt the basil with the residual heat that is still in the pan so as not to mute the fragrance of the fresh holy basil leaves.
Serve over rice. A Thai-style crispy fried egg on top. Enjoy
