00743 11 40 C 11 55. 007431 69 40 69 C 47. This is pad thai at its best. This recipe is the most authentic, unadulterated recipe for hot rice, with no compromises.

Just like the best one you can find in Thailand. Take it from a Thai person, it’s hard to find a really good, authentic pad thai outside of Thailand. I’ve searched high and low, and concluded that the best option is to master cooking it at home. This recipe is the real deal with all the ingredients of a traditional pad thai—no compromise. I’ll share all the tips and tricks and provide substitutions for ingredients you may not have. Make sure you also watch the video tutorial because this is a dish that’s better learned visually and the techniques are important to success! What does REAL traditional pad thai look like?

You’ve probably had pad thai in your local restaurant, but what you had may not be anything like the authentic version. First, it should not have ketchup or any tomato product in it. Second, it should not be syrupy sweet. And finally, it shouldn’t be just a heavy, soggy clump of noodles with bits of green onions.

Stir-fried in a hot wok, so the noodles come out dry with a little smokiness, not wet. A good balance of sweet, salty and sour, not leading with any one flavour. LOADED with beansprouts which lightens the noodles and add freshness. Have lots of “bits” in it which gives complexity: shallots, garlic, tofu, dried shrimp, etc.

All in all it should be a well-balanced dish that leaves you satisfied, and not heavy. Why is it so hard to find good pad thai in restaurants? Cooking pad thai is not that hard, but the fully-loaded, traditional version has a lot of ingredients, not all of which are easy to find. For many restaurants some ingredients may not be available, the many prep may be too complex for their simple operation, or they need to keep the cost of such a staple item low. So things get left out and substituted. But each ingredient in pad thai contributes a flavour. Nothing in there is added just for “fluff” – so the more you take away, the less complex the flavour becomes.