Everyone loves a go-to recipe and this is my secret weapon when having a crowd over for Thai food. This Thai dipping sauce goes well with just about anything! I like to serve it with grilled steak or sticks of veggies. Sometimes I’ll make plain sticky rice which, in Thailand, is eaten as a savoury with grilled meat or Thai salads. Another option would be to serve your grilled steak with lettuce leaves so your guests can dip their steaks and veggies then wrap in the lettuce leaves for an interactive starter.
Be warned… a little goes a long ways. It is super spicy!
Served with a good rib eye steak, simply grilled with plenty of salt.
For The Vegetarian, I usually make another dip using soy sauce instead of fish sauce. I heap a bunch of vegetables, raw and grilled onto the platter. It looks great and alot of times, it’s the vegetables that disapear first.
Grilled vegetables are just as good with this sauce.
Ingredients:
Use the quantities below as guide and adjust according to your taste. I’m a self-confessed chilli wimp so I go for less chilli.
- Two or three limes, juiced
- Palm sugar to taste
- 1 tbs fish sauce
- 2 garlic cloves
- 1 small shallot
- 1 spring onion
- 1 stalk coriander
- 4 mint leaves
- 1 tsp chilli powder (optional)
- 4 birds eye chili
- one or two tablespoons of glutinous rice
Be sure and buy the glutinous rice and roast it before adding it to the sauce. This is what it looks like after you have ground it.
Method:
- Firstly, toast your glutinous rice grains by heating the rice in a pan until it smells fragrant and turns slightly brown but is not burnt. (You can make this recipe without the rice but I find that it adds another dimension of aroma, flavour and texture to the dip).
- Grind the rice in a food processor or use a mortar and pestle to pound it until it breaks down. You may have some powdery bits and some bits the size of raw sugar. Set this aside.
- Finely mince the garlic cloves, shallot, spring onion, coriander, mint and birds eye chilli and set aside.
- Crumble your palm sugar into granules then, in a bowl, stir your palm sugar and fish sauce together until the sugar has dissolved.
- Combine everything but the toasted rice together. You can do everything up to this step in advance and set it aside until you are ready to serve.
- Just before serving, add the toasted rice into the sauce a teaspoon at a time until it reaches a nice consistency for dipping. It should not be too thick.
By the way, the cute little baby blue Le Creuset was a gift from a friend, Catherine who has a knack for giving me sweet presents that are totally prop-worthy. This mini casserole features on so many of my pics!
Shop the range of Le Creuset on Lazada in Singapore or if overseas try Sur La Table or similar items at one of my most favourite sites for inspiration Food 52.
Otherwise pop down to Tangs or Isetan. 😉
