Som Roi Yod Beach Bar-B-Cue

 

This is a meal – a trio of simple recipes, comprising a spicy salad, some meat kebabs and sticky rice, with a sauce for garnish.

Pig sticking

After many trials and errors, it is as close as I can get to the food served by the beach grill restaurant, on the beach opposite the Krua Chom Thale resort, Dolphin bay in Som Roi Yod, southern Thailand. The restaurant has no name, and no menu, no address. I was unable to communicate effectively with the chef to the level of cooking methods and ingredients, despite the willingness of both parties.

Here is a meal that won’t break the bank or the belt, but which breaks the taste barrier with a thunderous explosion.

 

Calories and Costs

Salad only, no peanuts: calories 150, cost £0.93

Lean Chicken + Salad with no peanuts, no sauce: calories  375 cost £2.31

Full meal, with Pork: calories 1100, cost £3.10

Priced in pound sterling 7/6/2014

 

Calories courtesy of http://www.nutracheck.co.uk

Costs courtesy of http://www.tesco.com (and others)

 

“Papaya” Salad. (Alias Linda’s Thai Courgette Salad)

Preparation time, including dressing: 15 minutes

Papayas were disappointing. Especially the unripe ones used in this salad were often watery and tasteless, eminently replaceable with a light vegetable with a bit of crunch and a subtle, agreeable flavour. With the spices involved here, courgettes fit the bill superbly.

Ingredients for One Person:

• One medium courgette just-picked (c 150g)
• Carrots (c 150g)- as sweet and crunchy as possible – e.g. chantonnay
• Handful of Peanuts – omit to reduce calories. I just use ordinary, cheap salted ones.
• Handful of Fresh Coriander, chopped
• Portion of Thai Salad Dressing. See below

I don’t bother peeling the veg. Just wash, dry and grate the courgette and carrots together in a bowl and roughly mix them. I coarse-grate them by hand along the grain; mechanical graters can’t seem to do this, producing pieces that tend to be too short with a tendency to disintegrate when mixing. The salad should be crunchy and light not soggy and flaccid.

Place the peanuts in a transparent, clean plastic bag. Crush them with a rolling pin or end of a chopping board, until there are no whole ones left.

(Just before serving) pour over the Thai Salad Dressing and toss thoroughly.

Sprinkle first the crushed peanuts over, then the coriander.

Serve.

 

Thai Salad Dressing

Keeps in fridge for at least 24 hours.

For 1 person:

• 1 dessert spoon of Soy Sauce. I use Healthy Boy brand Dark Thick Soy Sauce. Avoid the ones that contain molasses unless you are fond of that flavour – it is very strong.
• 1 dessert spoon of Fish Sauce. I use Squid Brand
• 1 dessert spoon of fresh squeezed lime juice. You can substitute wine vinegar if you are on war rations
• 1 medium garlic clove, crushed
• 1 heaped teaspoon of soft brown sugar. Use more than this if you wish, not less
• 1 red Thai chilli, including seeds. Remove seeds first and chop the chilli as finely as possible. Use both seeds and chopped chilli. Fresh is best, but I have been using thawed ones from frozen– I can’t tell the difference once finely chopped.

Combine all the ingredients except the chilli and stir well to mix.

Taste test (easier without the chilli), and potentially add more sugar or lime juice.

Add the chilli and its seeds and stir well to mix.

 

Som Roi Yod Kebab Marinade

Exactly the same as Thai Salad Dressing, but use wine vinegar instead of lime juice which can produce bitterness when heated.

 

Som Roi Yod Kebabs

The beach grill served pork or chicken “satays”.

The pork was belly meat, 50-50 fat to meat. It was sliced to about 3mm. Not floppy; thick enough for a 2.5 cm long piece to remain roughly horizontal when held at one end.

Buy some good quality stuff; something Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall would use.

150g is generous for a single serving.

Remove the rind. Cut the meat into 2.5cm pieces. Mix well with the Som Roi Yod Kebab Marinade. Leave covered in refrigerator for at least a day. For a Saturday bar-b do this Thursday or Friday night.

For chicken use skinless breast fillets, cut across the grain 4-5 mm thick. One breast per serving (150g). Marinade in the same way.

At least 2 hours before grilling, soak some bamboo or wooden skewers in water. This keeps the meat juicy and makes it easy to remove from the skewer.

Thread the meat onto the skewers. Should be about 3 skewers per serving. Don’t overload – these are going to grill quickly.

Grill close to glowing hot coals for probably not more than a minute each side. Timing is not an exact science – a good bar-b master will know. The kebabs should be lightly caramelised each side.

Serve with sticky rice, “Papaya” Salad and “Nam P’to” sauce

 

Sticky Rice.

Staple feculant with grills in Thailand, this is “Glutinous Rice” or “Sticky Rice” (Oryza sativa var. glutinosa)

Paddy Pot – Sticky rice in tuperware container

It needs to be soaked before cooking, for as long as possible. Fill a large tupperware pot or jam jar about ¾ full of the rice grains. Fill it to the top with water. The grains expand and soak up the water. Check the next day and top up if necessary. Leave for at least a day; Preferably 2. If you are planning this bar-b-cue, prepare the rice on the same evening as the kebab meat and marinade.

I keep pot of soaking sticky rice permanently in the fridge, ready for whenever I need it.

Like me you may not have a rice steamer.

Carb-O… rice arrange in a ring to allow steam to percolate around…

Find a fine mesh metal strainer and a saucepan into which it fits snugly. Hopefully the lid will fit over the ensemble and create a good seal. The better the seal, the quicker the rice will cook. With a good home-made solution, the rice needs about 60 minutes. Put about 2 cm of water in the pot and bring it to a rolling simmer. When loading the strainer, concentrate the rice in “clumps” leaving gaps. This facilitates the circulation of steam and also makings turning easier. Place the strainer with the soaked rice clumps over the simmering water and cover.

Turn the rice over half way through, as the rice below will cook quicker that the rice above. Once half cooked the rice is easy to manipulate.

When the rice is cooked it becomes translucent, so loses the milk white colour it starts with and becomes slightly grey. It can be rolled easily into tight balls without sticking to fingers. It is chewy between the teeth. If there is still a floury or grainy “bite” to it, steam it for another 15 minutes.

Leave it to rest (without removing it or uncovering your steamer) for 30 minutes before serving.

Thai restaurants serve this rice at room temperature.

 

 

“Nam P’to” Sauce

This is my best rendition in Latin script of the sauce we were served with this meal as pronounced by the chef. I can’t find it anywhere on the internet.

Exactly the same as Thai Salad Dressing, with the lime juice, but with the addition of plenty of chopped coriander. Important to taste test this and get it right.