Description
This Easier Weeknight Pad Thai recipe offers a quick and flavorful take on the classic Thai dish, featuring rice noodles soaked to perfection, a spicy and tangy tamarind sauce, fresh shrimp, and optional crab meat. With a balance of sweet, sour, and savory from palm sugar, tamarind paste, and fish sauce, this stir-fried noodle dish is garnished with crunchy bean sprouts, garlic chives, cucumber slices, and lime for a refreshing finish. Perfect for a quick dinner, it brings authentic Thai flavors together in just 35 minutes.
Ingredients
Noodles and Sauce
- 6 oz dry rice noodles (3 mm wide)
- 0.3 oz dried chilies
- 2 cloves garlic
- 3 tablespoons finely chopped shallots
- 2 tablespoons neutral oil
- 1.6 oz palm sugar (about 3½ tablespoons packed, or substitute brown sugar, finely chopped)
- ⅓ cup water (80 ml)
- 3 tablespoons Thai tamarind paste
- 2½ tablespoons fish sauce
Protein and Vegetables
- 10-12 medium size shrimp (peeled and deveined)
- 3.5 oz crab meat (optional)
- 1½ cups (85 g) bean sprouts, plus extra for serving
- 4 stalks garlic chives (cut into 2-inch pieces, plus extra for garnish)
- 2 baby cucumbers (halved and sliced, or substitute English cucumber)
- Lime wedges for serving
Instructions
- Soak Noodles: Soak the dry rice noodles in room temperature water for 30 minutes to 1 hour until they are completely limp with no resistance to gravity. Using warm water can shorten soaking time, but avoid over-soaking.
- Prepare Chili Powder: Remove seeds from dried chilies by cutting into chunks and shaking out seeds. Grind the chilies into a fine powder using a coffee grinder, or soak and pound into paste if a grinder is not available.
- Make Chili-Garlic Paste: Using a mortar and pestle, pound garlic cloves into a paste, then add shallots and ground chilies to form a rough paste mixture.
- Mix Tamarind Sauce: Combine tamarind paste, fish sauce, and ⅓ cup water in a bowl and stir well to combine.
- Cook Chili Paste: Heat a wok or large non-stick skillet over medium heat. Add neutral oil and the chili-garlic paste, cooking for about one minute while stirring constantly.
- Add Sugar and Sauce: Stir in the palm sugar and cook until mostly dissolved, approximately 30 seconds, then add the tamarind sauce mixture and bring it to a boil.
- Cook Shrimp: Add the shrimp and cook in the sauce for 1 minute, flipping halfway through until just done. Remove shrimp from pan and set aside, leaving sauce in the pan.
- Cook Noodles: Increase heat to medium-high and add soaked noodles to the pan. Toss continuously with tongs until noodles absorb all sauce. If noodles are still too chewy, add small splashes of water, cooking until the noodles are tender but slightly chewy.
- Combine Ingredients: Stir in the bean sprouts, garlic chives, cooked shrimp, and most of the crab meat if using. Toss gently just until bean sprouts wilt, then turn off heat.
- Plate and Garnish: Serve noodles topped with remaining crab meat, extra bean sprouts, sliced cucumber, and lime wedges on the side for squeezing.
Notes
- Soaking noodles in room temperature water prevents over-softening and allows better control of texture.
- If a coffee grinder is unavailable for dried chilies, soaking and pounding chilies into paste works as an alternative.
- Lime wedges add brightness and acidity that balance the sweet and savory flavors in Pad Thai.
- The recipe can be customized by omitting crab meat or substituting proteins like tofu for a vegetarian version.
- Keep water nearby during cooking to adjust noodle texture precisely by adding small splashes as needed.
- Prep Time: 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Category: Main Course
- Method: Stovetop
- Cuisine: Thai
