Delicious Homemade Pad Thaï

Posted by CK in pad thai, peanut butter, recipe, soy sauce, vegetarian

1 comments

Amanda and I are big fans of Thaï food - I'm particularly a big fan of pad thaï, minus the excessive amount of calories (pad thaï portions in restaurants can rack up to 1500 calories!!!). In the homemade version I made last night, I'm positive that while the calorie count can be slightly high, it is nothing compared to what you'd find in a restaurant and it pretty much tastes the same as a bonus ;)

So without further ado, go ahead and try this at home:

Ingredients:

• Magical pad thaï sauce:
• 1/2 cup soya sauce (if you have the reduced sodium kind, even better)
• 1/4 cup of lime juice
• 1/4 cup of sugar
• 1 1/2 tbsp of peanut butter
• The rest:
• 1/3 pack of flat noodles (or whatever you have on hand)
• 10 regular sized uncooked frozen shrimps
• 2 celery stems, diced
• 2 smalls carrots, diced
• 2 garlic cloves
• 2 egg whites
• vegetable oil

Preparation:

1. Soak your frozen shrimp in cold water for about 10 minutes (long enough so that it's easy to peel the shell off).
2. Cook the pasta according to directions on the package.
3. Next, scramble up the egg whites in a small skillet and put aside.
4. While all this is happening, get your pad thaï sauce mixture ready and put aside.
5. Mince the garlic cloves and fry them up in a wok for about 2 minutes.
6. Remove the shell from the shrimp and add to the garlic.
7. Once the shrimp is almost cooked (almost fully pink), add the celery and carrots and cook for about 3 minutes.
8. In the meantime, your pasta should be ready. Once it is, drain and add to the wok along with the eggs, mix well for about a minute or so.
9. Add the magical pad thaï sauce to the mixture and mix well until everything is well coated and the peanut butter has melted.

Additional options: You can add red pepper flakes for spiciness and peanuts if you want more authenticity (by authenticity, I mean restaurant style - I'm also quite positive this is not close to what we'd get in Thaïland...). For meat-eaters, add beef or chicken & for vegetarians, add some tofu (or replace the shrimp with tofu)! :)

This dish is great because it has so many variations. Plus, it only took around half an hour to cook (including prep time) and yielded about 3 portions.

Enjoy!

-CK