Omg, plara is such a staple here in my house, I can't live without it. Nam pla heighten a more rounded saltiness, but plara elevates the whole thing! I use it in soups, stews, fried rice, stir fry, dressing of salads. Everything. We never even touch sea salts unless for making something that can't be associate with fishiness such as desserts. Everything else are either nam pla, or plara or both. Never salt.
Thank you for everything you've teaching us how to cooked!! You're the best cooking teacher to me! My mother didn't cooked much Thai foods or others before she passed, needless to say, I learned mostly from reading Thai cookbooks before I came across your site. I past along your website to my sisters, cousins and my children. Thank you. ❤❤❤
I used a mandolin to make fast work of slicing a lot of papaya for my wife's Som Tam. She uses the traditional method with the large knife. I never argue with my wife when she is making Som Tam. I like the Lao style the best. Thanks for posting!
Pai, you’re making my mouth water! Living in Japan, I love to make som tam with daikon radish and green apples. You get a slight sweet and sour flavor from the green apples that goes so well with the som tam dressing. It’s really delicious!
Yes!! I’ve been waiting for you to show Tum Pla Ra recipe, my favorite type of Som Tum. At my house I like to add some Vietnamese ham and rice vermicelli as well to make it a full meal. Thank you very much for the awesome recipe krub ❤
I tried Green Papaya Salad for the first time ever 2 weeks ago and absolutely fell in love with it! Ordered it 5 times since then. But then I thought of learning how to make it myself and came across your video from 8 years ago. Finally made it yesterday following your steps and it was super easy and super yummy! Only thing I left out was the shrimp, because I couldn't find dried shrimp anywhere. But it worked perfectly, both my wife and I enjoyed it thoroughly. Plus I think you are very beautiful (my very pregnant wife wasn't very happy with me when I said that, not because because she doesn't think you're beautiful too, but because I shared my opinion with her, haha). Anyways, we still have half a papaya left, and I intend to make it tomorrow. Thanks again for your old video and this updated version. I've been to Thailand a couple of times, and I'm kicking myself I never knew about this before and didn't try it while there. Hopefully on my next trip.
Hey there ! Thank you to infinity and back for posting this video. Having lived in Korat and Chiang Mai, I am like a kid on Christmas morning when a plate of this Earth shaking dish is set before me with a bowl of rice. I am totally unfazed by the smell of Pla Raa and think those who nearly faint from it are just chickens. I promise, I could crawl in the crock and tear it up. Keep spreading the word and magical joy that is Thai and Lao food ❤. Peace and blessings 🙏
Thank you so much.. For 25 years my spous made this som tum almost every week but she also added small crabs in it when available.. Sadly she passed away two ears ago. I tried to make it myself but it was never the same. Now i understand what i did wrong.
Salivating whilst I watch this. This is my perfect summer food; when it's hot and humid, I want sticky rice, papaya salad, grilled sausages and other meats dipped in jaeu (fish is meat) with som phak or other pickled vegetables and that's the best of the world. I'm Lebanese, so food is life and this is the most amazing of life.
If not for the problem with the rest of my family on the funkiness of Pla Ra, I would have it at home more often. As for "Med Kra tin", it's the seed of Leucaena leucocephala (White leadtree), which is apparently originated from Mexico and Central America (known as "Guaje") before being spreaded to tropical parts around the world and considered invasive in some places.
Papaya salad was my gateway food into Thai food. I now make it frequently to take to work for lunch. I can also add a fourth method for shredding the papaya I use the largest shredder disk in my food processor and it’s done in a flash. I tried the other methods including the peeler and while the food processor does make a slightly shorter and thinner shred if toss the shreds into cold water to crisp then the salad spinner to dry and the texture really doesn’t suffer the shreds stay crispy for about a week in the fridge. For the dressing I put everything but the shredded papaya together and store in a jar then mix just before serving each portion. Day four is just as good as day one. And yes I can literally enjoy this everyday as the last two weeks will attest😊
In the Philippines we have this designated scraper we use for coconut and melon🍈 to get little strips. I wonder if it will work for papaya. We make papaya pickles there a lot (atchar or atchara). Otherwise I’ll just get the one you use.
I love papaya salad -- this looks and sounds so good. I have made with rutabaga but did not do the pounding and bruising. I can't wait to find pal ra and try! Thanks again for the inspiration and information!
I don’t have pestle and mortar this large …. I will have to improvise, and go thai food shopping . This looks sooooo delish ! I love Thai papaya salad and Thai Mango salad . It’s too costly at restaurants. Thanks 🙏🏻 for posting!
When we don't have papaya, my mom just makes carrot or long bean salad instead with basically the same process, except we're Laotian so she adds an ungodly amount of spice sometimes.
Huh. I never realized some people are sensitive to raw green beans. I've eaten so many raw green beans in my life with no issues... Learn something new every day.
I've had this in Laos and the brown, murky fish sauce they use is definitely very funky, but once it's mixed up with the rest, the funkiness level recedes and the salad becomes quite delicious.
I came across Pa Raa in northern Thailand .. Man I lifted the lid on this clay earn .. the smell nearly knocked my head off my shoulders.. but when the old lady cooked with it !! It was amazing .. !! 😂😂
Defintely the best substitute in terms of texture and taste if no green papaya is available and you don't want to use other veggies/fruits. My favorite is still cucumber
The heck! Asians aren't afraid of MSG. Only the west And is a priced ingredients almost all asian countries like my country the Philippines really requires it in some recioes like kilaw fish (civeche), nafive meat dishes such us papaitan (cow dung juice soup 😅) and many others! ❤❤❤
Not gonna lie, I like to use this som tum dressing as my unversal salad dressing. Don't care about the ingredients, just all salad veggies I can assemble from my fridge and add this dressing. Incredible
I used to work in a All you can eat Thai food restaurant in Japan. They used to use raw daikon radish as a subsitute for the papaya. Taste just like normal papaya salad to me.
"A little bit of funkiness..." I live in Udon, about an hour south of the Lao capitol. Dtam Lao (bplaa raa) is more than a little funky. It's, as they say, an acquired taste. It took me about two years to acquire it. Now that I have though I love it. But yeah, it's pretty dang funky.
I eat Som Tam Plaa Raa (Plaa deck) several times/week. I get the vendor to use extra limes and no sugar. The lime juice sweetens when mixed with the juice from the other ingredients. The Plaa Raa here is home-made and nothing like the bottled version's. The smell can be overwhelming lol. They always use roasted locally grown peanuts. Of course other ingredients often include wild paddy field crabs, snails and dried shrimp. I always eat mine with crispy pork rind plus I enjoy it extra spicy with at least a handful of chillies 🌶️🌶️🌶️🔥🔥🔥🥵🥵🥵
I have been the place where I stand and watching a cook put in MSG a half of Ladle…. Stunning and shocking. That was the first time in my life with that amount of MSG.
Khap khun khrab. Khop jai lai lai. I grew up with the Lao and Hmung diaspora in the USA. I'm so grateful for you acknowledging this. So many don't understand the Issan influence of Thai food around the world and the rich contribution of Lao culture and food. Thank you. I am so grateful to those that shared with me and wish others could experience that. I would go to the local Lao market and order tom bahum lao phit, phit lao. Pleading with them to trust me to tolerate and appreciate chilies. Depending which Sao was there, I could get it spicy and funky enough. It's a part of my heart and soul and I cannot express my gratitude enough. I'm so glad that you brought up the concept of nua; I haven't known how to properly explain it and you gave me the vernacular I was missing. If only I could have you expain kim also. Hahaha. I love that you included pork rind, but may we please discuss the beauty of fried pork ear and why that texture is different and absolutely perfect?Khop jai lai lai.
I've seen swede (rutabaga) suggested as another papaya sub. Kohlrabi is not super common here in the UK, it's definitely not sold in all supermarkets. You can get a swede all year round, and it's very cheap - about 60p for ~600g (1.3lb).
Really like the idea of adding the lime halves for flavor. Thanks for the veggie sub idea, really can't get green papaya here. Jicama might work and I can get that. No MSG for me, think it adds an odd flat salty taste and gives me the jitters. Nice you mentioned it's a popular product in Thai salad.
My preferred som tum is som tum farang: it is like som tum Thai but with way less chili. Many years ago, I helped a friend sell som tum during Songkran festival. Because I was the first farang that they saw on a som tum booth, all the people wanted to taste my creation, I had an unended queue of customers. Regarding the MSG, I recently watched an interesting video that lined the anti-MSG movement to a cultural war in China between provinces that used MSG and provinces that don't. That cultural war was then introduced in the USA by an anti-MSG Chinese immigrant.
I'm surprised to hear green beans are supposed to be cooked; I eat them raw all the time. I love your Som Tum recipe; I make it all the time alternating daily between american garden salads and papaya salads. mmm, mmm good
I actually utilizes both the traditional way and with a peeler to get the papaya flesh. First. Whack it the traditional way and then peel the flesh off with a peeler. That way you get the flesh that is consistent and not stuck together like if you use the julian peeler and then i put them in ice water to get them to be extra crunchy.
can you review no fish sauses . there are many thai recepies that would be vegan but for the fish sauses. and it would double the availedel vegetairian and vegen dishes if we knew a fishsauce alternativ.
Papaya delicious 😋 Japanese grandma did that with the bamboo all I know is she said it was very labor-intensive... Eeenoo gloves chili 🌶️ where's my eyes 👀
always love your precautionary tips for handling peppers:) 'they can jump into your eyes' as you cover the mortar with one hand is iconic
Omg, plara is such a staple here in my house, I can't live without it.
Nam pla heighten a more rounded saltiness, but plara elevates the whole thing!
I use it in soups, stews, fried rice, stir fry, dressing of salads. Everything.
We never even touch sea salts unless for making something that can't be associate with fishiness such as desserts. Everything else are either nam pla, or plara or both. Never salt.
Thank you for everything you've teaching us how to cooked!! You're the best cooking teacher to me! My mother didn't cooked much Thai foods or others before she passed, needless to say, I learned mostly from reading Thai cookbooks before I came across your site. I past along your website to my sisters, cousins and my children. Thank you. ❤❤❤
04:10 อุ้ย! อะไรวะ 😂😂
เอ็นดูพี่ไพพพ
I heard that too!!!😂❤
That's the best part of this video 😂❤
ลงมาหาคอมเม้นนี้
555
🤣🤣🤣🤣
I used a mandolin to make fast work of slicing a lot of papaya for my wife's Som Tam. She uses the traditional method with the large knife. I never argue with my wife when she is making Som Tam. I like the Lao style the best. Thanks for posting!
Pai, you’re making my mouth water! Living in Japan, I love to make som tam with daikon radish and green apples. You get a slight sweet and sour flavor from the green apples that goes so well with the som tam dressing. It’s really delicious!
Thank you so much for making this video! This was a staple in our home growing up. My mom made the best sumtom hands down 😊
Love your recipes and videos! We eat green beans raw all the time, straight from the garden😊
Yes!! I’ve been waiting for you to show Tum Pla Ra recipe, my favorite type of Som Tum. At my house I like to add some Vietnamese ham and rice vermicelli as well to make it a full meal. Thank you very much for the awesome recipe krub ❤
THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!! YOU'VE MADE US HUNGRY FOR IT & NOW WE WILL MAKE IT THIS WK.END. LOVE YOUR WORK SO MUCH.
I tried Green Papaya Salad for the first time ever 2 weeks ago and absolutely fell in love with it! Ordered it 5 times since then. But then I thought of learning how to make it myself and came across your video from 8 years ago. Finally made it yesterday following your steps and it was super easy and super yummy! Only thing I left out was the shrimp, because I couldn't find dried shrimp anywhere. But it worked perfectly, both my wife and I enjoyed it thoroughly. Plus I think you are very beautiful (my very pregnant wife wasn't very happy with me when I said that, not because because she doesn't think you're beautiful too, but because I shared my opinion with her, haha). Anyways, we still have half a papaya left, and I intend to make it tomorrow. Thanks again for your old video and this updated version. I've been to Thailand a couple of times, and I'm kicking myself I never knew about this before and didn't try it while there. Hopefully on my next trip.
Hey there ! Thank you to infinity and back for posting this video. Having lived in Korat and Chiang Mai, I am like a kid on Christmas morning when a plate of this Earth shaking dish is set before me with a bowl of rice. I am totally unfazed by the smell of Pla Raa and think those who nearly faint from it are just chickens. I promise, I could crawl in the crock and tear it up. Keep spreading the word and magical joy that is Thai and Lao food ❤.
Peace and blessings 🙏
I love papaya chop like that because it's still crunchy ❤ lots of ferment fish sauce, extra spicy/garlicky, sour ❤❤❤
You forgot an important ingredient which is ripped olive. It will never be a perfect Som tum laos without that aroma.
Thank you so much.. For 25 years my spous made this som tum almost every week but she also added small crabs in it when available.. Sadly she passed away two ears ago. I tried to make it myself but it was never the same. Now i understand what i did wrong.
You can sometimes find a two in one knife/peeler being used at somtam shops, which is really clever
My favorite salad. Thanks for the new version, Lao style.
Salivating whilst I watch this. This is my perfect summer food; when it's hot and humid, I want sticky rice, papaya salad, grilled sausages and other meats dipped in jaeu (fish is meat) with som phak or other pickled vegetables and that's the best of the world. I'm Lebanese, so food is life and this is the most amazing of life.
Thank you! Was craving it and now will make it today.
If not for the problem with the rest of my family on the funkiness of Pla Ra, I would have it at home more often.
As for "Med Kra tin", it's the seed of Leucaena leucocephala (White leadtree), which is apparently originated from Mexico and Central America (known as "Guaje") before being spreaded to tropical parts around the world and considered invasive in some places.
This is great! My papaya trees finally started producing this year. The very first thing I made was papaya salad! Can’t wait to try this version!
additional ingredient เม็ดกระถิน (aka white popinac seed, white lead tree seed) or มะกอกสุก ( ripe hog plum, ripe yellow mombin).
9:37 The pause of Pailin 😅🤣🤣🤣🤣
Best wishes from India!
You're the bestest!
Papaya salad is definitely my favorite salad in the world!
Read the title and could hear Pailin's voice in my head saying uuuuuuumami
Papaya salad was my gateway food into Thai food. I now make it frequently to take to work for lunch. I can also add a fourth method for shredding the papaya I use the largest shredder disk in my food processor and it’s done in a flash. I tried the other methods including the peeler and while the food processor does make a slightly shorter and thinner shred if toss the shreds into cold water to crisp then the salad spinner to dry and the texture really doesn’t suffer the shreds stay crispy for about a week in the fridge. For the dressing I put everything but the shredded papaya together and store in a jar then mix just before serving each portion. Day four is just as good as day one. And yes I can literally enjoy this everyday as the last two weeks will attest😊
looks so fresh and delicious!! I need to try to find a papaya to try this out
i just bought ur new cook book... so excited to cook.. which one will be my first menu to try... 😋
In the Philippines we have this designated scraper we use for coconut and melon🍈 to get little strips. I wonder if it will work for papaya. We make papaya pickles there a lot (atchar or atchara). Otherwise I’ll just get the one you use.
I love papaya salad -- this looks and sounds so good. I have made with rutabaga but did not do the pounding and bruising. I can't wait to find pal ra and try! Thanks again for the inspiration and information!
I don’t have pestle and mortar this large …. I will have to improvise, and go thai food shopping . This looks sooooo delish ! I love Thai papaya salad and Thai Mango salad . It’s too costly at restaurants. Thanks 🙏🏻 for posting!
When we don't have papaya, my mom just makes carrot or long bean salad instead with basically the same process, except we're Laotian so she adds an ungodly amount of spice sometimes.
The kicker is the crab sauce . If your kung fu is awesome and you make your own, it'll be even better
found a nice green papaya, making this tonight as a side with green thai curry chicken and rice, can't wait to dig in!
Life is complete! Thanks for this recipe. And thanks for showing us the MSG. Americans are generally afraid of it, and it's flavor magic (powder).
Green mango is delicious too!
That's my mom's favourite but it never fails to make my face go 😖
อย่าลืมผักสดแกล้มด้วยค่ะ 😄
Huh. I never realized some people are sensitive to raw green beans. I've eaten so many raw green beans in my life with no issues... Learn something new every day.
Me too!!!
Green beans are definitely edible raw! They are great in salads, with dips, or right from the garden.
I've had this in Laos and the brown, murky fish sauce they use is definitely very funky, but once it's mixed up with the rest, the funkiness level recedes and the salad becomes quite delicious.
Kohlrabi! I never considered! I love a papaya salad but I also love new ideas for PNW winter vegetables. Filing that one away for January.
I loovveeeee somtam!!!
We love it with beef skewers.
Thank you for making your recipes simple. ❤️❤️❤️
I’m Lao and I approve this video 😊
I came across Pa Raa in northern Thailand .. Man I lifted the lid on this clay earn .. the smell nearly knocked my head off my shoulders.. but when the old lady cooked with it !! It was amazing .. !! 😂😂
I’m Vietnamese but shamefully say that Thai\Lao food is my favorite!
No shame! I'm Filipino and Thai and Viet are my faves!
Why shameful for? Thai/Lao foods are just better. 😂😂😂
C'mon! any version will do, still loving it!💕
I will be having some Som Tum today.
You can use chayote as a substitute for papaya, too. This is definetley the best version of the salad!
Defintely the best substitute in terms of texture and taste if no green papaya is available and you don't want to use other veggies/fruits. My favorite is still cucumber
Yey, and you suggested adding khaep mu or pork rinds to it. Ow, yummy! I haven't had it that way for 30 years! Yum.
It all looks good 👍🏼
The heck! Asians aren't afraid of MSG. Only the west And is a priced ingredients almost all asian countries like my country the Philippines really requires it in some recioes like kilaw fish (civeche), nafive meat dishes such us papaitan (cow dung juice soup 😅) and many others! ❤❤❤
This white boy buys msg by the pound.
There’s so many MSG in normal package snacks here in the west. They just aren’t aware 😂
Yes the US is the #1 consumer of MSG, it’s in ranch dressing and in chips, I too have my little bottle of MSG at the ready 🎉
Not gonna lie, I like to use this som tum dressing as my unversal salad dressing. Don't care about the ingredients, just all salad veggies I can assemble from my fridge and add this dressing. Incredible
Places I’ve been to in Thailand usually call MSG Ajinomoto by its original brand name.
I absolutely LOVE that I have the same pestle and mortar as you do! :D
I used to work in a All you can eat Thai food restaurant in Japan. They used to use raw daikon radish as a subsitute for the papaya. Taste just like normal papaya salad to me.
Somtaam❤❤❤
"A little bit of funkiness..."
I live in Udon, about an hour south of the Lao capitol. Dtam Lao (bplaa raa) is more than a little funky. It's, as they say, an acquired taste. It took me about two years to acquire it. Now that I have though I love it. But yeah, it's pretty dang funky.
I love that the ingredients doesn’t have to be annihilated 😂 lol
I learned a new word today!! Thank you very much! 🤭
Add the pla ra, Kapi, and smash away. So freaking good.
I eat Som Tam Plaa Raa (Plaa deck) several times/week. I get the vendor to use extra limes and no sugar. The lime juice sweetens when mixed with the juice from the other ingredients. The Plaa Raa here is home-made and nothing like the bottled version's. The smell can be overwhelming lol. They always use roasted locally grown peanuts. Of course other ingredients often include wild paddy field crabs, snails and dried shrimp. I always eat mine with crispy pork rind plus I enjoy it extra spicy with at least a handful of chillies 🌶️🌶️🌶️🔥🔥🔥🥵🥵🥵
O M G , I really missed Thailand , you show me your video , hopefully soon go to visit Thailand.
Thank you so much for a great dish.
I have been the place where I stand and watching a cook put in MSG a half of Ladle…. Stunning and shocking. That was the first time in my life with that amount of MSG.
Khap khun khrab. Khop jai lai lai. I grew up with the Lao and Hmung diaspora in the USA. I'm so grateful for you acknowledging this. So many don't understand the Issan influence of Thai food around the world and the rich contribution of Lao culture and food. Thank you. I am so grateful to those that shared with me and wish others could experience that. I would go to the local Lao market and order tom bahum lao phit, phit lao. Pleading with them to trust me to tolerate and appreciate chilies. Depending which Sao was there, I could get it spicy and funky enough. It's a part of my heart and soul and I cannot express my gratitude enough. I'm so glad that you brought up the concept of nua; I haven't known how to properly explain it and you gave me the vernacular I was missing. If only I could have you expain kim also. Hahaha. I love that you included pork rind, but may we please discuss the beauty of fried pork ear and why that texture is different and absolutely perfect?Khop jai lai lai.
It looks delicious, I will try to find all the ingredients 🥰
I've seen swede (rutabaga) suggested as another papaya sub. Kohlrabi is not super common here in the UK, it's definitely not sold in all supermarkets. You can get a swede all year round, and it's very cheap - about 60p for ~600g (1.3lb).
You're such a saint!!
Great som tam recipie, thank you! 😊
Really like the idea of adding the lime halves for flavor. Thanks for the veggie sub idea, really can't get green papaya here. Jicama might work and I can get that. No MSG for me, think it adds an odd flat salty taste and gives me the jitters. Nice you mentioned it's a popular product in Thai salad.
the only hard part according to my thai gf is getting the green pappaya in the first place
Thank you for the nice recipe
Looks delicious! I think the only thing I’d add would be shrimp paste.
Lol, I’m sure Uncle Roger is bowing down to you at the 10 minute mark 😂
We’re going to pound town on this on
Thanks ❤
Do they normally include a pickled crab for additional flavour?
Oh I had someone make cucumber salad with crabs. My guess it was Lao style since it wasn't as sweet and had more depth. Thanks!
My preferred som tum is som tum farang: it is like som tum Thai but with way less chili.
Many years ago, I helped a friend sell som tum during Songkran festival. Because I was the first farang that they saw on a som tum booth, all the people wanted to taste my creation, I had an unended queue of customers.
Regarding the MSG, I recently watched an interesting video that lined the anti-MSG movement to a cultural war in China between provinces that used MSG and provinces that don't. That cultural war was then introduced in the USA by an anti-MSG Chinese immigrant.
ขาดไก่ย่างนะครับ
I'm surprised to hear green beans are supposed to be cooked; I eat them raw all the time. I love your Som Tum recipe; I make it all the time alternating daily between american garden salads and papaya salads. mmm, mmm good
apparently they can upset people's stomachs so I just want to be cautious.
You can also keep peeling into ribbons for Tum Luang Prabang
I actually utilizes both the traditional way and with a peeler to get the papaya flesh.
First. Whack it the traditional way and then peel the flesh off with a peeler. That way you get the flesh that is consistent and not stuck together like if you use the julian peeler and then i put them in ice water to get them to be extra crunchy.
I much prefer the Lao style.
No baby crab?
MSG massive 🙌
If uncle roger discover you, I'm sure you are gonna get the "Aunty" title and not a niece..because uncle roger WORSHIP msg 😂
Is this the “Isan” version?
Msg? Fuiyoh!!
Green mangoes (make sure it’s firm) would also be a great substitute.
9:38: Uncle Roger be like "FUIYOOOOOH!"
Pepaya salad pasti enaknya
@9:40 Fuiyoh!
can you review no fish sauses . there are many thai recepies that would be vegan but for the fish sauses. and it would double the availedel vegetairian and vegen dishes if we knew a fishsauce alternativ.
I have baggoong. Can I use that instead of the fermented fresh fish sauce?
Papaya delicious 😋 Japanese grandma did that with the bamboo all I know is she said it was very labor-intensive... Eeenoo gloves chili 🌶️ where's my eyes 👀
🤤
FYI - if you buy melon, green papaya tastes similar to the green flesh close to the rind 🙂
I wasn't aware that you can't eat green beans raw. I've seen farmers eat them right from the beanstock in the field.