today on Hot Thai Kitchen we're making Tom Yum Goong Sawaddee ka welcome to hot thai kitchen today
we're making possibly the most famous soup in Thai cuisine making tom yum now let's look at
the name tom means to boil so in a dish name it's an indication that it's a soup YUM actually refers
to a category of tied salads so in a way tom yum means salad soup which might seem strange but it's
because the soup uses the exact same seasoning ingredients as the salad and now because of spot
prawn season in Vancouver where I'm living right now uh we're making tom yum goong or tom yum
with prawns so let's get started so first to talk about liquids I got here four quarts of
shrimp stock and I have a video on how to make shrimp stock but you can also just use water or
chicken stock okay to that I'm going to add the herbs I'm going to add what I call the Trinity
the tom yum Trinity first we're using lemongrass lemongrass sometimes comes trims and everything
but sometimes it comes all like this so how you prep it is you first cut off the top drive it
and then you cut off the bottom and then there's usually a loose dry layer that you're also going
to remove so this is where the flavor is is where the flavor is concentrated and you're
going to smash it first with the back of your knife now this releases the flavors break the
cells of the plant and releases the flavors into the soup more easily and then we're going to just
cut it into chunks that goes into the soup and the next we're going to have galangal galangal
is a rhizome and it may look like a ginger but it's very different and it's not substitutable
the flavors like you galangal is cooling plate flip flavor whereas ginger is a hot flavor the
smell of galangal reminds me of lush pine forest so we're not going to use this part we're going to
use seven to eight thin rounds of this part it's small so I'm just adding some extra and that goes
actually that looks kind of small usually at seven to eight about this size I have a couple more and
then finally we have our kaffir lime leaves now kaffir lime leaves look just like this these have
actually been frozen that's how I store that when so when you buy them there's usually more than you
can use just keep them in freezer in a ziplock bag the last you forever so just five to six
leaves and you're just going to bruise them by tearing them and by doing this you bruise them
and it helps them release their flavors into the soup and then lastly our spice some Thai chilies
now I'm not going to finely chop this but I will just kind of bruise it a little bit just crush
it and these have also been frozen that's how I keep my Thai chilies maybe cut it in two pieces
and add that in there now I didn't want to like cut them into small pieces because I do want them
to be visible I don't want people to accidentally take in a piece of chopped chili and that's going
to be really really spicy this way I Bruce it it releases its spice as it infuses but there's a big
chunk so people can know to avoid them so I'm going to let this come to a boil and then let
it simmer it doesn't take a very long time a few minutes after it's coming to a boil do be able to
smell it really well and meanwhile let's prep our other ingredients so the other ingredients I've
got oysters mushrooms here about three cups the big ones I just split them into bite-size pieces
you can use other kinds of Asian mushrooms such as enoki mushroom or shimeji or beech mushrooms
work really well don't use the button mushrooms so they don't do as well in soup as we've got that
and next our prawns or shrimp so I've got spot prawns here they came into life and they're dead
now so what I did to prep them is I tear off the head and the head I save for making shrimp stock
which I already did and then spot prawns when they're fresh and raw it's really hard to peel so
I'm just going to leave the peel in but if you're using regular prawns you can just peel everything
and take them add them to your shrimp stock now I cut the back down so it's easier to eat and then
I'm going to use a paring knife and then butterfly it open it up a little bit more check to see if
there's any veins this one doesn't have any veins and that'll make it cook faster it also be easier
for people to have peel when they go to eat it okay so I've got about eight of them right here
you can use more if you want this recipes for four so you can just think you know how much how many
shrimp per person you want to add so let's look at our seasoning as I mentioned these seasonings
are the same as in a young or Thai salad first our salting agent we have fish sauce 3 tablespoons of
fish sauce and our sour agent we've got half a cup of lime juice it's about two to three juicy limes
you've got a little bit of steak to just round out the acid and the salt about a teaspoon or
two of sugar I started with one and you can always taste an add now the next ingredient you probably
have this if you've been to Thai restaurants this would probably be in your thumb yeah but
it's actually an optional ingredient it's Thai chili paste it's called an unpaid Powell and
the jar comes like this it says chili paste with soybean oil we it's a relatively new thing the
old rustic style of thumb yum does not contain shrimp paste but if you're going to add and only
add it if you're making something with shrimp because this is made from shrimp and it'll have
a shrimpy flavor or add shrimpy flavor to every you make so when we make some young chicken or
some young fish or other kinds of some young we actually don't do this we don't include that and
that's another thing in Thailand when you're making some young guy which is something of a
chicken or throw me on black.we it's not just a matter of switching out protein for another
the seasoning and the herbs actually change a little bit too but that's for another time so
that's all our seasoning and now we're gonna the soup is boiling now so let's go back to the soap
so the soups tend simmering now and if you use water you'll be able to tell that the water will
start turning a little bit yellowish or greenish and you can smell it that's how you know so it's
done here and I do need to say that these herbs are for infusing purposes only okay they're really
tough to chewy and they're not meant to be eaten Thai people usually leave them in for garnish and
it makes a little pretty but if you're serving it to an on-time make sure you either tell them that
do not eat these herbs or you can remove them at this stage where it's done infusing just use
a slotted spoon and just take them out okay okay so we're going in first with the oyster mushrooms
and then we're going to let it kind of come back to a boil so after it's come back to a boil then
you're going to go in with your shrimp and now you're just going to stir to split them apart a
little bit and then after about fifteen thirty seconds that come back to a boil a little bit
I'm going to turn it off and the reason why I'm going to turn it off is because this is
really hot and we've already butterflied our shrimp so if I cook it all the way
I'm actually going to overcook it with the residual heat that's still in the pot if I
let the shrimp sit in this hot water in about a minute or so it's just going to
be perfectly cooked and we're not going to risk overcooking it okay so now that that's
done we're going to go in with our seasoning line and once you've added the lime you don't
want to cook it because if you cook lime it actually kind of ruins the flavor of fish sauce
the chili paste and the sugar started making sure that the chilli paste is all dissolved
smells very good so now we're going to taste it always always taste your food because when
you're cooking with lime every lime has different acidity every fish sauce every brand of fish sauce
has different saltiness and especially when it comes to soup the amount of water that evaporates
there's a lot of variables that go into it in so you always taste and adjust accordingly so
what you're looking for the leaf flavor should be sour and the salt in the sweet is followed by
the salt and the sweet is just kind of there to round off everything and the spiciness should be
obvious so this is a lot of kind of dish where it's mild so the chili needs to play a leading
role I want you to say alright let's go and plate it up it's not going to all fit that's okay and as
you can see the herbs actually make a very pretty garnish and then the shrimp heads I saved from my
shrimp stock making earlier these actually work perfect as garnish now you know it's nice every
once in a while to be able to see the animal you're eating in the eye and and be connected
to your food that way most of the time food and stars come now with no heads fuels already gone
no feet no nothing is just pre-trimmed edible parts and it's nice that once in a while to
see what they really look like a little bit of cilantro garnish and then we're done our
tom yung goong and thanks for tuning in I'll see you next time for your next delicious time