VEGAN PAD THAI

Pad Thai isn’t actually as old as you might think.

This iconic national dish of Thailand is less than 100 years old! Brought to life in the 1930’s in an effort to celebrate Thai ingredients, the Thai government promoted this new dish to encourage the use of rice noodles in a time when rice shortages were prevalent. It’s not taken long for it to become a worldwide phenomenon and signature national flavour.

Vegan Pad Thai is possible to find in Thailand!

Thailand has a massive buddhist population, so animal product free cuisine is commonplace across the country. Looking out for red and yellow ‘jae’ (เจ) signs will lead you to vegan-friendly food made without chilli, onion or garlic. These signs are all over the place, and the whole country celebrates a jae festival every october where this animal-product free cooking is celebrated all over Thailand. Because of this, versions of pad thai made without fish sauce and egg aren’t hard to find. Check out my incoming vegan guide to Bangkok for more details on how knowing how to hunt for jae food will make your time in Thailand much easier as a vegan.

The sauce doesn’t need to be very complex.

The flavour sauce on pad thai uses tamarind, palm sugar and fish sauce to achieve the signature flavour profile. Vegan fish sauce can be found at most asian supermarkets these days, and if you can find it then definitely make my sauce recipe for big, sexy Thai flavour profile. Chef’s Choice is a vegan-owned brand from Thailand that produces a vegan fish sauce as well as pre-made pad thai sauce that’s ready to stir through.

But for those who aren’t purists, May Kaidee (Thai veg legend) has a cooking school (in Bangkok, Chiang Mai and New York) where she recommends making a sauce with half dark and half light soy sauce to use on pad thai. As someone who made this version directly under her tutelage, I can confirm it makes a glorious pad thai anyway, all without the extra ingredient sourcing effort.

Egg helps stop the noodles from sticking to the wok, but there’s ways around it.

Egg is in the traditional version for flavour and texture, but it also is introduced halfway through cooking at a point that helps stop the rice stick noodles from sticking to the wok without extra oil being added. Never fear, fellow vegans! Being more generous with your tofu portion (accounted for in my ratios) helps compensate for the bulk the egg adds to the dish. If you want that hit of eggy flavour, a very light dusting of kala namak (indian black salt) over the dish right before serving will do the job.

For cooking though? It’s even simpler. Keep a glass of water near the wok before cooking (you should anyway, hydration is key!). When the rice stick noodles hit the wok, a small splash of water and vigorous mixing should be more than enough to keep them from sticking. If needed, an extra splash of water will continue to buy you time as the dish cooks, but if you’re moving quickly - the sauce is added pretty soon after to make everything slippery, delicious, and not attached to the bottom of your wok when it comes to serving.

Plating up the dish is where the magic truly happens!

If you take a peek of the video on this page compiling some of the vegan pad thai I found, you’ll see no two look the same! Sometimes the garnishes are tossed over the top, sometimes they’re barely able to be found, but my absolute favourite way is to serve them (peanuts, white sugar, salt, lime wedges, chives & additional bean sprouts) is in little piles around the plate.

Not only is it adorable, it means you can pump out pad thai portions and let people adjust to their own palate. Mixing it all through and diving in works for me, but it also means everyone can bring these flavours in to every bite to their exact preference. I also loved that some places served fresh banana blossom heart on the side of a pad thai, so if you’ve followed my fresh banana blossom harvesting guide - this recipe right here is a lovely place to use your heart.

DO I NEED STRANGE INGREDIENTS?: If you’re new to thai cooking, tamarind puree and palm sugar might not be in your pantry.. but they shouldn’t be hard to find at a local supermarket. This recipe is so delicious, you’ll surely use them regularly if you invest in some of each, but if you don’t want to add more ingredients to your clutter - easy alternatives are provided within the recipe.

I also recommend you look out for preserved radish (a yellow pickled daikon found refrigerated in asian supermarkets - check out my how-to video for a visual reference). It adds a delightful flavour very characteristic of a classic pad thai, but it’s absolutely not mandatory so just add an extra handful of veggies if you can’t find it.

VARIATIONS?: Changing or leaving out the vegetables recommended are acceptable variations. If you have access to a lovely, pan-fryable egg substitute (like justegg), then scrambling some of this to stir through would be suitable. However, this product isn’t available where I live so I’ve not tested this nor do I think it’s necessary.