These are deep fried pastry parcels, like a small curried meat pasty, but fried instead of baked. The most unusual aspect of this dish is the pastry, it is made with two layers, an outer layer of pastry containing water, and an inner layer containing oil. They are eaten as a snack, a 'gop-gam' dish served with alcohol and they can be eaten hot or cold.

Ingredients for Outer Layer Pastry
100 gms Wheat Flour
50 ml Water
1 Tablespoon Oil
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1 Tablespoon Brown Sugar

Ingredients for Inner Layer of Pastry
50 gms Wheat Flour
50 ml Oil

Ingredients for Filling
60 gms Pork Mince
1 Teaspoon Curry Powder
50 gms Boiled Cubed Potato
50 gms Onion Chopped Finely
2 Teaspoons Sugar
2 Tablespoons Salt
3 Tablespoon Maggi Sauce
1 Teaspoon White Pepper

Preparation
1. Fry the pork with the oil.
2. Add the curry, onion, potato, sugar, salt, pepper and Maggi sauce then stir fry for 3 minutes and leave it to cool. This is the filling.
3. Make the outer pastry by mixing the flour with the salt, sugar, oil and water until the dough is soft. Then cut it into 14 equal parts.
4. Make the inner pastry by mixing the flour and oil together. Cut the dough into 14 equal parts.
5. For each parcel, roll the outer pastry into a flat circle 4-6 cms diameter.
6. Next place the inner pastry into the middle of the circle and roll it flat again.
7. Put the pork curry into middle, fold over the edges into a small pasty shape and crimp the edges closed.
8. Deep fry them for 5 minutes. The filling is already cooked, you are only aiming to cook the pastry until it is golden brown.

Serve With
Pickles
Salad

These deep fried pork sandwiches are also great as an appetizer or snack, the only downside is the amount of fat in this dish. Not suprisingly the bread soaks up some of the cooking oil and so its best to only eat these as a treat or as a small part of a larger meal.

Ingredients for 2 People
6 Slices of Bread
40 gms Pork Mince
1 Egg
1 Teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
2 Teaspoons Chopped Garlic Cloves
1/4 Teaspoon Ground Pepper
2 Tablespoons Chopped Spring Onion
Toothpicks
350 ml Oil (Enough to deep fry)

Preparation
1. Mix the pork mince with egg, salt, light soy sauce, ground pepper, spring onions and garlic together.
2. Take a couple of slices of bread and cut each into 9 equal squares.
3. Spoon some of the mixture onto the bread to make mini-sandwiches and stick a toothpick through them to hold them together.
4. Deep frying in 190 degree celsius oil (very hot).
5. They will cook very quickly, be careful not to burn them.

Serve With
Sweet 'Chicken' Sauce (The sweet chilli sauce intended for chicken).
Salad
Sliced Spring Onions

These fried pork balls are a common snack sold from street vendors in Thailand. Normally served with sweet chicken sauce (a sweet chilli sauce made for chicken dishes) or sweet chilli sauce, and served with salad or side vegetables.

Ingredients
500 gms Pork Mince
4 Garlic Cloves
1 Teaspoon White Pepper
2 Tablespoons Salt
2 Tablespoons Wheat Flour
30 gms Crushed Ice
400 ml Water for Boiling
400 ml Cold Water
Wooden Skewers
Oil for Deep Frying

Preparation
1. Mix the pork mince with the white pepper, salt, flour and garlic and blend in a food processor.
2. Add the crushed ice and blend it again for 3 minutes until well mixed. The ice will melt during cooking and make the mix spongy, you want small crystals of ice mixed throughout the pork mix.
3. Boil the water, take two spoons, take spoonfuls of the mixture carefully forming them into a ball using the spoons, and drop into the boiling water to cook.
4. Cook them for 2 minutes, then remove them and drop them into the cold water to cool down.
5. Drain them well, and skewer them onto the wooden sticks.
6. Deep fry the skewered pork balls for 3 minutes until brown.

Serve With
Sweet Chilli Sauce
Lettuce
Coriander
Mint
Cabbage

You can see the overlap between Thai dishes and western dishes here. Variations of this recipe exist in almost every country in the world!

Ingredients
200 gms Pork Steaks
1 Egg
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
1/3 Teaspoon White Pepper
1/2 Teaspoon Salt
Breadcrumbs
Oil For Deep Fry

Preparation
1. Clean and slice the pork into 5x5 cm slices.
2. Whip the egg, add the salt, light soy sauce and white pepper. Leave the pork in the egg mixture for 15 minutes.
3. Heat the oil to 190 degrees celsius.
4. Coat the pork with the breadcrumbs, and deep fry for 2 minutes until golden brown.

Serve With
Thai Fragrant Rice
Sweet Chilli Sauce

These slices of pork fillet get their flavour from soy & Maggi sauces (a German made savoury sauce popular in Thailand) and their texture from the crunchy sesame seed batter they're coated in.

Ingredients
200 gms Sliced Pork Meat
3 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
1 Tablespoon Maggi Sauce
1/2 Teaspoon Salt
1/2 Teaspoon Sugar
1/3 Teaspoon White Pepper
1 Tablespoon Flour
4 Tablespoons Sesame Seeds
Oil For Deep Frying

Preparation
1. Clean the pork and dry.
2. Mix the pork with the light soy sauce, Maggi sauce, salt, sugar, and white pepper. Marinade for 15-20 minutes.
3. Mix the flour and a little water to make a thin batter.
4. Heat the oil.
5. Dip the pork in the batter, then cover with sesame seeds, and drop into the hot oil to cook.

Serve With
Thai Fragrant Rice
Chilli Sauce
Cucumber

This pork is marinated in a tumeric and coconut sauce, then grilled to cook and brown it. A nice side dish to eat with rice.

Ingredients
200 gms Pork Meat
2 Tablespoons Coconut Milk
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
1 Teaspoons White Pepper
1 Teaspoon Ground Tumeric
1 Teaspoon Lemon Juice
Wood Skewers

Preparation
1. Slice the pork meat into thin 3x3 cm squares.
2. Mix the pork and all the other ingredients, mix well so that the marinade coats all the pork and leave overnight.
3. Threat the pork onto wooden skewers.
4. Grill on a hot grill for 5 minutes.

The filling for these paper thin snacks is pork and carrot, the outer wrapper is spring roll paper. In the photograph you can see I layered the papers with slices of pineapple. The pineapple adds a sharpness to cut through the fatty taste of the papers, but also it keeps the papers apart so they don't stick together.

Ingredients
100 gms Pork Meat
50 gms Pineapple
30 gms Carrot
20 gms Onion
3 Garlic Cloves
1 Teaspoon Salt
1 Teaspoon Sugar
1 Tablespoon Light Soy Sauce
8 Spring Roll Papers
Oil for deep frying

Preparation
1. Clean the pork and chop it into pieces (you will blend it later anyway).
2. Peel the carrot and garlic and slice the onion.
3. Put all the chopped vegetables and pork together into a blender, add salt, sugar, light soy sauce and blend until smooth.
4. Take 1 spring roll page, and cut into equal sized triangles.
5. Spread the mixture thinly and evenly onto each triangle.
6. Add a top triangle of spring roll paper (to form a sandwich), and repeat until all the filling is used up.
7. Heat the oil ready to deep fry.
8. Drop the triangles one by one into the oil until they're crispy - approximately 1 minute. Remove and drain.
9. Layer with slices of pineapple.

Serve With
Sweet Chilli Sauce For Chicken or Plumb Sauce
Lettuce
Cucumber

A common item from Chinese restaurants, here I've made a spring roll with a little pork to make it into a complete meal. You don't have to make spring rolls into rolls, I like to fold them into triangles too. Spring roll pastry is treated to stop the fat soaking into the pastry, you cannot make them yourself, you should by it from your Asian grocers.

Ingredients
4-6 Spring Rolls Papers
50 gms Pork Mince
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
1/2 Teaspoon White Pepper
30 gms Carrots
30 gms Glass Noodles
1 Egg
Oil for Deep Frying

Preparation
1. Whip the egg to break up the yolk.
2. Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a pan.
3. Add the pork mince, light soy sauce, white pepper and stir frying until the mince is cooked.
4. Peel the carrot and grate into thin strips, or slice with a knife.
5. Soak the glass noodle in warm water for 20 minutes, then remove it from the water and dry.
6. To make the spring roll, take the spring roll paper, lay out some mince, carrot and glass noodles then roll up the roll, folding the ends in as you roll.
7. Spread a little of the egg along the edge of the spring roll paper to seal it.
8. Heat the deep frying oil to 180 degrees Celsius.
9. Fry the spring rolls for 1-2 minutes, drain and serve.

Serve With
Sweet Chilli Sauce

This pork is made with a coating of sweet chilli sauce which caramelizes when the pork is fried.

Ingredients
200 gms Pork Meat
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
2 Tablespoons Sweet Chilli Sauce for Chicken
2 Tablespoons Condensed Milk
2 Tablespoons Flour
Oil for Deep Frying
Wooden Skewers

Preparation
1. Clean the pork meat and slice thinly to 3x5 cm pieces.
2. Mix the pork with the soy sauce, chilli sauce, condensed milk and marinade in the fridge overnight.
3. Coat the pork in the flour.
4. Skewer onto the wooden skewers.
4. Heat the deep frying oil to medium hot (180 degrees Celsius), fry the pork for 2-3 minutes.

Serve With
Fragrant Rice

These tubes are rolled up wonton pastry covered with red pork and deep fried, and served with sweet plum dipping sauce.

Ingredients
1 Tablespoon Red Curry Paste
100 gms Pork Mince
1 Tablespoon Sugar
20-25 Won Ton Pastries (The ready made pastry slices)
Oil For Deep Frying

Preparation
1. Mix the pork mince, red curry paste, and sugar together. Leave it to marinade for 30 minutes.
2. Take a wonton and spread the mixture evenly over it.
3. Roll up into a tube.
4. Steam these tubes for 8 minutes in a chinese steamer. This pre-cooking gives the pork chance to cook, the pastry cooks too quickly otherwise.
5. Heat the oil to 190 degrees (hot).
6. Fry the tubes for 30 seconds, just enough to make them crispy.

Ingredients to Serve With
Chopped Red Onions
Chopped Chillies
Chopped Lime
Plum Sauce
Lettuce

The wrapper on these pork balls in made from bean curd, the inside inside is pork, with a little shrimp and crab added to broaden the flavours. You can see below how the balls are made, a sausage of the mixture is wrapped in the bean curd sheet and tied with string. The string is steamed, then cut and finally fried.

Ingredients
50 gms Crab Meat Minced
50 gms Shrimps Meat Minced
200 gms Pork Mince With Fat
20 gms Chopped Spring Onion
10 gms Chopped Garlic
10 gms Coriander Root
1 Teaspoon Black Pepper
1 Teaspoon Salt
3 Tablespoons Wheat Flour
1 Tablespoon Cassava Starch Flour
1 Tablespoon White Wine
1 Tablespoon Light Soy Sauce
2 Eggs
4-5 Sheets Bean Curd
Oil for Deep Frying

Preparation
1. In a food processor, blend all three meats together, add the spring onions, garlic coriander root, black pepper, salt, flour, cassava starch, white wine, eggs and light soy together and blend some more. For this you want a fairly course mixture.
2. Soak the bean curd sheets in water for 30 seconds.
3. Lay out the sheet, spoon the pork mixture along the short side slightly in from the edge.
4. Roll up the sheet, you want the sheet several layers thick so that it doesn't break.
5. Tie pieces of string at regular lengths to form balls, you can see this in the photograph.
6. Steam for 10 minutes, remove and leave so that any water drains off.
7. Cut off the string, and cut into the balls.
8. Heat the oil to 180 degrees celsius (medium hot). Fry the balls until they go brown and crisp.

Serve With
Plum Sauce
Chicken Sauce
Lettuce
Tomato

I make the recipes for this site weeks in advance sometimes, the world cup is happening and so it's time to make a world cup snack! These are pork footballs, pork balls wrapped in 'string' pastry and deep fried.

Ingredients for Balls
200 gms Pork Mince
20 gms Chopped Spring Onions
2 Garlic Cloves
2 Coriander Root
1 Teaspoon Peppercorns
2 Eggs
1 Teaspoon Salt

Ingredients for Wrapper
140 gms Wheat Flour
1 Large Egg

Preparation
1. Mix the wheat flour and 1 egg together, if the mixture is too tight you can add a little water and leave for 20 minutes. You want to make a faily firm pastry for this recipe.
2. Pound the garlic, peppercorns, and coriander root together.
3. Mix the pork mince, spring onions, egg and salt together.
4. Pinch off 2 cms balls of the pork and roll them in the palm of your hands to make them round. Steam these for 10 minutes to cook them.
5. Roll out the pastry, and slice into thin strips with a sharp knife to form strings of pastry.
6. Wrap the strings around the pork balls.
7. Deep fry in hot oil (190 degree celsius) until the pastry is just cooked and brown.

There's a technique to eating bamboo shoots, pick it up with your hands and tear strips of fibres from the bamboo and eat them. Chew carefully to break up the fibres. For this dish I used bamboo shoots in tins, which are easy to find in asian grocers.

Ingredients
5 Bamboos (Boiled or Tinned)
80 gms Pork Mince
10 gms Chopped Spring Onions
1/4 Teaspoon Salt
1/2 Sugar
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
Oil for Deep Frying
2 Tablespoons Flour

Preparation
1. Mix the pork mince, salt, sugar, spring onion and light soy sauce together, knead until sticky.
2. Take the bamboo shoots, cut a slit in them with a fork or knife along their length but not to the ends.
3. Push the pork mince stuffing into the bamboo shoots.
4. Mix the flouur with a little water to form a paste.
5. Roll the bamboo in this batter.
6. Heat the deep frying oil to 180 degrees celsius.
7. Fry the bamboo for 30 seconds, remove, drain and serve.

Nam is the raw seasoned pork dish we eat in Thailand. You don't have to eat it raw though! Here I've wrapped it in bean curd sheets and deep fried it. Since Nam is raw, it has a very short shelf life, and must be eaten fresh. This is a good way to use up old Nam.

Ingredients
200 gms Nam
Yellow Bean Curd Sheets (Tofu sheets)
Oil for Deep Frying

Preparation
1. Soak the bean curd sheets in warm water for 20 seconds to soften them.
2. Cut them in 10cm x 10cm squares.
3. Roll a sausage of nam, cut it into lengths and place it at one edge of the sheet.
4. Fold over then edges and roll it up.
5. Steam for 10 minutes, then drop into hot oil to brown it.
6. Drain and serve with sweet chilli sauce.
7. It's as simple as that.

Fried pork ribs with garlic, anyone can cook this at home with - you won't have to hunt around for obscure Thai ingredients, they're all easy to find in a typical supermarket! This dish is eaten everywhere in Thailand - North, South, East or West, of Thailand, it's the same basic dish in all provinces, except that in the North and East of Thailand they sometimes use lime juice to add a sour taste. This version is the central province version.

Ingredients
500 gms. Pork Ribs.
4 Garlic cloves.
1 Teaspoons Pepper Corns
2 Teaspoons Salt.
2 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce.
1 Tablespoon Oyster Sauce.
200 ml.Oil

Serve With
Sliced Cucumber, Tomato and Lettuce.

Preparation
1. Clean & cut the pork ribs ( if you prefer long ribs you don't have to cut it )
2. Pound the garlic and pepper corn together in a pestle.
3. Put the ribs in a big mixing bowl, so you can mix up the pork ribs and seasonings thoroughly.
4. Add the garlic and pepper corn, soya sauce, oyster sauce, and salt together, and live it in the fridge for 30 minutes to marinade.
5. Put the oil in hot pan and preheat it. Add the pork ribs and shallow fry in this oil for 15 minutes or until cooked.

It's difficult to find the correct word for these in English, they are similar to rissoles, but without breadcrumbs or pastry coating. It's a useful way to extend expensive pork meat into a bigger meal, something us Thais do often!

Ingredients
200 gms Pork Mince
125 gms Bread
10 gms Chopped Onions
1-2 Garlic Cloves Chopped
1 Teaspoon White Pepper
1-2 Tablespoons Salt
1 Egg
Oil for Deep Frying

Preparation
1. Soak The bread in warm water for 15 minutes, then squeeze out the water with your hands, breaking up the bread as you squeeze.
2. Mix the bread with the pork mince, salt, white pepper, chopped onion, egg and chopped garlic and stir to mix well.
3. Take pieces of the mixture and form them into small round shapes. Don't make them too big or they won't cook in the middle.
3. Deep fry for 8 minutes at 160-170 degree celsius.

Serve With
Thai Fragrant Rice
Bread
Tomato
Lettuce

Mu means pork, Gop means crunchy and as you'd expect the main part of this dish is the crunchy pork. It is normal to use thick strips of bacon, or similar cuts of pork with the skin still present. However not everyone likes the crunchy skin, so you may prefer to remove it. The pork can be prepared ahead of time.

Ingredient for 2 people
150 gms Fatty Pork
200 ml Water
1 Teaspoon Salt
100 gms Broccoli
4 Red Chillies
2 Garlic Clove
1 Tablespoon Light Soya Sauce
1 Tablespoon Oyster Sauce
1/2 Teaspoon Sugar
2 Tablespoon Oil

Preparation of Crunchy Pork
1. Add the salt to the water and bring to the boil.
2. Add the pork to the boiling water and cook for 5 minutes.
3. Take it off the heat and leave the pork to dry. You can prick the pork all over with a fork, it will help to make it crunchier.
4. Once it is dry, deep fry in hot oil.
6. The finished pork should be very very crunchy.

Preparation
1. Chop the garlic and fry it in a hot frying pan for a few seconds to release the garlic fragrance.
2. Chop the crunchy pork into bite sized strips, and put it in the frying pan with the garlic.
3. Add light soy sauce, oyster sauce, and sugar, and stir fry it for 1 minute.
4. Slice the red chilles in halves and the broccoli into florets and add those to the stir fry.
5. Fry for a few minutes longer, to just lightly cook the broccoli.
6. Serve with hot fragrant rice and optionally, the chilli sauce below.

Preparation for Chilli Sauce
1. Chop a red chilli finely, and chop a garlic clove finely.
2. Put those in a bowl together with a single slice of lemon.
3. Add 2 tablespoons of fish sauce.
4. Thats it, a spicy chilli sauce - this is a common condiment, if the dish isn't spicy enough, you can add a teaspoon or two to your rice.

Rice is cheap, pork is not and it's not surprising that we stretch pork with rice. These fried pork & rice cakes have the crunchiness of crisp rice with the meatiness of pork.

Ingredients
50 gms Pork Mince
3 Garlic Cloves
2 Coriander Root
1/2 Teaspoon Ground Pepper
2 Tablespoons Chopped Chives
2 Tablespoons Chopped Carrots
2 Tablespoons Fish Sauce
150 gms Fragrant Rice
Oil for Frying

Preparation
1. Pound the garlic, coriander root, and ground pepper together. Mix with the pork mince, fish sauce and the other ingredients.
2. Form the mixture into round patties and deep fry at 180 degrees celsius until brown.

Serve With
Chillies
Lettuce
Pickled Ginger

A typical gop-gam dish to eat as a snack or with alcoholic drinks. This one is fatty pork garnished with crunchy (fried) kaprow basil leaves. We love our snack food in Thailand!

Ingredients
20 gms Large Kaprow Leaves
300 gms Pork with Rind and Fat (3 layer pork)
1 Teaspoon Flaked Chillies
1 Teaspoon Dark Soy Sauce
1 Teaspoon Lime Juice
1 Teaspoon Fish Sauce
Sliced Kaffir Lime Leaves
Sliced Red Onion
Sliced Garlic

Garnish
Sliced Coriander Leaves
Sliced Mint

Preparation
1. Clean the kaprow leaves, dry them and drop them into hot oil to just crisp up, this only takes around a minute. Set aside on kitchen paper to drain.
2. Boil the three layer pork in water for 10 minutes to cook it, chop it into tiny strips.
3. Mix the pork with the other ingredients, and shallow fry for 2-3 minutes.
4. Garnish with the fried kaprow leaves, coriander and mint.

There is an Indonesian season chilli sauce, known as Sambal Oelek (the Oelek type is the spicy one). We use it in Thailand too, and here I've used it to make spicy sweet ribs. The sauce is used as a marinade but you should also keep a tablespoon of it back to add at the end. The heat from the spices is reduce by the cooking process and adding a spoonful at the end peps it up. Since this is a ready made sauce it is about as simple as it gets!

Ingredients
1 Rack of Ribs
6 Tablespoons of Sambal Oelek

Preparation
1. Cut the ribs into individual ribs.
2. Cover with 4 tablespoons of the sauce and marinade for at least an hour.
3. Fry in a covered shallow frying pan with little oil until well browned on all sides.
4. Add two more tablespoons of sauce.
5. Cook a little longer just to warm and coat the ribs.

In China these are made using Wonton skins: a flour based dough processed with lye to change the texture of the flour. However at home in Thailand we make our own pastry without using Lye. This recipe is much better than the frozen Chinese parcels you can buy in the supermarket, the fresh spring onion and coriander really makes a big difference.

Ingredients for 2 People
100 gms Wheat Flour
1 Egg
1 Teaspoon Oil
150 gms Pork Mince
1 Teaspoon Salt
2 Tablespoon Light Soy Sauce
1 Teaspoon Pepper
3 Garlic Cloves
20 gms Coriander Leaves (approx 2 sprigs)
20 gms Spring Onion (approx 1 spring onion)

Preparation
1. Whip the egg, put into flour and add the oil.
2. Mix this into a flour dough, it is better not to overwork it - knead it only enough to make a dough. Leave the dough for 5 minutes to rest.
3. Blend the pork, garlic, spring onion, light soy sauce, salt, pepper and coriander in a food mixer.
4. Take the dough, roll it into a sausage shape and chop off little pieces (approx 5 gms) from the end.
5. Roll each piece into a ball using your hands, then using a slightly oil rolling pin, roll the ball into a thin flat circle of pastry.
6. Put the meat filling into the centre, fold over the pastry and pleat the edges to form a parcel.
7. Pre heat a fryer or deep pan of oil to 190 degrees celsius (high).
8. Drop the parcels into the oil and fry for 2-3 minutes until the pastry has just browned and the meat cooked.
9. Remove and place on kitchen paper to remove any oil.

Serve with
Sukiyaki dipping sauce or chilli sour Chinese sauce and coriander, mint and chilli. Or you can just eat them plain.