A common ingredient of Thai soups, this is a chinese mushroom 5-8 cms diameter, that is widely used across Asia. The easiest way of buying and keeping this mushroom is dried and they are available in many western supermarkets.

Preparation
1. Before using the dried mushroom, soak them for 5 to 10 minutes until they feel soft when squeezed.
2. Cut off the stalk, it is the cap of the mushroom we are interested in.
3. Cross-score the cap of the mushroom to make it softer if you are using the whole mushroom. This is not necessary if you will slicing this.

This vegetable is like a harder large pea and has a very similar flavour. It is used in dishes such as 'Gak Khiewwan Kai' (Green mince curry) to add green colour and an interesting texture to the dish.
You can buy it from asian grocers, and it can be frozen just like peas and kept for months at a time. If you cannot obtain this aubergine, use large uncooked peas, however you should add the peas later in the cooking process as peas take less to cook than these aubergines.

A common ingredient in Thai cooking, the Thais use the leaves of the coriander plant much more than ground coriander seeds. Americans refer to the leaves as 'cilantro' and seeds as 'coriander', but in Thailand the words are the same and the plant has only one name. Throughout this site we refer to the plant as coriander, the leaves as coriander leaves and the seeds as coriander seeds. If in doubt its the leaves (cilantro)! In the above photograph, each leave is approximate 2cms across.

Storage
Coriander leaves are best bought and used fresh. However if they're difficult to come by, you can buy bulk coriander leaves and deep freeze them. Like that they can last for 6 months or longer. If you grow coriander (it really is very easy to grow), it can be harvested fresh during the summer and some set aside in a freezer so you have it during the winter months too. If you really can't obtain coriander, use parsley, however the taste is not quite the same.

There are two types of bamboo commonly used in Thai cooking, bamboo shoots in water and pickled bamboo slices in vinegar. Either way the only part of the bamboo that is used are the soft shoots. Bamboo can be bought in cans at any Thai or Chinese grocer, either sliced or whole.

Storage
Once the can or bottle are opened, keep in the fridge for up to 3 months. They can also be frozen, but they lose some of their strong texture if frozen so it is not recommended.

These Thai greens beans have a different appearance but a similar taste to long green beans. If you can't find the Thai beans use long green beans. They are eaten raw with spicy sauce, or sometimes steamed or par-boiled.

This tuberous root vegetable is widely available in Asia, grown in the east & north east of Thailand (in provinces such as Buri Ram) because, unlike rice, it does not require lots of water. It has a hard brown outer layer and a white or yellow flesh, only the cooked flesh is used. It is also known as Yuca or sometimes Tapioca root.

Uses
1. Used to make sweet desserts (kanom) in Thailand such as Man Ted Tuam (Candied Cassava).
2. Used for its starch, for this purpose corn starch or potato starch can be substituted if you cannot find cassava starch.
3. Used to make tapioca, tapioca beads are balls of cassava starch.
4. Used to make thin crackers for frying, these are similar to rice crackers and you can use rice crackers as a substitute.
5. Used to make monosodium glutamate.
6. Used boiled as a vegetable in a similar way to boiled potatoes.

Toxic
The root contains chemically bound cyanide and should not be eaten raw, although it's not as poisionous as it's often claimed. Cooking the root causes the cells to break and the cyanide to be broken down.

I thought you might like to see what Thai oranges look like. They have a sweet orange taste, but the skin is very much thinner, green, and easier to peel, a sort of larger mandarine variety. For any recipe that requires a Thai orange, you can substitute any sweet orange, the taste it the same.

This large white Chinese radish is used to make soups and stocks in Thailand. Shown here next to a carrot and some garlic. Peel it and slice thinly, add to stocks as they boil and it fills out the flavour and cuts through the fatty taste. If you can't find it, use a carrot or swede when making the stock. Don't use the small salad radish for stock.

These are rovellon mushrooms, they're very common in Southern Europe, they have a soft spongy, almost jelly like texture. To clean them crush off any dirt or grass that sticks to them before cooking. Don't rinse them, and don't freeze them, they are too soft to survive freezing. You can make a soup and store that in the fridge if you don't want to eat them right away.

Fresh beansprouts (shoots of the mung bean) may not sound very exciting, but the freshness can really improve a stir-fry dish. Here's how to grow them from the soya beans you can buy in the grocers. It takes 3-5 days at normal room temperature, so it's very easy and quick to do.
In the photograph below you can see the soya beans, with the grown soya shoots in the middle and some shoots on the right with the seed head and root removed. You can eat all of the shoot, seed head and root included.

Ingredients
100 ml Hot Water
100 ml Cool Water
100 gms Green Soya Beans
Square Plastic Box 12 cm High, 20 cms on the sides.
1 Spray Bottle to Spray Water
Old Newspapers
Cotton Wool
Kitchen Peper

Preparation
1. Mix the hot and cold water together in a bowl.
2. Add the soya beans and soak it for 8-10 hours to kick start the growth.
3. Into the plastic box, place a few layers of kitchen paper and cotton wool. Make a 1 cm or so layer on which to grow the beans.
4. Soak this layer in water. Make sure the kitchen paper and cotton wool are well soaked and drain off any excess water.
5. Spread the soya beans over the paper/cotton. They can be close together, but only a single layer of beans can be placed in the box.
6. When these beans are growing they need to be kept in the dark, for this you will need to cover them with old newspapers. Make sure light can't enter through the sides of the box either.
7. Keep them in regular room temperature, every few hours lift the newspaper and spray the shoots with water.
8. After approximately 3 days they will have grown enough to be eaten.

Taro is a root vegetable used in Asian cooking in desserts and as a snack. It is starchy, similar to many other starchy roots such as Cassava and if the recipe calls for Taro, you can often substitute Cassava.

Store fresh in a cool dark cupboard, freezing will soften the texture, so if you can avoid it it is better.

This green vegetable grows in central Thailand and is practically a weed. It has a very strong sulfur smell, thankfully when it's cooked the sulfur smell disappears. It's commonly eaten cooked in omelettes, and also boiled or steamed as a dipping vegetable with spicy chilli dip. Keep in the fridge and it can last about 2 weeks, eat only the soft tops of the stalks, not the woody lower parts.

This is a bitter shoot from a tree, eaten steamed or boiled, with chilli paste sauce. Once you get use to the bitter taste, you start to appreciate it more and seek it out. It's easy to find in fields and borders and in scrublands around temples. Serve it as an authentic Thai vegetables to your guests.

This is eaten fresh as a salad vegetable. It grows next to water and is typically found in wet lands. When a recipe calls for salad vegetables, this is often one of the salad vegetables we would serve in Thailand.

Thailand has many many aubergines, this plant is seasonal, grows about knee height, and the aubergines are 4-5cms across. It is used in receipes such as Fried Red Curry Pork and also in soups. If stored in the fridge they will last approximately 1 week, they don't freeze well, and will go brown if cut.

This is the bitter unopened flower of a tree, used in sour curry soups, or steamed and eaten with chilli paste. Each one is approximately 7-8 cms in length.

Another Thai aubergine, the 'white' aubergine, this one is smaller (approx 3cms in length) and is better to eat raw than green & black aubergines. Each raw with chilli paste. It is a spring time aubergine, that can be kept for a week or two if kept wrapped in tissue paper in the fridge.

This Thai melon can be easily recognised from it's knarled surface, it has a bitter taste and is used to add a bitter note to soups with meat. When cooking with it, scoop out the seeds and pith from the centre.

These reed like leaves are 1 to 2 feet long (about 60cms) and grow pretty much everywhere there is a hot climate. We use them for their flower scent (very rose like) and to create a natural green colouring for foods.
To prepare them, either squeeze them in water, or place water and the leaves in a blender and blend them, then sieve out the pulp. Once you've made the green scented water, you can freeze it and it will last 6 months or more without problems.

Banana leaves are very common item in Thai cooking. They can be bought frozen from Asian supermarkets and in some places fresh. A common misconception is that they have a banana smell, they do not - they smell like leaves! The reason we use them is not for the smell, but because they are waxy, so food is easy to remove from the leaves. They are also natural and organic, so no waste and also they look good for presenting food.
If you buy them fresh they will go brown within a few days, so freeze them or keep them in the fridge. If a recipe is made in banana leaves, you can use oiled tin foil instead.

A common ingredient worldwide, this is how baby corn is presented in Thailand - with some of the outer husk left attached. We eat them raw with chilli paste, or steam them, use them in soups, stir frys and many other recipes. Apart from the presentation there is no difference between a Thai baby sweetcorn and western baby sweetcorn.

We eat these as a salad vegetable, like a bitter lettuce. It is from the same family as broccoli and if you can't get hold of them, use either broccoli leaves or a bitter lettuce.

An unusual ingredient, and a good source of iodine and some minerals. The taste though leaves a lot to be desired and so it's best to use it in salads and stir fry dishes rather than eat it directly.

You can find kelp in Asian grocers usually in packets.

Palm seeds are served in a sweet syrup and eaten in desserts. As you can see from the photograph, they're clear which makes them extremely difficult to photograph and virtually invisible when in water. The seeds in the photograph are 1-2 cms in length each.

This is actually a Chinese (not Thai) leaf vegetable similar to Pak Choi, the taste is slightly more bitter and the leaves are smaller and more serrated. It is good for stir frys.

Preservation
This green leaf vegetable wilts easily. Clean it, leave it standing in water to recover, then dry it and keep it in the fridge and it lasts several days without wilting.

Palm seeds have a natural sweetness and can be bought in tins very easily from Asian grocers and supermarkets. They are normally sold in heavy syrup, as long as you keep the tin covered in the fridge, and enough syrup to cover the seeds, they can be kept for 2 months.
In the photograph above you can see sliced palm seeds, and a tin shown on the right.

Pak Choi (Bok Choi in some pronunciations) is a Chinese green leaf cabbage used in stir fry dishes. The great thing about Pak Choi is the broad stems can be used just like the leaves. Keep in the fridge in the vegetable tray, like that they'll keep for a week or so.

Mango is one of our most commonly eaten fruits, and naturally we have many ways of preserving it.

At the left are Mango rollups, these are thin slices of mango preserved in salt and sugar. At the right is salted mango strips. The salting draws our the water causing shrinkage, but these are nice to eat as a gop-gam dish, a snack to eat with beer or wine. At the top are pieces of preserve dried mango.

We use the juice as a flavouring in some dishes, and also add the lemons to boiled dishes. Cheap cuts of pork can have a 'old' smell about them, and we use pickled lemons to take away that smell. When adding these pickled green lemons (or limes if you prefer to call them that), to boiled dishes, it is important to only boil them for 5 minutes or so. Any longer and the lemon will break open, making the stock bitter. You don't want the lime to open, only whole limes should be used in stocks.

One of my favorite things is fresh cold guava juice made by my own hands from ripe guava fruit. In the photograph you can see whole green guava, together with peeled and halved guava. You can also eat the rind if you wish, it is rich in vitamins, but a little tougher than apple skin. Over-ripe guava goes brown and soft, under-ripe guava is hard. The outer part of the flesh is the part to eat.

Sala has a fibrous center with a complex flavour, I'm told it tastes of sherry trifle with slightly bitters notes next to the sweetness. If you want to try one Thai fruit this is the one I'd go for.
Sala also forms the basis for many cream soda drinks including Hales Blu Boy.

Mangosteens are a pithy not very sweet soft fruit the size of an apple. To open cut around the middle and twist. When they're freshly cut the pith is bright red, you eat the white centre, discarding any stones. We call this the 'Queen' of fruit. (The King of Fruits is Durian).