How Spicy Do You Order Your Thai Food?

We love Thai food and get it most often as take-out. I like mine a little more spicy than Beth likes hers. Even with a restaurant we have used multiple times there can be some variation in the spiciness from day to day and if we are on travel and trying a new place, how hot is there recipe when i ask for it to be 3 out of five in spiciness.

There is an easy answer to getting your dish just the way you want it. A simple Thai sauce called Prik Nam Pla lets you kick up the level of spiciness to what you want. it is often on the table in Thai restaurants and the picture shows what it looks like. if it is not on the table you can ask for it and they will bring it to you. We also ask for it when we order take-out and they put in a tiny take-out container with no questions asked. We generally ask for two Prik Na Pla when we order and are not charged anything for it. If we forget to ask when placing the order, we also have asked them to put some in the bag when we pick it up and they are happy to do that.

It is pronounced just the way it looks. If they don’t understand my terrible accent the first time i ask for it, generally they do understand what I am asking for when I repeat myself. “Spicy sauce” is the final fall back and that has always ended up working. I believe they are not used to round eyes like me asking for Prik Na Pla but they give the impression that they like it that I am.

A little goes a LONG way. I take a small taste to determine what the spice level, or heat, is when i ordered it as 3 out of 5. i then usually take about 1/2 teaspoon of the sauce, sprinkle it over, and stir to mix it in. My goal is to get it to about 3.8. Sometimes I add another couple of drops to get there. If halfway through I decide I want it a little hotter, I can add a little more. But if I put too much sauce on it and it gets too spicy, there is NO going back, I am stuck eating it that hot, so I use incremental steps. Beth wants hers about 2.5 so she orders it at the 2 level and adds a little sauce to kick it up to that level of spiciness.

if you want to make your own it is a pretty simple sauce and will keep for a week or so in your refrigerator. Jet Tila has the recipe I use in his excellent new cookbook, 101 Thai Recipies. The only tricky ingredient is getting the Thai chili peppers which one the ones in the bag next to the sauce I made. The dried chilis will keep for a long time and I just hydrate one for a few minutes in water and then slice it up for the sauce. Beth got these from Amazon.

I am now making two different curries and I am cooking out the green curry paste for at least 20 minutes to have the curry at about a 2 level and the we can each use the Prik Na Pla sauce to get to the level of heat that we want. There are a number of other recipes that Jet has in his cookbook that I plan to try and expand my Thai repertoire. I will post the two curry recipes and any other ones that I really like.

Let me know if this helps you get your Thai food to the level of heat that you like.