It's been a few days since my last post, and I'm back on my usual diet. I know, I know, that I'm-gonna-start-eating-healthily-after-vacay spirit didn't last very long. 😂😂 But hey, I'm not being too naughty or anything, so I guess I'm okay.
Today I was being a proper Thai eating this Thai cashew chicken stir-fry (or gai pad med mamuang in Thai) with rice for breakfast! I mean, HELLO, this stuff tastes really good. Call me biased, but I think Thai cashew chicken is one of the best Asian stir-fried chicken dishes out there (along with Thai holy basil chicken, of course!).
This dish is a great way to enjoy chicken. It contains a couple of ingredients, namely dried chilies, onion, green onions and cashews, that give it awesome flavors. If you want the dish to be hot, you can definitely add fresh chilies or more dried chilies than the recipe suggests. Normally, people also use bell peppers in this dish, but because I didn't have any, I used cabbage instead. I have to say the combination of textures and flavors I ended up with was amazing! And just look at the beautiful colors. Need I say more?
As the dried chilies and cashews need to be fried before you can put them in the stir-fry, I won't say this dish is the simplest dish ever. However, it's still relatively easy since you only need a minute to fry those two ingredients, or you'll burn them! Overall, it's worth making this dish yourself at home because this means you can have the stuff as much as you want. I mean, come on, who doesn't like Thai cashew chicken?
And if you’re a vegan or follow a plant-based diet, you can replace chicken with tofu and oyster sauce with soy sauce. Although soy sauce isn't thick like oyster sauce, you'll still enjoy the dish. And whatever you do, make sure you have warm, fluffy rice ready to serve this Thai cashew chicken with.
Now go and make this awesome Thai favorite!
Thai Cashew Chicken | Gai Pad Med Mamuang Recipe
Ingredients
- 280 grams chicken cut into bite-sized pieces
- 1 pinch salt
- 7 dried Thai chilies
- 1 cup cashews
- 1 small onion quartered
- 150 grams cabbage cut into bite-sized pieces
- 1 tablespoon garlic finely chopped
- 1 tablespoon oyster sauce
- 1 teaspoon soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon black soy sauce
- 5 green onions cut into 3 cm. pieces
Instructions
- Marinate the chicken with a pinch of salt.
- Heat enough oil to fry the dried chilies and cashews over medium heat. Fry the chilies and cashews for about a minute and use a slotted spoon to remove them from the pan and drain on a paper towel. Discard the oil.
- Heat 1 tablespoon of oil in a pan over medium heat and fry the onion.
- When the onion starts to become translucent add the cabbage and garlic and stir. *In Thai cooking, it's common to add garlic before anything else in a stir-fry, but finely chopped garlic burns very easily. So, you can add it at this stage.
- Add the chicken and continue to stir.
- With kitchen scissors, quickly cut the dried chilies into 1 cm. pieces directly into the pan. *Some people put them in whole, but I find that they don't release any flavor whole.
- Season with oyster sauce, soy sauce, black soy sauce and stir until the chicken is done.
- Toss in the cashews and green onions and stir for another minute or so. Then, remove from heat and serve warm with rice.