Thai Specialty Pad Kra Pao Is Alex Albon's Favorite Dish
This Thai specialty is a literal breeze to make — and it's so delicious
Welcome to Grand Prix Gastronomy! In 2024, this series is dedicated to cooking the favorite dishes of every driver on the grid.
The Foods That Alex Albon Loves
I don't know if I really have a “favorite” Formula 1 driver anymore, but if I had to pick one, I think I'd pick Alex Albon. He seems like a genuinely nice fella, and he also loves his pets. I have so much respect for that.
I also have so much respect for his choice of favorite food: pad kra pao, or holy basil stir fry. This is a classic Thai dish that absolutely feels like it could be the kind of food that reminds him of home. Plus, the British Grand Prix seems like a great time to cook the dish of a British/Thai driver.
This Week's Recipes
When it comes to Thai recipes, I always check out Hot Thai Kitchen before I go anywhere else. Pailin Chongchitnant is a trained chef who shares some amazing Thai dishes with recipes that hail right from her home country. Whether I’m looking for a tasty green curry recipe or trying to figure out what to pair with my drunken noodles, this is the place I go.
This week, I actually combined two different recipes from Hot Thai Kitchen. Basically, Hot Thai Kitchen features several different recipes, and I basically just meshed together two to make sure I had both protein and some veggies in my stir fry.
Core Recipes
Supplemental Recipes
Cooking Pad Kra Pao
My favorite thing about any good stir fry is the fact that they're generally pretty straightforward to cook and come together quickly — and pad kra pao is no different!
You can basically use any protein you want for this recipe, but I opted for ground chicken. If you're using raw meat, you'll want to start out by combining that meat with some fish sauce for an extra tasty Thai flavor.
Next, you'll do your prepping. You're going to make two different sauces and one paste.
We'll start with the stir fry sauce. Mix together oyster sauce, soy sauce, fish sauce, dark soy sauce, sugar, and water, stirring until the sugar is dissolved. You'll pour this over your meat and veggies as they cook on the wok.
Next, I made my second sauce, prik nam pla. This is an essential Thai condiment made of chili and fish sauce, and it adds a ton of flavor to anything you put it on. Basically, you'll just need to mix together some thinly sliced shallots (or, in my case, diced onions), thinly sliced garlic, lime juice, fish sauce, and some chopped Thai chilies. Just like that, you're done!
Finally, you'll make your chili paste. Grab your mortar and pestle, then pound some more Thai chilies into a fine paste. Then add in garlic and some mild red pepper, and pound it into a paste. The level of heat in your stir fry will depend on how many chilies you pound up here, so adjust based on what you'd like.
Then prep the last of your veggies: dice some onions and roughly chop some mild red peppers and long beans (or green beans). And that's it, prep done!
In a hot wok, fry up your meat of choice until browned, then remove it from the pan.
Then, add in your chili garlic paste and give that whole mess a nice cook until the garlic gets golden. Toss in your onions and cook until softened, then add in your other veggies and let those soften a bit as well.
Now you'll crank the heat up to high and add in your protein and stir fry sauce, tossing until everything is heated through and the sauce is distributed evenly. Turn off the heat and add in your basil; toss it just long enough for the leaves to wilt.
That done, you'll want to fry up some eggs, then serve your pad kra pao with jasmine rice, an egg, and a hearty drizzle of your prik nam pla.
The Wine List
This week, I opted for a classic method sparkling wine — which is basically just the roundabout name for a champagne-style wine made outside of the Champagne region of France!
There are few better pairings in this world than spicy food and a chilled glass of sparkling wine. Bubbly wine serves as something of a palate cleanser, which is really important when you're eating foods that pack a punch in terms of flavor, heat, or weight. It's the same reason why sparkling wines are great with fried foods; the bubbles cut through whatever food-ness is lingering in your mouth, and it serves as a kind of palate reset.
I picked up a bottle of Frappato from COS, an Italian winery that makes sparkling wines in the French, or classic, method. It's kind of fruity and dry and a little powerful, which means it's robust enough to stand up to the heat of the pad kra pao. A match made in heaven!
So, What's The Verdict?
Few things in this world speak to me the way a good stir fry does, and pad kra pao is a new instant favorite for me.
Growing up, I wasn't a particularly adventurous eater — but that's mostly because there was nowhere for me to adventure to in rural Michigan. The extent of my experience with Mexican food was Taco Bell. If we had “Asian” food, it inevitably came from a heavily Americanized buffet.
When I graduated high school and moved to Austin, TX for college, it took a while for me to feel comfortable experimenting. My great friend Remy introduced me to Indian food when they crashed at my apartment during the 2014 U.S. Grand Prix weekend — and I will literally never forget my first taste of biryani. Later, my first experience with Vietnamese food came with my Formula SAE team; there was a pho place open late, and about 15 of us ventured there after a long day in the shop to bond over a comforting meal.
My first Thai experience was a little less fortuitous. I tried pad thai from a food truck and I absolutely hated it — and I'm still not sure why! I remember it overwhelmingly tasting like peanut butter, a food that I'd just come off a long hyperfixation on, and it just turned me off. It took a while before I ventured back into the Thai world — next, with a friend who had visited from Michigan — but I'm so glad I did. One taste of green curry, and I was a changed woman.
Despite that, I'd never tried pad kra pao until I made it for Grand Prix Gastronomy — and I'm seriously regretting that it took me this long to finally get to it! As with many Thai dishes, pad kra pao is a great blend of spicy, sweet, and umami. It's got that tinge of fishiness, that heat, that sour punch — and it's so dang good. I was actively sad that the leftovers were gone because it meant my pad kra pao experience was over.
I have to give kudos to Alex Albon for several reasons. First and foremost, the dish he picked as his favorite was delicious — and I'm glad he actually, y’know, picked something.
But I also loved that he picked something that hails from a culture he grew up with. My original goal for this season of GPG was to help introduce readers to a deeper side of each driver by showing off the dishes that remind them of home. That goal never quite came to fruition, but every now and again, a driver opts for something that I could imagine them eating as a kid, and I'm very grateful for it.
Ready… Set… COOK!
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