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Welcome to Hot Thai Kitchen. If you had to guess what I miss the most about the food in Thailand, what would you guess? You probably are not going to guess dipping sauces, right? But that's actually the correct answer. If you ever go to Thailand and you look at a table of Thai people eating, you'll always see so many little bowls scattered around the table full of various delicious sauces. I miss that so much. And no, I am not talking about Thai peanut sauce because that's not a thing and we will talk about that. What I am talking about is what we call namim, which means dipping sauce or condiment. Thai people love our namim. And if you want to really understand Thai cuisine and how
Thai people eat, you've got to learn about namim. There are many kinds of namim, of course, and today I'm going to talk about the five that are most common, the top five favorite num of Thai people, plus a rant about what is not a Thai sauce. I have shared recipes for these sauces individually in the past, but I wanted to do a roundup of them together because we can compare them side by side so you can make a decision about which sauce will better pair with what you're cooking. And no, you do not have to cook Thai food to go with these sauces. These will go with absolutely anything you are cooking, Thai or not. First, we have to talk about what a namim is and what it is
not. Namim literally means dipping sauce. Nam refers to a liquid. Dim means to dip, but you don't have to dim. You can also drizzle the namim onto your food as well. So, basically, it's a condiment. Right now, I define namim as a sauce that is served on the side of the main dish and it's there to complement and enhance the flavor of the main dish. Now, as we go through the sauces, you notice a theme of balance coming through because most of the time the role of the naming is it brings in flavor elements that's missing from the main dish in order to create a better balance. Now, what it is not is a dip.
Namjim is a dipping sauce, not a dip. A dip is a dish unto itself, the star of the show. Like hummus, right? Like you order a bowl of hummus and it comes with vegetables. You don't order a bunch of vegetables and then it comes with hummus. The namim on the other hand is not a thing you order. You order something and it comes on the side and it plays a supporting role and it is technically optional. You don't have to put your thing into the namim. But if you ask a lot of Thai people in many situations, we're going to say no, no, no, it is not optional. Let's now talk about our namim number one. Namjim seafood, which means exactly what you think it means. Namjim for seafood. If
you go to any seafood restaurant in Thailand or if you order seafood of any kind, you will be given namim seafood 100% of the time. Thai people love it so much that those of us living abroad have been known to bring our own in a little Tupperware to seafood restaurants here. Once you learn to love nami seafood, you just cannot live without it. To make it, it's very simple. Start out with some garlic, chilies, red or green is fine, cilantro roots or stems, and then pound it into a paste. If you're making a lot, you can simply throw everything into a blender. Then add some palm sugar and pound that until dissolved. Add some fish sauce for saltiness and then lots of lime juice for acidity. And that is
it. The recipe will be on hot thaiikitchen.com and I'll link to that below. But keep in mind that the recipe is flexible. The ratios of ingredients can change. You can make it with more cilantro or less garlic or you want it a little sweeter. It is up to you. But the leading flavor should be sour from lime juice. Okay, this is the star here. In the same way that a squeeze of lemon always works well with seafood, you want the lime to be the lead. And typically this is a spicy dip, at least medium spicy I would say, but that can be adjusted according to your taste. How to use namim seafood. So if the seafood has been simply steamed or boiled or grilled, then this will be like your
main sauce. But even if the seafood has been already prepared into a dish, let's say like a shrimp stir fry, like my shrimp and glass noodle recipe for example, you can still dab a little extra nam seafood on the shrimp to give it a little extra flavor, a little extra acidity. The simplest dinner can be made simply with like a filt of fish. You put some namim seafood on it, serve it with rice, done. And if you love raw seafood, nam seafood works especially well with raw stuff. One of my favorite fish recipes on my website is salmon tossed in numjim seafood. Uh so good. And if you're a fan of raw oysters, forget the minion net. Like make some numjim seafood, drizzle it on. It is going to
be lifechanging. It also works on not seafood. Actually, sometimes we use it for meat like crispy pork belly. Anything that's fatty and salty cuz the acidity will help balance the grease of the fatty meat. And basically, just think if something you want to put like a vinegary hot sauce on, this will probably work. Drizzle it on tacos. It'll be great. And if you have any further questions about how do you store these sauces, can you make this and that substitute? All of that will be included in the recipe post linked below. Next is Thailand's most famous dipping sauce, and that is nam, which means dipping sauce for chicken. But of course, it's not just for chicken. And the reason I
say it's the most famous is because this is the Thai sweet chili sauce that you see in bottles and you can get basically at any store all around the world. To make it, you simply blend together some mild chilies, spicy chilies to taste, garlic with some water and white vinegar. Blend that until it's a little bit chunky and then transfer into a pot. Add some sugar and salt and then cook it for a few minutes. You want to thicken it slightly with a starch slurry. And that is that. Now, even though you can buy this everywhere, I will say that the homemade one is so much better. So, I encourage you to try making it at home. You can keep it in a
jar and it lasts literally forever in the fridge. How to use namim kai? While namim seafood is fresh, bright, and tart, namim kai is thick, sweet with just a little bit of acidity from the vinegar. And it pairs beautifully with any kind of deep fried foods, fried chicken, fried spring rolls, fried tofu, you name it because these foods tend to be primarily salty. So the sweetness and the acidity helps to balance that quite well. And the reason why Thai people call it chicken dipping sauce is because the most iconic use of this sauce is with fried chicken. Of course, you don't have to use it for fried food. Some people also use it for barbecue chicken. That works really well. Um, you can even
use it as a sweet component in your stir fry sauce, but I find personally that if anything is crunchy and salty, whether it was fried or baked or what, it works every time. Next is namimo. This is a mustave for the summer because it is our go-to sauce for all manners of barbecue. Beef, pork, chicken, even fish. You name it. If it has been on the grill, you better believe we're going to put namima on it. To make a basic namim tao, simply combine some fish sauce, lime juice, tamarind paste, palm sugar, roasted chili flakes, and the thing that makes it unique is toasted rice powder. Finish it off with shallots and cilantro or green onions, and you're good to go.
It's a salty, sour, slightly sweet, and spicy sauce that's meant to brighten the flavor of grilled meats. Now, there are many variations of this and you can make it a little lighter, a little sweeter, a little thicker, a little thinner. The options are endless. You can even add things like tomatoes on it. And on hot thaiikitchen.com, I share with you three different recipes for three different styles of dao that you can choose from. How to use namim dao. Even though the textbook used for namim dao is on grilled meat, I like to think of it as a sauce for any big hunks of meat. Okay? whether you fry it or roast it or grill it. So try it on a steak instead of a
usual gravy. That is always a winner. You can put on roast chicken, roast turkey, roast beef. This holiday season, serve namim tao alongside your holiday meal and thank me later. I even love it on a side of roasted salmon. Before we move on to the next sauce, I need to take a quick rant break because I need to free us from the tyranny of Thai peanut sauce that has plagued the western world. So, when you go to the international aisle of your local grocery store and you see a bottle that says Thai peanut sauce, please know that's not a thing in Thailand. Okay? or when you come across a recipe for Thai peanut sauce on some random food blog that invariably contains peanut butter, rice vinegar, and soy sauce, please also
know that is not a Thai thing. Peanut butter and rice vinegar are not Thai ingredients. Now, the sauce might taste good, but to call it Thai is misrepresenting all culture, which is why I feel it is important for me to talk about it. Now, the only sauce that could be described as peanut sauce that we have in Thailand is our saté sauce, the sauce for pork saté, which contains ground peanut, not peanut butter. And we call that namim sate, which means dipping sauce for pork saté. There's not even a mention of the word peanuts in the name of the sauce because it is the sauce that we use only for pork saté and not a thing that you drizzle on random thing like it was ketchup. And while I'm ranting, let me just get this other one
in. On many occasions I've seen on restaurant menus served with namim sauce. Namjim sauce is not a thing just like peanut sauce is not a thing. But this time it's because it is too vague. What you're saying is dipping sauce. What kind of dipping sauce? We have so many kinds of namim. Okay. It doesn't mean anything. I refuse to let what happened to chai tea also happen to namim. Thank you. Let's now move on to the next dipping sauce. Next is prnamsum. Prick is chilies and namsum is vinegar. And at the very basic level, that is literally all there is. Chilies and vinegar. Now, this one is a little different in a
sense that it can be a dish specific dipping sauce like the previous three or it can also be used like an all-purpose condiment to help fix things that you think needs a little bit of a zing. The basic version is made simply by pounding some chilies into a paste. If you're making a lot, you can also do this in a blender and then just adding some vinegar to it. It's like the simplest hot sauce in the world. You can also simply combine some sliced chilies and vinegar together and the vinegar in this case would be less spicy and the chili pieces will become pickled and you can eat those as well. There are of course more complex variations to
this on hot thaiikitchen.com. I'll link to below. How to use prnams in Thailand. There are some dishes that will always come with prnams on the side. These are typically dishes that don't already have spiciness and acidity in itself such as noodle soups, patiu ratna, which is noodles with gravy or any kind of meat stews. Again, it's all about balance, right? So, these dishes tend to be salty and sweet. So, a little spicy acidity is there to balance and brighten. Now, you can also keep a jar of priam in the fridge like I do and just use it kind of as an all-purpose condiment. Sometimes something just feels like, man, if this has a little sharp vinegariness to it, it would be so much better. That's the
time to pull it out. Finally, we have to end with none other than the queen of Thai condiment, the ultimate flavor booster, the most commonly used sauce in Thailand. Ladies and gentlemen, prick numpla. Now the previous four sauces we discussed are associated with a specific use. Right? If you order barbecue, you get namim. You order fried chicken, you get namim kai. But pnla is more of an allpurpose condiment that we use to fix things. If a dish tastes a little dull, a little flat, it lacks a little sequ. Now to Thai people, prnumpla is not technically a namim because of this allpurpose nature of it, but I wanted to include it in our discussion because of how often it comes up in Thai cuisine.
If you go to Thailand, this will be everywhere. It is also the easiest one to make. All you need is some chopped chilies. Any color is fine. Combine it with some fish sauce and then add a little squeeze of lime. And that is it. You don't even need to measure anything. And of course, there are variations. You can jazz it up with garlic and shallots, even a little sugar. And all of that will be on hot thaiikitchen.com. How to use prnumpla. Think of it as salt and pepper in western cuisine. If something feels under seasoned, prnumpla to the rescue. It's salty, umami, and acidic. And usually when something feels bland, dull, it's usually because it's
lacking in one or all of these three elements, which is why pikna works every time. I personally use it the most often on fried rice, fried noodles, and anything that has a fried egg on top because this is the greatest thing to season that egg. A lot of people also just drizzle it on their rice as sort of a catchall flavor booster because in Thai cuisine, we eat almost everything with rice. And here's a tip. When eating in a Thai restaurant, you can always ask for prnumpla just like you can ask for salt and pepper right now. Even if they don't have it ready to go, if you ask nicely, they might just make it for you because it's so easy. And don't worry, the chef will not be offended that you
asked to add more seasoning to your food because Thai dining culture were super open with people seasoning their own food at the table. If anything, they'd probably be impressed. You know what it is. So, here they all are side by side. So, let me give a quick recap. Namim seafood. Tart, spicy, and fresh. Perfect for seafood. Namim kai is sweet, thick, and a little bit acidic. It's great for deep fried foods or anything that is salty and crunchy. Namima is your go-to for any big hunks of meat, barbecued or otherwise. Piknam is your condiment for anything that needs a little acidic zing. Anything that's salty, sweet, prnams will give it a faceelift. And finally, prick numpla, the ultimate
allpurpose flavor booster that can fix anything that is under seasoned or feels a little dull. And that is it. I hope that was helpful to you. And before I go, I want to just double click on two things. One, Thai cuisine is all about balance, which is why all of these sauces add elements that's missing from the main dish. And two, Thai food culture loves the idea of letting diners do the final touches. You are the last chef because your preference is not the same as other people's preferences. This is why when you go to Thailand, our food always comes with so many things on the side. Not just sauces, but little side vegetables, side bowl of chilies, a wedge of lime, like crispy something or
other. There's always all these things on the side. So, I encourage you to experiment with all of these little things. And remember that these sauces are not just for Thai food. They are great for any kind of food that you're cooking. And the recipes for all of these, as always, will be on hot thaiikitchen.com. A special thanks to all of our Patreon members who help support the show. Thank you as always for watching, and I will see you next time. Satika.
