Facebook | Pinterest | Instagram Thai food (not just the curry) is AMAZING. It is now my mission in life to make it to Bangkok, just for the food alone. We made Pad Thai (garnished with authentic banana leaves), Drunken Noodles, Pineapple Fried Rice, Tom Kha Gai Soup, and Chicken Satay with Peanut Sauce. It was probably one of the best meals of my life. Every dish was incredible. But I couldn’t stop going back to the Chicken Satay and Peanut Sauce. The fatty, greasy, oh-so-satisfying chicken (recipe coming asap) dipped in dreamy creamy Peanut Sauce. It is sweet and savory all at once, and absolutely addictive! The thing is, when you are making a recipe for about 30 people (that’s my parents, their 5 children, and all the grandkids put together), you kind of have to guess on how many times to multiply a recipe. Should we triple the pad Thai, or quadruple it? Quintuple the Pineapple Fried Rice, or sextuple it? (How many times in your life do you get to sextuple something, anyway? I feel like there’s a joke in here somewhere but we’re just going to let that rest.) Over the next few days, we all realized that you can put this stuff on A.N.Y.T.H.I.N.G and it will only make your food taste more amazing. Use it as a salad dressing. Toss it on chicken, steak, salmon. Dip your sliced apple in it. You cannot fail here. For my family’s big Thai meal, we used real lemongrass in a few recipes and ended up busting out a hammer to smash it. It’s supposed to be crushed, and lemongrass is really tough! Thai cooking is no joke! Plus, to get this peanut sauce authentic, you would have to grind your own peanuts. Eep. No thanks. Using natural peanut butter, the kind that is just ground peanuts and nothing else, is a great substitute. My recipe actually calls for regular Jif peanut butter because I like a smoother texture. That’s just my preference; it’s not how Thai peanut sauce is made authentically. The real stuff is much less smooth, and a little more chunky (because of the ground peanuts!) See notes for details about how to use natural peanut butter! I adapted this recipe from Leela Punyaratabandhu’s peanut sauce, found on her blog She Simmers. Leela is a fabulous cook and an engaging writer! I really enjoy her blog. Definitely check it out if you are interested in authentic Thai cooking. Leela also has several cookbooks; I really want to get this one called Flavors of the Southeast Asian Grill. It looks SO good. Thank you, Leela, for sharing all your amazing recipes with the world! It only takes about 10 minutes and a pot on the stove. Many other peanut sauce recipes you will find online from Americans are uncooked, and I actually tried it both ways. I much prefer cooking the sauce, even just a couple minutes bubbling on the stove brings the flavors together and changes the texture to be just right. Add the coconut milk, peanut butter, curry paste, sugar, garlic, lime, vinegar, and salt to a pot and set it on the stove over medium heat. Whisk it together, making sure all the peanut butter is broken up and incorporated. Once the mixture reaches a simmer, bring the heat down to low and simmer for just a couple minutes. That’s IT! Take it off the heat and give it a taste. This recipe includes water as an optional ingredient. I left it out entirely, because I prefer a very thick sauce. But you can add up to a half cup water while you are simmering on the stove if you want it to be more “drizzle-able.” But we don’t have to limit ourselves here. There are SO many things you can do with this peanut sauce. Like I said, my family and I were putting it on everything for several days, using up the giant pot we made! Here are some more ideas for how to use peanut sauce:
