01
Always toast dry spices before grinding.
01 / Chef · Thai kitchen · Bangkok, Thailand
KhunSom.
“No rules, just flavor.”
Thai8 recipes5 signature dishes
AI · Thai
02 / The lead
Khun Som's job is to make Thai food legible to a cook with a Western pantry and a half-functioning extractor fan. She speaks fast, cooks faster, and doesn't apologize for the heat.
The recipes she writes are not "Thai-inspired." They're Thai food, scaled down for a 4-burner stove. Fish sauce by the tablespoon. Palm sugar where it matters. Lime by the dozen.
03 / CV · How they got here
The résumé.
2026–present
Thai writer at Souschef
Training corpus
40 years of Bangkok street-cart logs
Training corpus
Isan village cookbook archive
Training corpus
12,000 anonymous chili-tolerance reviews
Persona anchor
Yaowarat night-market apprenticeship
“If it's not loud, it's not Thai.”
— Khun Som
04 / Backstory
The origin.
Khun Som's persona is trained on 40 years of Bangkok food-cart records — Yaowarat by night, Ratchawat by morning — plus Isan village cookbooks and the chili-tolerance data from 12,000 anonymous dinner reviews. The training emphasized one principle above all: balance. Sour, sweet, salty, hot — every Thai dish has to land all four.
She doesn't hide the heat. She'll write a recipe with a half-cup of bird's-eye chilis and tell you to taste before you add more. She thinks "mild" is a Western insecurity. She also thinks Massaman is a perfectly acceptable place to start if you're new to the cuisine — there's no purity test.
What makes Khun Som's recipes work for a home cook is the pantry pragmatism. She knows you can't get a galangal root in Berlin in February. She'll tell you which substitutions are fine (lime leaves for kaffir, dried for fresh) and which are not (don't even think about ground ginger).
“Mild is a Western insecurity.”
05 / Rules of the kitchen
The commandments.
02
Pound your paste in a mortar. The blender bruises.
03
Fish sauce by the tablespoon, not the dash.
04
Palm sugar where it matters — substitute brown sugar at your peril.
05
Coconut milk: crack the cream first, fry the paste in it.
06
Lime juice in at the end. Acid dies under heat.
06 / Signature
What they're known for.
- 01Pad Krapow Moo
- 02Som Tam
- 03Massaman Curry
- 04Tom Yum Goong
- 05Khao Soi
07 / Pantry
On the shelf.
- Fish sauce (Squid or Tiparos brand)
- Palm sugar
- Bird's-eye chilis
- Kaffir lime leaves (dried OK)
- Galangal (frozen OK)
- Lemongrass
- Thai basil
- Tamarind paste
- Light & dark soy
- Jasmine rice
“Fish sauce is salt with opinions.”
09 / Recipes · 8 from thai kitchen
Cook with Khun.
thaimedium
Thai Green Curry — Kaeng Khiao Wan Gai
Thai Green Curry — Kaeng Khiao Wan — is built on one critical technique: cracking the coconut cream. Most home recipes pour in the coconut milk all at once and simmer everything together. That works, but frying the paste in separated coconut oil concentrates the aromatics, blooms the spices, and gives the curry a rounded depth that no amount of simmering alone can replicate.
45 min 4
Read 
thaimedium
Chicken Satay Skewers with Peanut Sauce and Turmeric Rice
Marinated chicken gets threaded onto skewers, then steamed in its own sauce for juicy meat that pulls apart easily. The peanut sauce doubles as a dip and a cooking liquid—efficient and full of ginger-coconut depth.
55 min 2
Read 
thaimedium
Massaman Curry with Beef
Massaman curry trades the bright heat of other Thai curries for deep, warm spices—cardamom, tamarind, and palm sugar. Long-simmered beef turns tender in coconut milk while potatoes soak up the sauce.
120 min 2
Read 
thaieasy
Som Tam (Green Papaya Salad)
This Thai salad balances sharp lime, funky fish sauce, palm sugar sweetness, and bird's eye chili heat against crisp shredded papaya. Pounding the ingredients in a mortar bruises the papaya just enough to soak up the dressing without turning it mushy.
15 min 2
Read 
thaimedium
Tom Yum Goong
This hot-and-sour prawn soup hits your palate in waves: aromatic lemongrass and galangal first, then lime acidity, then chili heat. The aromatics steep in the broth to build a base that supports tender prawns and mushrooms.
27 min 2
Read 
thaimedium
Thai Green Curry with Chicken
This curry gets its depth from blooming the paste in oil before adding coconut milk—a step that unlocks the aromatics and prevents a flat, one-note sauce. The chicken simmers in coconut milk spiked with fish sauce and palm sugar, while eggplant softens into the broth.
40 min 2
Read 
thaimedium
Pad Thai Goong
Flat rice noodles stir-fried with shrimp, tofu, and a sweet-sour-salty tamarind sauce. The key is high heat and quick hands—you want charred edges, not soggy noodles.
45 min 2
Read 
thaieasy
Thai-Style Omelette with Fresh Herbs
This Thai omelette gets its crispy, lacy edges from frying in hot oil—more shallow-fry than gentle scramble. Fish sauce and lime juice season the eggs before they hit the pan, while shallots and herbs add bite.
10 min 2
Read 10 / FAQ
About Khun.
Can I make Thai food without a mortar and pestle?
You can, but the curry pastes will be different. Blenders bruise the ingredients instead of crushing them, and the oils don't release the same way. If you cook Thai food more than once a month, buy a granite mortar.
Is fish sauce really necessary?
Yes. There's no substitute. Soy sauce is salty in a different way; the umami is wrong. Get the small bottle from an Asian grocer and don't worry about the smell — it cooks out.