Red Curry Paste Isaan Style (recipe)

During many of my travels I found that red curry pastes differed in their ingredients, some have star anise in them, others have fennel seeds and some have palm sugar.

To be perfectly honest, I think the best tasting paste to me is the Isan variant of Khaeng Phed (hot curry or red curry) which is quite strong (and not for the faint hearted) and can be added or subtracted to in order to make a variety of other dishes. I learned this recipe from my neighbours in Nong Khai.

Pad Thai - a shortcut that works

In my search for getting that authentic taste out of real ingredients that make up traditional dishes I have always managed to fail when it comes Pad Thai. The pad thai I used to eat in Nong Khai in Thailand was exquisite but I never learned to make it from my neighbours during the brief time that I was living there. Recipes on the web and in books never seemed to come even remotely close to what I wanted.
I did however have a massive craving for pad thai recently but as it was late on a Sunday I did not have all of the ingredients - this however I think will surprise you enormously - you don't actually need the thousand and one hard to find ingredients. Have a look at this.