Updated March 2, 2026
The wok hei tradition of Central Thailand. Sixteen stir-fries demonstrating wok technique as a governing principle, from holy basil to oyster sauce, garlic to ginger.
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Chef Fai
Nam prik pao is a kreung tam hiding in a jar. Roasted chilies, shrimp paste, garlic, tamarind, all pounded. When it hits the wok with seared shrimp, the paste becomes the sauce. That's the system at work.
Chef Fai
Thai-Chinese wok tradition at its sharpest: roasted chili jam builds the backbone, fish sauce holds the salt, dried chilies bring slow heat, and cashews go in last so they stay crunchy. The wok does the rest.
Chef Fai
Garlic hits oil first. Beef sears before sauce enters. Fish sauce underneath the oyster sauce for depth. Three rules. Follow them and the wok does the rest.
Chef Fai
Ginger is the governing aromatic here, slivered and seared in a screaming wok, coating delicate fish in a light glaze that proves Thai stir-frying isn't always about brute force. Sometimes the wok whispers.
Chef Fai
The stir-fry that uses the kreung tam as a live weapon: a rough paste of fingerroot, galangal, garlic, and chili hits screaming oil before any seafood enters the wok. Every aromatic principle Ajarn taught, fired at maximum volume.
Chef Fai
Wok hei is not a technique, it's a temperature. Garlic hits screaming oil, pork chars on contact, holy basil wilts in the last breath of heat. Thailand's most eaten lunch, governed by the same four pillars as every other Thai dish.
Chef Fai
Wok hei is not a technique. It's a temperature. Morning glory hits screaming steel and open flame for sixty seconds, dressed in tao jiao, garlic, and chili. The fire itself is the ingredient.
Chef Fai
Tamarind for sour, not vinegar. Palm sugar for sweet, not white sugar. Fish sauce for salt, not soy. Thai sweet and sour follows the four pillars, and it tastes nothing like the neon-orange version you're thinking of.
Chef Fai
Crispy pork belly meets wok-charred Chinese broccoli in a sauce built on oyster sauce for body, nam pla for salt, and palm sugar for balance. The wok does the rest. Bangkok's lunch hour in a single plate.
Chef Fai
Cracked black peppercorns replace chili as the heat engine, garlic hits screaming oil first, shrimp sear in seconds. Central Thai wok cooking that proves the four pillars don't care which spice you use, only that the system holds.
Chef Fai
Red curry paste slammed into a screaming wok with no coconut milk to hide behind. This is the kreung tam stripped naked: paste, pork, long beans, kaffir lime, and wok hei doing all the talking.
Chef Fai
No paste. No protein. Just vegetables, garlic, a screaming-hot wok, and the same governing principles that run through every Thai dish: fish sauce for salt, oyster sauce for body, sugar for balance. The simplest stir-fry proves the system works.
Chef Fai
No paste. No mortar. Just a screaming wok, sliced chilies, garlic, and fish sauce doing what the four pillars do: salt, sweet, heat. Central Thai stir-fry at its most stripped-down and honest.
Chef Fai
Mung bean glass noodles absorb every drop of fish sauce, oyster sauce, and wok hei you throw at them. That's not a side effect. That's the whole point of this Central Thai stir-fry.
Chef Fai
Wide rice noodles seared against a screaming wok, stained black with si ew dam, charred at the edges, tangled with egg and Chinese broccoli. Wok hei is not a technique. It is the dish.
Chef Fai
Three ingredients in the mortar, thirty seconds in the wok. This is the kreung tam stripped to its bones: garlic, white pepper, cilantro root. The first paste every Thai cook learns, and the one that teaches you everything.
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