Recipe - Thai Table Hot Sauce (Nam Prik)

One fourth cup Thai fish sauce (Squid brand
is good)
1/8 cup Unseasoned rice wine vinegar
(optional)
1/8 cup Water
6 Thai "Bird" chiles or 2
Serranos; more to taste
1 Lime; juice of
1 teaspoon Sugar or honey; more to
taste

An hour or two before you plan to serve the sauce, thinly slice the chiles
and mix them in with the other stuff. Serve chilled or at room temp.

Note: finely minced ginger and/or garlic can be added to either of these
with good results, but I like the simple versions because you can taste
each element, as well as the harmony of the whole. Another note: I'm not
sure there's any, or much, difference between Viet and Thai fish sauces. I
pretty much stick with the Squid Brand, since that's what I have a huge
bottle of. Our first bottle lasted years, but this one's going down faster.

There are as many versions of these sauces as there are cooks of these
cuisines. You have to play with either one a bit to get it just the way
YOU like it. Viet versions usually include grated carrot, skip the lime
juice, and are "heated" with commercial Viet chile paste. Thai versions
usually skip the carrots, and use fresh bird chiles instead of paste. Here
are a couple of starting points:

Will wdborgeson@ucdavis.edu

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