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July 4th is two days away and I am sure you are busy finalizing your party menu. If you are looking for a new recipe idea to impress your guests, I have got you covered with this guest post by my dear friend Chef Robert Danhi—Gai Yaang or Thai BBQ Chicken Wings recipe. Chef Danhi is my cookbook colleague as he is currently working on his second cookbook, Easy Thai Cooking by Tuttle (my publisher). This Sunday also marks the 4th anniversary of Rasa Malaysia, so to all my American readers, have a great 4th and Happy Independence Day, and Happy 4th Birthday to Rasa Malaysia!
July 4th is all about grilling and each year I like to try something new. This year I am in the midst of writing my second book Easy Thai Cooking (Tuttle, November 2011) and the flavors of Thailand fill my test kitchen. If you are still undecided about what to make this July 4th weekend, I recommend trying out Gai Yaang or Thai BBQ Chicken Wings with a sweet-and-spicy chili glaze.
Like American French fries scream out to be dipped in ketchup, grilled chicken of Thailand yearns for Thai Sweet Chili Sauce. Traveling through the streets of Thailand, especially in the northeast area of Issan, grilling chicken (Gai Yaang) is a common sight. Charcoal fired grills release aromatic smoke and imbue the marinated chicken with a welcome layer of smoky flavor that the sweet chili sauce is right at home with. It is usually served on the side to dip the chicken in but here I find that tossing the grilled wings in the sauce ensure every bite is filled with a sweet-spicy goodness…
Like ginger, garlic and scallion is a common trinity that lays the foundational flavor in many Chinese dishes, the combination of garlic, coriander root (cilantro) and white pepper is a prevailing ingredient combination of Thai cooks. Then seasoning this mixture with some sweet golden palm sugar and the omnipresent fish sauce. Minced lemongrass come to the party with a bright citrus-like aroma.
In short, use the traditional recipe marinade, there is no problem to use coriander (cilantro) stem instead of the less available roots and buy the chili sauce to save that time—also having the remaining bottle will encourage you to incorporate it into all sorts or recipes. I even make a mean coconut martini that I use this chili sauce to coat the glass with.
Now back to my new cookbook…the new book will be different than my Southeast Asian Flavors book in that the recipes may not be the long standing traditional recipes of this food focused culture, they are recipes that have the genuine flavors of Thailand but rely on store-bought condiments to save some time. This is how many of us cook now, even in Thailand. Stay tuned and follow me on Twitter or friend me on Facebook to check on the progress of the cookbook.
(Click Page 2 for the Gai Yaang Recipe)
Pages: 1 2
Click Below for More Easy and Delicious Recipes:
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Lovely recipe, looks good. I love Thai BBQ chicken, and it doesn’t seem too hard to do. Thank you!
Please verify step 2 and 4:
2.Make Glaze: Whisk together all ingredients for glaze in large bowl. Toss wings in glaze until coated well.
4.Glaze Wings: Toss wings in glaze until coated well.
Tossing pre-cooked wings in glaze in step 2 and tossing cooked wings in the same glaze in step 4 would caused cross contamination!
Sorry about the confusion. Recipe is corrected now. Glaze after grilling.
The Marinade ingredients include oil but no soy sauce; the instructions say to mix the soy sauce with the other ingredients, but omit the oil.
Please indicate which is correct.
Also – white or black pepper? It doesn’t make much difference in this sort of marinade, but again the ingredients and instructions seem to be in conflict!
Thanks
Sorry about confusion, I have seen/used fish sauce and soy sauce but the recipe is with fish sauce. Pepper-white pepper is more common for marinades. Yes, they are the same plant but the skin is removed and white are not fermented like the black.
What brand of fish sauce do you recommend? Thai or Vietnamese?
The fish sauce industry in Vietnam is not as developed am hence the limited availability of Vietnamese brands, most stores don’t have any (although the lables have Viernamese on them and even go ao far to list Nuoc mam Nhi- nhi indicted the best quality grade). Out of theThai brands commonly available in the USA I prefer Golden Boy and Squid as both of these are pure without flavor enhancers like Three Crabs brand has.
Here is much more on fish sauce, including photos I took during my numerous trips to fish sauce factories. http://www.southeastasianflavors.com/southeast_asian_pantry.shtml
From personal experience I found Squid brand fish sauce to be a very good all round brand. It’s a thai brand but high quality. A thai gourmet chef here recommended that brand for me personally.
Robert, what I love about your first book is it’s educational detail that stays truly authentic. I have dozens of Asian cookbooks that cut corners for us lazy Americans who won’t go out of the way to source real ingredients. I don’t need more shortcut books – I need more books like your first that are my proxy directly into an Asian kitchen with no subtleties omitted. Alas, I’m sure they are not as good of a seller as those with “easy” or “fast” in the title. I’ll buy your number 2 book but will put in a vote for book #3 to be a return to the painstakingly authentic. There is no substitute for real.
John, so glad you like my first book, yes, it is about the authentic food and beverages of Southeast Asia – I published it myself and invested heavily in order to do it my way, thanks for appreciating its soul. I am now doing a book that uses pre-bought curry pastes and some chili sauces and such because I am trying to reach the rest of the folks out there that will at least cook these instead of no cooking whatsoever. Walk through any Thai market and you will see curry pastes ready for those that don’t have the time or interest. There is a fine line between shortening the recipe and making something altogether non-authentic…I will try to achieve the first…wish me luck and thanks for taking the leap of faith and committing to buy it..it is more of a stepping stone to my first book – try this then if you REALLY want to go for it make it from scratch…like training wheels. Have a great weekend and thanks for being active on rasamalaysia.com!
Chef: So is it Gai Yaang or Gai Yang? You’ve used both spellings here. Both can’t be correct, can they? I am wondering which one you prefer and why.
Yaang or yang are both very common, even in Thailand. SInce the Thai language is not Roman Alphabet based it can be phonetically translated (transcription) many ways. Yes, there is a national standard but most dont follow it. Check this links out if you want to know more!
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thai_language – General overview
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Thai_General_System_of_Transcription
Either way…it is delicious.
Better in using white Kampot pepper.
Could you post the Nam Jim recipe for those of us who want to try the other recipe
Arturo – please find the recipe below.
Happy 4th blog day to you RasaMasaysia – they’ll be shooting off some fireworks in your honor, and I hope to be munching on some of these incredibly delicious looking BBQ chicken.
OysterCulture – it looks as if you will have fireworks in the sky….and in your mouth! Make them extra spicy for that bright explosion.
OMG delicious and easy to make…thank you for sharing and I look forward to giving these a shot…
Made this last night and will do it again with some changes. Halfway through the marinating time I came back to the site (there had been some inconsistencies in the printed recipe that now appear to be fixed) and noticed the discussion of garlic and the link to the more authentic recipe. I kicked myself for not reading more thoroughly the first time, particularly with regard to the garlic and the cilantro root, and use of mortar and pestle. Following the simplified recipe, I used the stems and discarded the root having no idea that the root is in fact preferred – good to know, how interesting! There was nothing I could do about that but I did pull out the old mortar and pestle and ground up some garlic, poured in the marinade, gave it a few good swishes and dumped it all back on top of the chicken. I let it marinate another hour or so with the revised concoction. The results were DELICIOUS. We used a combination of wings and legs and they came out great. A total keeper.
I recommend that when making the glaze, put in half the sriracha and taste – then decide if you want to add the rest. Half gave it a good level of heat. Going the rest of the way might have been a bit masochistic for the main plate of the meal. For me, anyway.
Next time I will follow the authentic recipe for the marinade and allow them to marinate overnight. I will add the glaze (with half the sriracha) at the end as well. Delicious, thanks so much for sharing this!!
Jen – so happy the end results were tasty (as Thais would say – aroy maak). Sorry for the confusion. In regards to the garlic, the Thai sweet chili sauces are usually filled with the garlic (as you can see in my recipe I Replied to Arturo) so you would still get that flavor as a glaze!
ah, good point! my mae ploy doesn’t seem very garlicy so I think I did myself a favor by adding the garlic. thanks again for sharing the delicious recipe!
Arturo – My pleasure to share the recipe.
Thai Sweet Chili Sauce – Nahm Jim Gai
2 Tbsp. Roughly chopped long red chilies or other hot red chilies (seeds are optional, leave them in if you want it spicy)
1 medium Thai bird chili, red, roughly chopped
1 Tbsp. Roughly chopped garlic
1 1/2 tsp. Kosher salt
1 1/4 cups Granulated sugar
2 Tbsp. Fish sauce (nahm pla)
3/4 cup Distilled white vinegar
1/2 cup Water
1. In a mortar, pound both chilies, garlic, and salt into a rough paste (if not using a mortar, finely mince chilies and garlic). 2. Combine chili mixture with sugar, fish sauce, vinegar and water in a 2 qt. (2 L.) saucepan; bring to a boil. Boil over medium heat for about 10 minutes, until reduced to 1 cup. 3. Cool to room temperature. Sauce will thicken when cooled. Store in refrigerator. Bring to room temperature before serving. For the best flavor, use within the first few weeks (though sauce can be stored in the refrigerator for up to three months).
Thanks! That was very generous of you to share!!
Happy Fourth of July everyone – thank you for being so active on RasaMalaysia.com. I am honored to be part of the dialog!
Yummy stuff. Had them in Bangkok, Krabi and Phuket before.
No need for the chili sauce dipping, really.
J2KFM – glad you like this style of chicken, yes, it pops up everywhere in Thailand, but similar to Ipoh Chicken and Bean Sprouts, until you had it where its from (this case Issan, Thailand) it’s not quite the same. I look forward to my next eating adventure in your hometown Ipoh – it rocks!!! I like going to Kedai Kopi Hong Heng – have the Ipoh Sar Har Fun.
Made this for dinner tonight,….. was a hit! Simply delicious!
Thanks for sharing! will definitely use this recipe again!
Caroline…so glad that you liked them. Thanks for making the effort!
This recipe looks great! Btw, just fyi, I have moved to new domain. :)
Hi! Nice recipe. Is it common to barbeque with the chicken feet? I usually only use chicken feet in Chinese soup.
I have never grilled chicken feet..I think if I did I would steam/boil them first to make them tender, dry them a bit then grill until crispy.
Is there a substitute for lemongrass? I really want to try this recipe.Thanks
This looks so delicious. BBQ season is right around the corner in my area and I’ll definitely be trying this one out.
I used to post comments as “Simon” before. However I’m popping in Kinda late, but finally got myself to register. After eating lots of thai food there isn’t really any thai stores here who serve Gai Yang, however the Moo Yang is popular among thai citizens here. This recipe is very interesting. I think I’m gonna go ahead and try and impress my other half with some grilled chicken thai style.
Thanks Robert for sharing this interesting recipe.
Robert…looks like you’ve got your work cut out for you just answering all the comments. I think most of the questions could be figured out by the home chefs. Good thing you have nothing else in the world to do.