Hit Pause on the Takeout and Make Pad Thai at Home With This Pro-Chef Recipe

Pad Thai needs no introduction. It may be the most recognized Thai dish worldwide, and for good reason—it’s delicious. The noodles deliver a balance of sweet, sour, and salty flavors from palm sugar, tamarind, and fish sauce, nuttiness from peanuts, freshness from mung bean sprouts, and a subtle garlicky kick from Chinese flat garlic chives.

Yet, despite its popularity, it can often fall short at your neighborhood takeout spot—too sweet, lacking depth of flavor or umami, and frequently missing key ingredients such as Chinese flat garlic chives (often replaced with green onions for convenience). This might be a dish you never imagined making in your kitchen, and admittedly, gathering all the ingredients can feel like a chore. But with ingredients on hand, you’ll realize the process for making incredible pad Thai at home is far more approachable than it seems.

More Than Just Takeout

Let’s address the elephant in the room: “Pad Thai is just a dish for tourists.” I think due to pad Thai’s global popularity, and this notion that it’s somehow not “authentic,” the new generation of Thai chefs and restaurants often steer away from it to showcase other aspects of Thai cuisine. This is understandable and admirable to see since for many, pad Thai is synonymous with Thai takeout, and it’s often the default choice for those unfamiliar with the cuisine. However, the idea that it’s solely a dish for tourists is a misconception. It’s important to recognize that pad Thai is still a beloved dish in Thailand, enjoyed by Thai people. The reality is, that if you’re a restaurant owner in Thailand, you need to make money. What will sell the most? Pad Thai. 

Breaking pad Thai into its key components makes it easier to understand and execute. It may seem like an intimidating laundry list of ingredients at first, so I like to organize the dish into distinct blocks: aromatics, noodles, sauce, and finishing touches.

The Aromatic Base

Pad Thai begins with cooking pork in neutral oil, a nod to the tradition in which pork fat is often used to infuse the dish with a subtle, rich flavor. Once the pork is cooked, the iconic aromatic base is built from shallots, dried shrimp, pressed tofu, and sweet preserved radish. 

A few ingredient notes: First, pressed tofu, also often labeled as extra-firm tofu, is the ideal tofu choice here. It has minimal water content and holds its structure exceptionally well during cooking. My preferred brand, Nature’s Soy, offers a noticeably firmer and drier texture than other standard extra-firm varieties.

As for the sweet preserved radish, be sure to seek out the pre-minced sweet version, as the salty counterpart won’t deliver the same balance of flavors essential to the dish. Adding these ingredients to the wok together creates pad Thai’s deeply flavorful foundation. After they have had a moment to mingle and release their flavors into the oil, I add the egg.

For years, I added the egg at the end of cooking, after the noodles were tossed with all the other ingredients, as this is common in many recipes. But recently, I’ve switched up the order and have started adding the egg right after stir-frying the aromatics—before the noodles and sauce are added. This allows the egg to absorb more of the infused oil from the aromatics that have just been cooked in the wok. Plus it’s easier to break up the egg into smaller pieces in a less crowded skillet without the noodles, ensuring the cooked egg integrates seamlessly into the dish once the noodles are tossed in.

The Noodles

In Thailand, pad Thai is often made with fresh medium-size rice noodles (sen lek) as well as dried. In the US, your best option is to use dried rice noodles. Look for medium-size noodles with an ingredient list that includes only rice flour and water. These noodles need to be soaked in water for about 30 minutes until they become pliable. Once rehydrated, they can be stored in the fridge for a couple of days and will be ready to use when needed. 

Unlike pad see ew, in which using pre-cooked fresh noodles is standard, pad Thai relies on the sauce and additional water in the wok to cook the noodles properly. This is one instance where I would not advise you to follow the package instructions. Do not pre-boil the noodles—this is a step that often leads to overcooked, clumpy pad Thai.

The Sauce

Pad Thai, at its core, is a rice noodle dish, and those noodles act like a sponge, soaking up every flavor you introduce. This makes a well balanced sauce absolutely critical to the dish’s success. Forget ketchup and sriracha, and stick to the essentials: palm sugar, fish sauce, and tamarind. Pad Thai leans naturally toward the sweeter side, typically requiring roughly equal parts of each component to strike that iconic sweet-sour-salty balance.

When it comes to tamarind, I highly recommend buying a block and making your own paste. This approach gives you control over the paste’s thickness and is also more cost-effective than purchasing pre-made versions. However, be sure to use the correct variety—for this and other Thai recipes, avoid Indian tamarind pastes, which are thick and syrupy, as the ratios would be drastically impacted.

The Finishing Touches

The final touches are what bring pad Thai all together and without them, the dish just wouldn’t be pad Thai. Those components are chopped peanuts, crisp mung bean sprouts, and Chinese flat garlic chives (not to be confused with Chinese flowering chives). I use them in abundance as their fresh flavor balances the sweet-tart sauce to lighten the dish while also adding quite a bit of volume to make the dish more substantial. The garlic chives provide a pungent garlicky flavor, the peanuts a nutty aroma, and the bean sprouts a neutral crunch that defines the dish and makes it a proper pad Thai. Garlic chives are non-negotiable for me. Yet, I often see restaurants and internet chefs opting for green onions instead. If you’ve already put in the effort to gather the other ingredients for pad Thai, don’t cut corners now–seek out Chinese flat garlic chives!

Pad Thai is not inherently spicy, but it is highly customizable at the table. Thai cooks expect diners to adjust the dish to their liking with Thai chili powder for heat, lime for additional sourness, peanuts for nuttiness, and sugar for sweetness. In Thailand, you might also find accompaniments like banana blossoms, which add astringency to counterbalance the sweet and sour flavors, as well as green mango or pennywort—elements rarely seen outside Thailand but welcome additions to the dish.

Finally, the most important thing I can say is to cook in small batches. This recipe is designed for two servings, but if you’re cooking for four, double the recipe and prepare it in two batches. Resist the temptation to cook everything at once. Your stovetop can’t handle that volume, and the results will suffer. Cooking in smaller portions ensures proper heat distribution, better sauce reduction, and perfectly cooked noodles.

For the Rice Noodles: In a medium bowl, cover noodles with slightly warm water (about 110°F; 43°C). Allow noodles to hydrate until pliable, about 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, for the Pork: In a mixing bowl, stir together pork, fish sauce, and sugar until well combined.

For the Sauce: In a small saucepan, combine palm sugar and tamarind and set over low heat, stirring until sugar is dissolved (if sugar is slow to dissolve, add 1 tablespoon water). Remove from the heat and stir in fish sauce until well combined.

For the Stir-Fry: Heat a wok or large carbon steel or cast iron skillet over high heat until lightly smoking. Add oil and swirl to coat the surface. Immediately add pork and, using a wok spatula or large spoon, stir until about halfway cooked, about 20 seconds.

Add tofu, sweet preserved radish, dried shrimp, and shallot and continue to stir rapidly until aromatic and heated through, about 40 seconds. Push everything to one side of wok.

Crack egg into now-empty side of the wok, and using wok spatula or large spoon, break yolk and briefly stir to distribute yolk, then cook without stirring until egg is mostly set (you want to avoid scrambling the egg as it sets). Once set, fold the aromatic mixture over the egg, flipping and scraping with the spoon or wok spatula to ensure nothing sticks. Stir until everything is well combined and egg is broken up into smaller pieces.

Add rehydrated noodles, then pour sauce around edges of wok followed by 1 tablespoon plus 2 teaspoons water. Continue stirring until sauce is absorbed, about 2 minutes.

Add a 1/4 cup Chinese flat garlic chives and 1/4 cup mung bean sprouts and continue stirring until wilted, about 30 seconds.

Turn off heat and add remaining Chinese flat garlic chives and mung bean sprouts, along with peanuts and stir to combine. Serve immediately with additional crushed peanuts, sugar, lime wedges, Thai chile powder, and fish sauce on the side.

Special Equipment

Large carbon steel wok or large carbon steel or cast iron skillet, wok spatula or large spoon

Notes

You can buy boneless pork shoulder and slice it very thinly yourself; par-freezing helps for thinner slices. You want roughly 1/8 inch–thick slices that are about 1×1.5 inches in size. You can also buy pre-sliced pork as it is sold in Asian markets for hot pot instead.

Look for tamarind concentrate from a Thai brand; Indian and other South Asian brands of tamarind concentrate or tamarind paste are not a good substitute here. Alternatively, you can buy a block of tamarind pulp and prepare it as follows: Remove any seeds, then soak the pulp in an equal volume of boiling water; let stand until softened, then squeeze by hand until tamarind and water are fully blended.

Make-Ahead and Storage

The noodles can be rehydrated and stored in a zip-top bag in the refrigerator up to 2 days in advance.

The sauce can be made up to 2 weeks in advance and refrigerated. 

The pork can be marinated up to 1 day in advance and stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator. 

Pad Thai is best served immediately, but leftovers can safely be stored for up to 3 days in an airtight container in the refrigerator.