Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Heavy granite mortar and pestle (krok), at least 6 inches diameter
• •Wok (carbon steel preferred)
• •Wok spatula

Instructions

1. 1

   Pound the kreung tam

   Put the white peppercorns in the mortar first. They're the hardest ingredient and need to be cracked before anything else goes in. Pound until they're broken into coarse fragments, not dust. Add the cilantro roots and pound them into the pepper until fibrous and bruised. Then the garlic. Pound everything together into a rough, wet paste. You should see chunks of garlic. You should smell the peppercorns burning your nostrils. If the paste is smooth and uniform, you went too far. Rustic is correct.

   Cilantro root is not cilantro stem. The root is the thick, pale base attached below the stems. It has a deep, earthy flavor that the leaves and stems don't have. If your grocery store sells cilantro with roots attached, that's gold. Wash them well, there's dirt in the crevices. If you truly cannot find cilantro root, use the bottom two inches of the stems, but know that you're losing depth.
2. 2

   Marinate the pork

   Take about a third of the pounded paste and rub it into the sliced pork along with half the fish sauce. Let it sit for ten minutes while you get everything else ready. This isn't optional. The paste needs time to penetrate the meat. The fish sauce seasons the pork from the inside while the garlic and pepper coat the surface. Ten minutes is the minimum. Thirty is better if you have it.

   Slice the pork against the grain, about 1/4 inch thick. Too thin and it'll dry out. Too thick and it won't sear fast enough to get wok hei before the inside overcooks. Pork shoulder has more fat than loin and stays juicier, but either works.
3. 3

   Fire the wok

   Get the wok screaming hot over your highest flame. Add the oil and wait until it shimmers and just barely smokes. Drop the remaining two-thirds of the gra tiem prik thai paste into the oil. It should explode with noise. Stir it for five seconds, just enough for the garlic to start turning golden. The raw peppercorn smell shifts to something nutty and warm. That's the moment.

   The paste goes in the wok before the protein. This is the rule for all Thai stir-fries that use a paste. The oil fries the paste, blooming the aromatics and building the flavor base. Protein on top of raw paste is a mistake you'll taste.
4. 4

   Sear the pork

   Spread the marinated pork slices across the wok in a single layer. Don't touch them for thirty seconds. Let the wok do its job. You want the pork to make hard contact with the metal so it chars and gets color. Wok hei lives in that moment of stillness. Then flip and sear the other side. Another thirty seconds. The pork should be golden-brown on the edges with bits of fried garlic clinging to the surface.

5. 5

   Season and finish

   Add the remaining fish sauce, oyster sauce, dark soy sauce, sugar, and the chicken stock. Toss everything together. The sauces will hit the hot wok and reduce almost instantly into a glossy, slightly sticky coating on the pork. Fifteen seconds of tossing, that's all. Taste. It should be savory and peppery with a faint sweetness underneath. The fish sauce provides the salt. The oyster sauce gives body and gloss. The sugar just rounds the edges. If it needs more salt, a splash more fish sauce. Never table salt. Plate over jasmine rice. Fried egg on top. Cilantro leaves and sliced cucumber on the side. Done.

Chef Tips

• •This is the first kreung tam every Thai cook should learn. Three ingredients: garlic, white peppercorns, cilantro root. Master this paste and you understand the foundation that every other Thai paste is built on. Green curry paste? Same skeleton plus chilies, lemongrass, galangal, shrimp paste, kaffir lime zest. But the bones are gra tiem prik thai. Ajarn always said: start here.
• •White pepper and black pepper are not interchangeable. They come from the same plant, but white peppercorns have the outer hull removed, giving a sharper, cleaner heat that defines Central Thai cooking. Black pepper is earthier, more complex, and belongs in different food. Use white. It's the pepper of the Thai kitchen.
• •The amount of garlic in this dish is not a typo. A full head. Ten cloves. Gra tiem means garlic. It's in the name. The garlic fries in the oil, clings to the pork, and becomes sweet and nutty on the surface. If you're worried about garlic breath, you're cooking the wrong dish.
• •Oyster sauce quality matters here because you're using so few ingredients. Cheap oyster sauce is mostly corn syrup with artificial color. Look for brands where oyster extract is the first ingredient (Megachef and Maekrua are solid). The good stuff tastes like concentrated shellfish. The bad stuff tastes like sweet brown paint.

Advance Preparation

• •The gra tiem prik thai paste can be pounded hours ahead and kept covered at room temperature, or refrigerated overnight. The flavors actually deepen with a little time.
• •Pork can be marinated with the paste and fish sauce for up to 4 hours in the fridge. Longer than that and the fish sauce starts to cure the meat too aggressively.
• •Have jasmine rice cooked and fried eggs ready before you touch the wok. The stir-fry is done in under two minutes once the wok is hot. It will not wait for you.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 390g)