Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •Heavy granite mortar and pestle (krok hin) for the marinade paste
• •Charcoal grill or gas grill at maximum heat
• •Bamboo skewers (soaked 1 hour minimum)
• •Small saucepan for peanut sauce

Instructions

1. 1

   Pound the satay kreung tam

   Toast the coriander seed and cumin seed in a dry pan over medium heat until fragrant and just starting to darken. Thirty seconds, no more. Dump them into the granite mortar and pound to a powder. Add the white peppercorns and pound those in. Now the wet aromatics, in order: salt and garlic first, pound to a paste. Then the cilantro roots. Then the lemongrass. Then the shallots. Then the turmeric. Pound after each addition until fully incorporated before adding the next. The paste should be smooth, golden, and violently fragrant. Your hands will be stained yellow. Good. That's the kamin at work.

   This is a Southern spice profile. Cumin and coriander seed in quantity, turmeric instead of galangal. If you're used to Central Thai curry pastes, this will smell different. That's the Malay influence. Respect it.
2. 2

   Marinate the chicken

   Combine the pounded paste with the coconut cream, fish sauce, and palm sugar in a bowl. Mix until the sugar dissolves. Add the chicken strips and work the marinade into every piece with your hands. You want full contact. The coconut cream is the vehicle: it carries the aromatics into the meat and will caramelize over the charcoal later. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours. Overnight is better. The turmeric needs time to penetrate.

   Use chicken thighs, not breast. Thighs have fat. Fat keeps the meat juicy over high charcoal heat. Breast dries out in seconds. Every satay vendor in the south uses thigh meat. There's a reason.
3. 3

   Make the peanut sauce

   Heat the coconut cream in a small saucepan over medium heat until the oil starts to separate, about 3 minutes. This is cracking the coconut cream. The surface should look broken and oily, not smooth. Add the red curry paste and fry it in the coconut oil for 2 minutes, stirring constantly. It should darken slightly and smell intensely aromatic. Add the ground peanuts, tamarind paste, palm sugar, fish sauce, and salt. Stir. Add a splash of water if it's too thick. You want it loose enough to drip off a skewer but thick enough to coat. Taste: it should be sweet, salty, sour from the tamarind, with the heat of the curry paste underneath. Adjust. Set aside.

   Ajarn always said: crack the coconut cream first. If you dump everything in at once, the paste fries in liquid, not oil. The flavor is completely different. The oil separation is the step that builds depth.
4. 4

   Make the cucumber relish

   Dissolve the sugar and salt in the vinegar in a small bowl. Toss in the cucumber slices, shallots, and sliced chili. Let it sit while you grill. The ajat should be sharp, sweet, and cooling. It's the acid counterpoint to the rich, fatty skewers and the heavy peanut sauce. This is the sour pillar doing its job.

5. 5

   Skewer the chicken

   Thread each strip of chicken onto a soaked bamboo skewer, weaving the skewer through the meat in two or three places so it lies flat. Don't bunch it into a ball. Flat meat means even cooking and maximum surface area touching the grill. Maximum surface area means maximum char. That's the goal.

6. 6

   Grill over charcoal

   Get your charcoal grill screaming hot. If you're using a gas grill, crank it to maximum and get the grates blazing. Lay the skewers across the grill, leaving the exposed bamboo handles off the heat. Baste with a light coat of oil using a lemongrass stalk brush or a regular brush. Grill for 2 to 3 minutes per side. The coconut cream and turmeric paste will caramelize and char in spots. That's what you want: golden-brown with blackened edges, the sugar in the coconut cream turning to caramel against the heat. The chicken should be just cooked through, still juicy, never dry. Pull them the moment the juices run clear.

   Southern satay vendors use coconut shell charcoal and fan the coals by hand. The smoke from coconut shell is part of the flavor. If you have access to coconut charcoal, use it. If not, lump hardwood charcoal is the next best. Briquettes are a last resort.
7. 7

   Serve immediately

   Stack the skewers on a plate. Set the warm peanut sauce alongside in a bowl. Set the cucumber relish next to it. That's the spread: protein, fat, acid, crunch. Each bite of satay gets dipped in the peanut sauce, then followed with a forkful of ajat to cut through the richness. The system is always present. Serve with sliced white bread (toast bread) if you want to be traditional. The bread soaks up peanut sauce. Southern vendors always have it on the table.

Chef Tips

• •This is Southern Thai Muslim food. The spice profile is completely different from Central Thai. Turmeric (kamin) is the backbone, not galangal. Cumin and coriander seed appear in quantities that would overwhelm a green curry but are essential here. This is the Malay border talking. Don't try to make it taste like Bangkok satay. Bangkok satay is a watered-down version of what the south has been cooking for centuries.
• •The marinade needs time. Four hours minimum, overnight is the standard. The turmeric and coconut cream work together: the coconut fat absorbs the turmeric's fat-soluble curcumin and carries it deep into the protein. A 30-minute marinade gives you yellow chicken. An overnight marinade gives you satay that's golden all the way through. Science, not magic.
• •Peanut sauce is a kreung tam in disguise. You're cracking coconut cream, frying a curry paste in the separated oil, then building a sauce. The same technique you'd use to start a gaeng. The peanuts are just the protein component. If your peanut sauce tastes flat, you probably skipped the step of cracking the coconut cream and frying the paste properly.
• •Toast bread (white sandwich bread, lightly grilled) is the traditional accompaniment in the south. It sounds strange until you dip a corner into the peanut sauce. It soaks up everything. Thai Muslim satay stalls always serve it. Don't skip it just because it looks un-photogenic.
• •The ajat (cucumber relish) is not optional. It's the sour-sweet counterbalance that makes the rich, fatty, charred satay work as a complete dish. Without it, you have half the equation. With it, you have the four pillars in play: nam pla in the marinade for salt, palm sugar for sweet (sparingly, this is southern), vinegar in the ajat for sour, and chili throughout for heat.

Advance Preparation

• •The satay kreung tam (marinade paste) can be pounded up to 2 days ahead and refrigerated. The flavors deepen as the toasted spices meld.
• •Chicken should be marinated at least 4 hours ahead, ideally overnight. Skewer the marinated chicken up to 2 hours before grilling and keep refrigerated.
• •Peanut sauce can be made a day ahead and gently rewarmed. Add a splash of water when reheating to loosen it back to dipping consistency.
• •The ajat (cucumber relish) should be assembled no more than 30 minutes before serving. The cucumber releases water and dilutes the dressing if it sits too long.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 300g)