Pla Goong — Prawn Salad with Lemongrass / พล่ากุ้ง

Central Thai and coastal Thai — a premium dish associated with Bangkok seafood restaurants and coastal Thai cooking

Pla goong is a hot-sour-herby prawn salad — the prawns are cooked briefly (poached, grilled, or flash-fried) then dressed warm with a lime-lemongrass-chilli dressing and an abundance of fresh herbs. The dressing is more complex than standard yam: lemongrass is finely sliced raw and adds its citrus-camphor texture; shallots are thinly sliced; kaffir lime leaf chiffonade provides floral top notes; galangal julienne adds piney sharpness. The dish is essentially an aromatic herb salad with prawns as the protein vehicle rather than a prawn dish with herbs as garnish — the herb volume should visually dominate.

Pla goong is Thai flavour layering at its most refined — each aromatic herb contributes a different frequency of flavour, and the interplay between the citrus-lemongrass, the floral-kaffir lime, the hot-chilli, and the briny-prawn creates a multi-layered eating experience.