Pad Prik King — Dry Curry Stir-Fry / ผัดพริกขิง

Central Thai — a beloved Thai home-cooking dish; the pork belly version is the most common, the tofu version is common in vegetarian contexts

Pad prik king is a dry, intensely fragrant stir-fry of pork (typically belly), tofu, or long beans with a red curry paste base and kaffir lime leaf chiffonade — essentially a curry paste stir-fried without coconut milk. The paste is fried in oil until completely fragrant and the fat separates, then the protein is added and cooked in the paste rather than in coconut milk. The absence of coconut milk produces a more concentrated, direct paste flavour. Kaffir lime leaves (fine chiffonade) are the defining finish. This dish demonstrates that curry paste has a life outside of coconut curry.

Pad prik king demonstrates that Thai curry paste is a dry flavouring agent, not merely a curry base — the full complexity of the paste is revealed more clearly without the buffering effect of coconut milk.