Tod man pla (fried fish cakes)

Tod = fried. I'm not sure what 'man pla' means. Possibly: oil fish. So, 'tod man pla' would be 'fish fried in oil' (?).


Start by preparing the sweet & sour dip sauce.

100 gram sugar
50 ml. rice vinegar
2 teaspoons Thai fish sauce (nam pla)
1,5 tablespoon water
50 gram cucumber
2 chillies



1) Boil the sugar, rice vinegar and water for one minute and set aside to cool.

2) Cut the cucumber and chili in very small cubes and slices.

3) Mix the fish sauce, cucumber, chili and sugar-vinegar mixture (see 1) and set aside.



You need 500 grams white fish. I used cod, but any white fish will do.

Clean the fish. Make sure you take out all the bones with a fish bone tweezer.



Puree the fish in a blender.



The ingredients for the fish cookies:

* 40 grams yardlong bean (Dutch: kousenband, Thai: thua fak yao ถั่วฝักยาว) cut in very thin slices.
* Coriander leaves.
* 1 teaspoon sugar.
* Lime peel, shredded finely.
* 1 table spoon Thai fish sauce (nam pla).
* 1 table spoon Thai Red Curry paste (you can make this yourself but it's a lot of work and you only need one tablespoon for this recipe).
* 1 egg.



Mix the fish and ingredients by hand.



Make small balls and flatten them (should be 4 - 6 centimeter diameter).



Fry in hot oil. Roughly one minute each side. This is the tricky part. You want the inside to be cooked and the outside golden brown. It's not easy.



Serve Tod nam pla with dipping sauce. Or spoon the dipping sauce over the fish cakes. Serve with white rice for a whole meal. Otherwise it's a great snack.