Thai Basil Chicken

I've been bitten by the travel bug. Well, the vlog of travels, to be precise. I was watching the travels of this guy, Mark Weins, who is based in Thailand and I saw that he made this delicious looking (and sounding) dish. I knew this dish from my favourite celebrity (SHOUT OUT TO MY BABY NICHKHUN OF 2PM!) as this is his most favourite Thai dish.

Thus, I decided to cook this. It's fairly simple if you ignore the preparation part (the tedious part is to peel the garlic. It's a LOT of garlic to peel!). You basically just chuck everything one at a time and it's done!

In Thailand, apparently this dish is one of the most popular dishes ever. It is usually eaten with rice and fried egg. Since my family LOVES spicy food, I used a lot of chillies. You can adjust the number of chillies based on your preference. It goes without saying, the more you add the chillies, the spicier the dish will be.

Thai Basil Chicken

Serving: 4-5 persons

Ingredients

• 3 pieces of chicken breast/keel (I deboned and minced the chicken, it's a great stress reliever)
• Thai/holy basil (the taste of Thai/holy basil is different from the basil we use in Italian cooking. I found this at a local Aeon supermarket. In Malay, it is called 'daun selasih' if I'm not mistaken)
• 10 cloves of garlic
• 15 birds eye chillies (yes, we like it as spicy as we can take it)
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of dark soy sauce (light soy sauce can be a good alternative)
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of oyster sauce
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of fish sauce
• 1 medium sized carrot (I julienned the carrot, but you can slice it any way you prefer)
• 4 tablespoons of vegetable oil (for frying)

Additional note: You can add more vegetables such as pepper. You can even add mushrooms. Another thing to note, I found the original recipe used sugar (around 1/2 tablespoon). However, my family despised (ABSOLUTELY HATE) sweet savory dishes, I decided to omit the sugar. If you like it, you can add it. Alternatively, you can use sweet soy sauce.

Cooking Method

1. Mince or finely chop the garlic and birds eye chillies. I made it into a rough paste using my mortar and pastle.
2. Debone and mince the chicken.
3. Heat up the oil and saute the minced garlic and birds eye chillies until a nice fragrant appears (the oil will turn light reddish).
4. Add the minced chicken and fry until chicken is cooked through. Since the chicken is already minced, it will cook fast (around 5 to 10 minutes). Chicken breast is a white meat, so it's dry. We LOVE white meat. If you prefer the red meat of chicken, then you can use chicken thigh or drumstick. The meat will be juicier.
5. Add the sauces (dark soy sauce, oyster sauce and fish sauce) and mix well.
6. Add the vegetables and stir until the vegetables are ready.
7. Add Thai/holy basil before you turn off the heat.
8. Finally, add salt if needed.

Voila! It's all done! This is so delicious and it has my Baba-approval. My dad has very limited palate and he usually likes fried food or curry best. He has a second serving so I take it he likes it. 

P/S: Do visit Mark Weins Youtube channel. It is awesome! I love his Langkawi series.