Name: Khao Pad (ข้าวผัด) — Thai Fried Rice
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 20 min
Yield: 2 servings
Cuisine: Thai
Ingredients: 350 g day-old jasmine rice (ข้าวสวยหอมมะลิ), cold; 150 g minced pork (หมูสับ); 2 eggs (ไข่ไก่); 20 g garlic (กระเทียม), chopped; 1 tomato (มะเขือเทศ), cut into wedges; 1/2 onion (หอมใหญ่), sliced; 2 kale stalks (คะน้า), cut bite-size; 1 1/2 tbsp light soy sauce (ซีอิ๊วขาว); 1 tbsp seasoning sauce (ซอสปรุงรส); 1 tbsp fish sauce (น้ำปลา); 1/2 tbsp sugar (น้ำตาลทราย); 1/4 tsp white pepper (พริกไทย); 2 tbsp vegetable oil (น้ำมันพืช); 20 g spring onion (ต้นหอม), sliced; cucumber slices (แตงกวา), to serve; lime wedge (มะนาว), to serve; 2 tbsp fish sauce with sliced fresh chillies — prik nam pla (พริกน้ำปลา), to serve

The Dish That Humbles Everyone

Fried rice looks like the easiest thing in Thai cooking and is the one nobody gets right first. On Pantip the plea is a standing joke: "Please give me a fried rice recipe — no matter how I fry it, it's never good." The answer is never in the ingredients list. It's in the rice being a day old, the wok being actually hot, and the tomato surviving the pan in one piece.

And the ceiling is high. Hia Hai — a street stall in Ekkamai — has sat in the Michelin Guide every year since 2020 on the strength of its crab fried rice: wok-fragrant rice, lump crab meat piled on top, a seafood sauce drizzle, queues every day. One dish, world status. That recipe is the variant below.

The Recipe (classic pork fried rice — serves 2)

Thai	English	Amount
ข้าวสวยหอมมะลิ (แช่เย็น)	Day-old jasmine rice, cold	350 g
หมูสับ	Minced pork	150 g
ไข่ไก่	Eggs	2
กระเทียมสับ	Garlic, chopped	20 g
มะเขือเทศ	Tomato, wedges	1
หอมใหญ่	Onion, sliced	½
คะน้า	Kale stalks (คะน้า), bite-size	2
ซีอิ๊วขาว	Light soy sauce	1½ tbsp
ซอสปรุงรส	Seasoning sauce	1 tbsp
น้ำปลา	Fish sauce	1 tbsp
น้ำตาลทราย	Sugar	½ tbsp
พริกไทย	White pepper	¼ tsp
น้ำมันพืช	Vegetable oil	2 tbsp
ต้นหอมซอย	Spring onion, sliced	20 g
พริกน้ำปลา	Prik nam pla — fish sauce with sliced chillies	to serve

The ancient version (Thairath's ข้าวผัดไข่โบราณ) adds a spoon of dark soy for colour and more fish sauce — otherwise the same dish.

The Method

The rice comes first. Day-old (or air-dried) jasmine rice, cold from the fridge, clumps broken by hand. Never fresh-cooked rice — the steam makes the dish mushy. This is the step that decides the dish.
Garlic in hot oil. Wok over medium-high, garlic in until golden and fragrant.
Pork in. Stir-fry the minced pork until just cooked, breaking it into small pieces.
Eggs to one side. Push everything over, crack the eggs into the empty side, scramble until just set.
Rice and season. Light soy, seasoning sauce, fish sauce, sugar, white pepper. Heat up and stir hard — every grain coated, the rice smelling toasted. This is where the wok fragrance happens.
Tomato gently. Tomato, onion and kale folded in with a light hand — the tomato must stay in pieces. A minute more, then the spring onion at the very end.
Serve with the trimmings. Cucumber slices, lime wedge, and the prik nam pla — fish sauce with sliced fresh chillies — to season each mouthful at the table.

The Crab Variant (Hia Hai, Michelin Guide every year since 2020)

The difference is restraint. Same day-old rice and hot-wok technique, but the seasoning is lighter — the crab is the flavour. Lump crab meat goes in near the end, just warmed through, never fried to shreds.

The plate: rice mounded, a generous pile of crab meat on top, a drizzle of the house seafood sauce, spring onion and cucumber around the edge. Queues out the door since the Guide found it.

At home: skip the pork and egg if you like, keep the garlic and the wok, fold in 150 g of white crab meat at the end, and serve with prik nam pla rather than the seafood sauce — honest and very good.

Where Thai Sources Disagree

Fish sauce or soy? The classic home line is fish-sauce-forward; modern versions run soy-forward. The ancient recipe uses both plus dark soy.

Tomato and onion. In the old version, out of the minimal modern one. If they're in, the tomato is handled gently — that part nobody argues.

The egg. Scrambled through the rice, or fried crisp and served on top (ข้าวผัดไข่ดาว). Both are standard.

Protein. Pork, chicken, prawn, crab, salted fish — every shop has its version; the technique is identical.

Butter. A modern home style starts the pork in butter instead of oil (Thairath's pork-and-egg recipe) — richer, not traditional.

How Western Versions Get It Wrong

Fresh rice. The defining error. Fresh-cooked rice carries steam and turns to mush in the wok. Day-old, cold, clumps broken — or it isn't fried rice.
Low heat. The wok fragrance only happens at proper heat. Pale, steamed-tasting rice means the pan was cold.
Brown with soy. Thai fried rice is golden, not brown. Soy is a seasoning, not a colour wash.
Tomato mush. Tomato folded in gently at the end stays in pieces. Cooked from the start, it dissolves and wets the rice.
No prik nam pla. Fish sauce with sliced chillies is the table condiment — the dish is finished at the table with it.
Overloaded wok. Too much rice at once steams instead of frying. Two portions max in a home wok.

UK Ingredient Notes

Day-old rice is the recipe — but do it safely: cool cooked rice quickly, refrigerate within an hour, use within 24 hours, and fry it until piping hot throughout. Never leave cooked rice sitting out.
Jasmine rice from any supermarket; the drier Thai-style grains beat sticky short-grain for this.
Seasoning sauce (ซอสปรุงรส): the green-capped bottle in Asian grocers — Golden Mountain or Healthy Boy. Light soy works as a fallback.
คะน้า (gai lan / Chinese kale): Asian grocers and larger supermarkets. Tenderstem works; regular kale doesn't.
Prik nam pla: two minutes — fish sauce, sliced bird's eye chillies, a squeeze of lime. It is the condiment that makes the dish Thai.
Crab for the Hia Hai variant: white crabmeat from the fish counter, folded in at the very end.

Sources

This recipe is translated from the following Thai-language sources. Where they disagree, we've said so.

1. Thairath — "5 สูตรข้าวผัดไข่ พร้อมวิธีทำข้าวผัดไข่ง่ายๆ ให้อร่อย ข้าวร่วน เม็ดสวย" (incl. the ancient version and technique tips) — thairath.co.th

2. Kapook — "ข้าวผัดจานเด็ด เมนูตามสั่งทำง่าย อร่อยเหมือนกินที่ร้าน" (22 recipes + wok rules) — cooking.kapook.com

3. Hia Hai (Here Hai, Ekkamai) — crab fried rice, Michelin Guide 2020–present (Wongnai review + Ryoiireview roundup) — wongnai.com

4. Pantip thread 42519741 — "ขอสูตรข้าวผัดหน่อยครับผัดยังไงก็ไม่อร่อย" (the failure-mode discussion) — pantip.com

Johnny Tiger

Johnny researches and translates Thai recipes from Thai-language sources — chefs, restaurants and home cooks in Thailand — and publishes them with their sources cited. No westernised shortcuts, no invented steps.