Healthy and easy pad thai?? Please
 

I am not talking the real thing..Just somehting similar in taste to the Thai kitchens packaged rice noodles...
I love the sweet and spiciness of it...YUMO!!!!!! ANyone have a recipe? I am trying to not have so much sodium..
Thanks
Amy

Hi Amy, I make Pad Thai all the time for DH. It's addictive, isn't it? :T

The eggs, shrimp, green onions, and sprouts should be fine. I think you'd need to be careful with the rice noodles and chopped peanuts, but they're OK too in controlled portions. It's the sauce that's the killer and I'm just not sure what you could do to fix it. I either use a jarred sauce that's loaded with sugar or make my own with a recipe based on ketchup, which is also loaded with sugar.

Maybe find a sauce recipe and try some substitutions like Splenda for sugar and low-sodium soy sauce?

Good luck and let us know if you come up with a winner! (then I might even eat it!)

I found this recipe on the Thai Kitchen's website, and I calculated the recipe with splenda and sugar. With Splenda, the total per serving was 48 calories, but with sugar it was 42. :?:

The sauce is for 4 servings.

• 3 tbsp sugar or splenda
• 1 tbsp lime juice
• 2.5 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 tbsp rice vinegar

If you want the other nutrition information, just let me know.

Hmm..Now I have to figure out how to buy fish sauce..;) I wonder if anything could be used in place of it...
And yes I would like all teh nutritional info you have..
I appreciate it.
Amy

Here's another recipe http://importfood.com/recipes/tstirfryNoodle.html

There's not really anything you can substitute for fish sauce. You can buy it online though if you can't find it locally.

You can get fish sauce in any major grocery store in the aisle with the soy sauce and asian products.

You should be able to find fish sauce in the international foods aisle at pretty much any grocery store. Here's the info:

With Splenda:
Calories:
48 kcal
Water 15.54 g
Carbohydrate* (95%) 11.59 g
Protein (5%) 0.59 g
Total Fat (0%) 0 g
Monounsaturated 0 g
Polyunsaturated 0 g
Saturated 0 g
Cholesterol 0 mg
Dietary Fibre 0.02 g
Alcohol (0%) 0 g

Minerals
Calcium 5.38 mg
Iron 0.09 mg
Magnesium 20.93 mg
Phosphorus 1.33 mg
Potassium 37.54 mg
Sodium 868.62 mg
Zinc 0.02 mg
Copper 0.01 mg

With Sugar:
Calories:
42 kcal
Water 15.54 g
Carbohydrate* (94%) 10.39 g
Protein (6%) 0.59 g
Total Fat (0%) 0 g
Monounsaturated 0 g
Polyunsaturated 0 g
Saturated 0 g
Cholesterol 0 mg
Dietary Fibre 0.02 g
Alcohol (0%) 0 g

Minerals
Calcium 5.47 mg
Iron 0.09 mg
Magnesium 20.93 mg
Phosphorus 1.33 mg
Potassium 37.73 mg
Sodium 868.62 mg
Zinc 0.02 mg
Copper 0.01 mg

Athenac, your recipe sounds interesting, I'd really like to try it :T

I ran it through mastercook and came up with different results.

With Splenda - per serving 28 calories, with sugar 59 calories. :?:

Suzanne: Yours might be more reliable. I use fitwatch for my recipes and sometimes I don't agree with their results. They're either too high or too low.

Fish sauce doesn't have to be a one-recipe ingredient. If you have an oriental grocery in your area, it is well worth a trip, as bean sprouts, soy sauce, fish sauce... and a lot of other ingredients are much cheaper and of much better quality in an oriental grocery than in the average grocery store.

I love mushroom soy, its a very rich tasting wonderful soy sauce, and it is only $3 a bottle, and the bottle is like a quart size.

As for fish sauce, I use it in place of worcesteshire sauce in recipes and add it to soups, stews, and casseroles for a little umph. Using it sparingly, it gives a rich taste to dishes without tasting fishy at all. In fact, I added it to my regular chili recipe, and got rave reviews from family who liked my "new" recipe much better. They were really shocked at the "secret" ingredient.

I'll give you one pre-emptive word of warning on fish sauce, though...

Most of the pad thai recipes out there will call for you adding it early on to a hot wok. The smell it can produce is a major turn-off for some people. It didn't bother me or my mother, but one time I made it a few years back it sent my father, brother, and sister running. They almost didn't even want to try the finished product at that point.

(Even using the right 'real' ingredients, I still never managed to reproduce the taste most restaurants produced with it, unfortunately.)

I'm sure you'll find fish sauce if you look harder, hopefully even multiple ones to choose from. If that is the case, look for something that looks similar to a light coffee, more brownish, and it should be clear--no particulate matter floating around in it.