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      Within a few years, I was teaching Thai cooking classes and writing about Thai food for newspapers and magazines. Then came cookbooks, which led to my good fortune in meeting Nongkran Daks. I remember seeing her presentation on Thai cuisine at a conference for food professionals in Washington, DC, around ten years ago. I loved her energetic, generous, knowledgeable spirit and the way she brought the deeper story of Thai culture forward while offering tips on ingredients and apt points on technique. I bought her books and began to benefit from her knowledge personally, as she became my source on Thai language and classic and regional dishes which were unknown to me. Nong shared one of her recipes, a fantastic noodle dish from her Southern Thai tradition, allowing me to include it in one of my Thai cookbooks.

      When I learned that Bobby Flay was heading to Nong’s lovely DC-area restaurant, Thai Basil, for one of his signature Throwdowns, I smiled. He knows his stuff, but nobody throws down Pad Thai like Nongkran Daks! I wisely placed my bets on my friend, who of course won the day. Visiting her restaurant is a treat for anyone, but for people like me, who long for the food we remember enjoying in Thailand, it is a particular delight. From her exquisite Chicken Wrapped in Pandan Leaves and Shrimp Soup with Coconut Milk and Thai Ginger, to her sublime Watercress Salad with Shrimp, Spicy Beef with Mint Leaves, and Roasted Duck Curry with Wild Eggplants and Tomatoes, Nong’s Thai menu transports her guests to Thailand for just a little while.

      When Nong told me that she was working on this comprehensive book, I was thrilled and delighted for two reasons. One is that I love having Thai food known and shared, anywhere, anytime. I’m glad that Nong’s deep, unique lifetime of knowledge and mastery of her cuisine will be made available to the world. I’m also selfishly glad for myself, because I am still learning about this extraordinary, sparklingly unique, complex way of cooking. I cannot imagine a better guide, instructor, inspiration, and mentor for any of us who love Thai food and long to understand it, learn about it, and become fluent in its pleasures and delights.

      Nong’s expertise stems from a lifetime spent in the Thai kitchen, literally beginning in her childhood and continuing to this day. She has cooked in Thailand, offered cooking classes, lectures and presentations, and headed up her own restaurant kitchens. She is also a mother who knows well the challenges of making meals for family at home. Given Nong’s family’s life, this has meant cooking around the world, including Bangkok, Taiwan, Pakse and Vientiane in Laos, Beijing, and her current home here in the US.

      Whether you’re just beginning the journey or you are, like me, a longtime devotee of Thailand’s amazing cuisine, there’s never been a better time to learn about Thai cooking. Thai ingredients are available on the shelves of many supermarkets, and the recent profusion of Asian markets, huge Asian grocery stores, and homegrown Asian ingredients in farmer’s markets and CSA boxes makes it even easier.

      I love Nongkran’s food, I love her restaurant, and I love the way she writes recipes and shares her wisdom with everyone who wants to learn what makes Thai cooking special and how to bring it home. We are lucky that she and Alexandra Greeley have made the time to write this splendid, beautiful, practical and delightful cookbook, so that we can enjoy Nong’s amazing Thai food at home.

      At last, I can have Nong in the kitchen with me—and so can you.

      NancieMcDermott

       Author of Southern Pies: A Gracious

       Plenty of Pie Recipes, from Lemon Chess to

       Chocolate Pecan, and food blogger at

       nanciemcdermott.com

      Nongkran, Pad Thai Champion!

      In the past several decades, many Americans have explored ethnic and often exotic cuisines, welcoming flavors and ingredients that rarely appear on the average American dinner table. Thai food, with its balanced flavors and textures, has staged a major American success. Thai-centric restaurants, Thai-inspired recipes, and Thai cookbooks have gained the public spotlight. You can walk down any street in almost any town in the USA and find a Thai restaurant dishing out pad Thai and chicken with basil. Not surprisingly, a number of Thai chefs have gained celebrity status. One who stands out is Nongkran Daks, owner of Thai Basil restaurant in Chantilly, Virginia and the winner of the Food Network’s “Pad Thai Throwdown with Bobby Flay.”

      A native of Chumporn province in Southern Thailand, Nongkran Daks may well have been born to cook. She certainly began her kitchen life at an early age. Nongkran recalls that at age seven, when living with her sister-in-law in the small town of Langsuan, she was required to make ten curry pastes each afternoon to sell at the local open market. At her first lesson, she was seated before all the curry ingredients arranged in piles on trays and instructed to pound together the makings for each paste with a mortar and pestle. Unlike other cooks, whose first kitchen foray might be boiling or frying eggs, hers was making authentic Thai curries from scratch. Gradually, cooking transformed itself from something she had to do to something she couldn’t live without.

      As she matured, Nongkran continued to cook, preparing and serving luncheon foods for her schoolmates at the request of her teachers. “My head teacher would ask me to make Panang curry and stewed pork with egg,” she remembers. She cooked the dishes in the school kitchen and wrapped each serving in a banana leaf for separate lunch packets. The teachers chose Nongkran for this task because they knew she cooked well, and though it took time, they also knew she could keep up with her studies.

      After high school, Nongkran moved to Bangkok, where she attended Chulalongkorn University’s preparatory school. After graduation, she attended Kasetsart University, where she studied agricultural economics and lived in a dorm for the first few years. Her friends, knowing about her kitchen skills and her love

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