Thinbaw Thee Thoke

Burma's green papaya salad, not pounded but tossed by hand with garlic oil, fried onion, dried shrimp, lime, and roasted gram flour

Origin: Yangon & Lower Burma

From the journey of Papaya.

The Burmese name for papaya is thinbaw thee, ship fruit. Two readings are offered for it: that a papaya cut in half is the shape of a boat, or that thinbaw is the prefix Burmese gives to things that arrived by sea, which the papaya did. The second is the likelier of the two, since the prefix does the same work elsewhere in the language, but the record does not settle it. Thoke means salad, and it is one of the great Burmese categories, the one that also produces laphet thoke from fermented tea. A thoke is mixed with the hand, which is where the word's sense of squeezing and tossing comes from, and it is not pounded: this is the first and largest difference between the Burmese papaya salad and the Lao, Thai, and Khmer ones. The shreds stay separate and dry and crisp, and nothing is bruised. The seasoning is Burmese rather than Thai. Garlic is fried slowly in oil until it is gold and then both the garlic and the oil go in; fried onion goes in as well; the salt comes from ground dried shrimp and fish sauce, the sour from lime, and the body from a spoonful of roasted chickpea flour, which is the ingredient that makes a Burmese salad cling. It is eaten as a snack at any hour, or as one dish amongst several with rice.

Ingredients

Salad

500 g green (unripe) papaya, peeled, seeded, and finely shredded
1 tsp salt

Garlic Oil

120 ml groundnut oil
8 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
1 onion, thinly sliced

Dressing

3 tbsp dried shrimp, ground to a floss
2 tbsp roasted chickpea (gram) flour
3 tbsp lime juice
1 tbsp fish sauce
1 tsp chilli flakes

To Finish

1 handful coriander leaves, chopped
2 tbsp roasted peanuts, crushed

Method

Toss the shredded papaya with the salt, leave for 15 minutes, then squeeze it dry in a cloth and shake the shreds apart.
Fry the garlic slowly in the oil over a low heat until it is pale gold, then lift it out with a slotted spoon before it darkens. Fry the onion in the same oil until crisp and lift it out too. Keep the oil.
Put the papaya in a wide bowl with the ground dried shrimp, gram flour, lime juice, fish sauce, and chilli flakes, and add three tablespoons of the garlic oil.
Mix with your hand, lifting and squeezing lightly, until every shred is coated.
Fold in most of the fried garlic and onion, pile the salad up, and scatter the rest over with the coriander and peanuts.

Notes

Roast plain gram flour in a dry pan for three minutes, stirring, until it smells nutty, then cool before using. Burmese cooks often add a shredded cabbage leaf or a few slivers of green mango; neither is required.

The Gastrographer

Name: Thinbaw Thee Thoke
Prep time: 25 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 35 min
Yield: 4
Cuisine: Yangon & Lower Burma
Ingredients: 500 g green (unripe) papaya, peeled, seeded, and finely shredded; 1 tsp salt; 120 ml groundnut oil; 8 garlic cloves, thinly sliced; 1 onion, thinly sliced; 3 tbsp dried shrimp, ground to a floss; 2 tbsp roasted chickpea (gram) flour; 3 tbsp lime juice; 1 tbsp fish sauce; 1 tsp chilli flakes; 1 handful coriander leaves, chopped; 2 tbsp roasted peanuts, crushed

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Journey Point Map Key

Ingredient originTrade or transit route

Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control