Love Tom Yum? Love fried rice? This famous Thai Tom Yum Fried Rice is the right recipe for you! Made with jasmine rice, prawns/shrimp, and tom yum paste and loaded with garlic and chillies. It has a unique spicy, savoury, tangy flavour and is so satisfying. Use your choice of protein, leftover rice, and quick stir fry sauce, delicious dinner is done in 15 minutes!
If you are finding quick and simple classic Thai dishes, Tom Yum Soup, Basil Fried Rice and Thai Fried Rice ( Khao Pad ) are our readers' favourite recipes that you will definitely love.
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Things to Gather
Following is a quick guide with photos and detailed measurements is on the recipe card at the bottom of this page.
Cooked Rice - cooked Thai jasmine rice is ideal for this recipe, but you can add your choice of long-grain cooked rice.
Protein - king prawns, shrimp, tiger prawns, or a choice of seafood. Recommend adding raw prawns or seafood instead of pre-cooked prawns.
Birdeye chilli - has a unique hot peppery flavour which is ideal for making this spicy fried rice.
Garlic - is a must-add ingredient to make this garlicky Thai-style fried rice.
Spring onions ( green onions/scallion ) - bring extra flavour to the fried rice and you can swap it with freshly chopped coriander.
Sauce:
Tom yum paste - I usually use store-bought instant tom yum paste for this fast and easy recipe. Using readymade paste reduces the preparation time and you don't need to make a tom yum paste from scratch.
Soy sauce - you can add regular soy sauce or light/thin soy sauce but light soy is slightly saltier than normal soy sauce.
Fish sauce - as I have mentioned in my previous Thai recipes, fish sauce is ideal for making Thai and South East Asian cuisines and highly recommend adding fish sauce if you don't have any seafood or shellfish allergy. It is salty, sweet, earthy, and umami in flavour.
Sugar - the purpose of adding sugar is to balance out the saltiness, sourness, and spiciness of flavour. You can either use brown sugar, palm sugar, or regular white sugar.
Lime - freshly squeezed lime juice can pop more flavour to the tom yum stir fry sauce.
Toppings - Crisp cucumber slices, lime wedges, chillies, and coriander are great toppings you can add.
Simple Cooking Steps
- Combine stir-fry sauce ingredients in a small bowl and whisk until sugar is dissolved.
- Heat the large wok or pan over medium heat, drizzle 2-3 tbsp of oil and stir fry the garlic and shallots for a few seconds until fragrant. Next, add the prawns and cook for 1-2 minutes. Sprinkle a pinch of salt to taste. Add chillies and stir it well for a few seconds.
- Add cooked rice and pour the sauce mixture over the rice. Bring the heat to a high and stir fry for about 2 mins or until cooked through.
- Finish with spring onions, and toss everything well. Transfer to a serving bowl and garnish with, cucumber, chillies, lime wedges, and coriander.
Quick Tips & Variations
Prawns: Use ready peeled and deveined prawns to cut the prawn's preparation time. Do not recommend using cooked prawns as cooked prawns are less in flavour and it can be hard and rubbery when you stir fry them together with the rice.
Other proteins: you can add: chicken breast or thigh, eggs, Chinese sausage, minced meat, squid, scallops, crab meat, fish cake, etc. Tofu and mushrooms are great meat-free options.
Extra veggies: Small dice of onions, carrots, green beans, green peas, sweet corn, and baby corn can be also added if you love extra vegetables.
Commonly asked questions
Tom yum paste is made of lemongrass, shallots, galangal, kaffir lime leaves, garlic, fresh chillies, sugar, cooking oil, salt, chilli powder, etc.
Instead of store-bought tom yum paste, you can add homemade tom yum paste. Grind lemongrass, galangal, kaffier lime leaves, garlic, shallots, and chillies into a paste and saute it before adding prawns and rice.
This dish is delicious on its own but you can pair it with Thai Spring Rolls, Thai Wings, or Drunken Noodles ( Pad Kee Mao ) and make it a delicious family dinner.
It is a combination of fried rice and tom yum flavour, which is strong in spicy, sour, salty, savoury and slightly sweet. Fresh herbs and spices like lemongrass, galangal, kaffir lime leaves, lime, and chillies are included in the tom yum paste and that makes this fried rice very unique and fragrant.
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📖 Recipe
Tom Yum Fried Rice
Equipment
- 1 Large wok/pan
Ingredients
- 3 cup Cooked Rice Jasmine rice or long grain rice ( About 350 gram or 2 servings )
- 250 grams Prawns/shrimp Peeled and deveined king prawns, tiger prawns, shrimp, white prawns, etc. ( About 8.8oz )
- 2-3 cloves Garlic Finely chopped/minced
- 1 Shallot onion Or small onion, Finely chopped
- 2-3 Bird-eye chilli Or a choice of hot/mild fresh chillies
- 2-3 Spring onions Cut thin slices
- 2-3 tbsp Cooking oil Neutral flavour oil or vegetable oil
- Salt to taste A pinch of salt to season the prawns
Tom Yum Stir Fry Sauce
- 1 tbsp Tom Yum paste Store-bought/readymade paste
- 1 tbsp Soy sauce Light soy sauce or all-purpose regular soy sauce
- 1 tbsp Fish sauce
- 1 tbsp Brown sugar Or regular white sugar
- 1 tbsp Lime juice Fresh lime juice
Toppings to serve
- Cucumber slices
- Lime wedges
- Coriander
Instructions
- First prepare and gather all ingredients. Combine the stir fry sauce ingredients in a small bowl and whisk until the sugar is dissolved.
- Heat the large wok or pan over medium heat, drizzle 2-3 tbsp of oil and stir fry the garlic and shallots for a few seconds until fragrant.
- Next, add the prawns and cook for 1-2 minutes. Sprinkle a pinch of salt to taste. Add chillies and stir it well for a few seconds.
- Add cooked rice and pour the sauce mixture over the rice. Bring the heat to a high and stir fry for about 2 mins or until cooked through.
- Finish with spring onions, and toss everything well. Transfer to a serving bowl and garnish with, cucumber, lime wedges, and coriander.
Notes
- Protein - instead of prawns, you can use small dice of chicken, minced meat, squid, crab meat, sausage, or a choice of protein.
- This recipe is for 2-3 servings. The nutritional facts are calculated per serving approximately and it can be varied by a number of factors.
- This recipe is just for your guidance and you might want to adjust the flavour to your preference.
Mary says
We first tried Tom yum fried rice in a restaurant and loved it, but didn’t know it’s very easy to make it at home. I used both chicken and shrimp for the meats. Delicious!
Maria says
We really enjoyed it. The place I live isn’t close to Asian groceries so it’s difficult for me to get fresh Thai herbs. Love your idea of using tom yum paste. Thats a great hack! Thanks a lot.
Khin says
Glad that you enjoyed it, Maria! Thank you so much for sharing your feedback.