Thai Khai Pad Gaprao (chicken with Holy Basil)

Ingredients ----------- 2 tablespoons chopped garlic 2 tablespoons chopped shallots 2 tablespoons chopped mixed red & green jalapenas (prik chi fa) 1 teaspoon green peppercorns, whole. quarter cup fish sauce 2 tablespoons palm sugar 1 cup coarsely chopped holy basil leaves (bai gaprao) Optionally you can add a medium "Spanish" onion, cut into rings, quartered and separated. Or you can use sliced green onions, or a combination. 1 pound ground or minced chicken Method ------ (my wife chops the chicken with a pair of cleavers, and I can't bear to watch... you can of course use a meat grinder or a food processor) The garlic, shallots, peppers and peppercorns are ground together in a mortar & pestle or a food processor. In a hot wok, with a little cooking oil, briefly stir fry this paste to bring out the flavour and aroma. add the remaining ingredients and continue to stir until the chicken is cooked through. Serving ------- For luncheon pad bai gaprao can be served over plain rice, or over a fried egg or egg crepe, placed on the rice. For dinner it goes well with the hot and sour tom yum soups, as well as curries and other Thai food. Add the usual Thai condiments (chilis in fish sauce (prik nam pla), ground chiles (prik phom) and sugar), as well, perhaps as ground black pepper. Variants -------- It can be made with chopped pork, or even a chopped beef base, though of course the flavours are quite different. You can also experiment with replacing the meat with hard tofu marinated in a mixture of sweet soy, fish sauce and ground ginger, say, or a vegetable mix of your choice (I like to mix broccoli and cauliflower florets, with julienned carrots and wing beans), to make a vegetarian pad bai-gaprao.