Green Papaya Salad (Som Tam)

Shred and crisp the papaya

Peel the green papaya and shred it into thin, long strands with a julienne peeler, a mandoline, or a knife. Drop the shreds into a bowl of cold water for 5 minutes, then drain well and pat dry; this keeps them crisp so the salad soaks up the dressing instead of turning watery.

• 300 g green papaya

✅ Done when: the papaya is cut into fine, even strands and feels crisp and dry

Pound chilies and garlic

Put the chilies and garlic in the mortar (or a sturdy bowl) and pound a few times with the pestle until just broken down into a coarse, fragrant paste, not a smooth purée. This wakes up the garlic's bite and the chilies' heat right at the base of the dressing.

• 2–3 Thai bird's eye chilies
• 2 cloves garlic

✅ Done when: the chilies and garlic are roughly crushed and smell fragrant

Bruise beans and shrimp

Add the long beans and dried shrimp to the mortar. Pound lightly, turning the mixture with a spoon between strikes, just enough to crack the beans and soften the shrimp so they take on the chili-garlic flavor.

• 6 long beans
• 2 tbsp dried shrimp

✅ Done when: the beans look lightly crushed and bruised, not pulverized

Bruise the tomatoes

Add the tomato halves and press down with the pestle two or three times, just to split the skins and release their juice. Don't turn them into mush — you want soft, juicy chunks of tomato in the finished salad.

• 6 cherry tomatoes

✅ Done when: the tomatoes are split and juicy but still holding their shape

Add papaya and pound

Pile the shredded papaya on top. Pound and toss with the classic alternating motion: one hand taps gently with the pestle while the other turns the salad with a spoon, lifting from the bottom. Keep this up for about a minute, just enough to bruise the strands so they soften slightly and drink in the dressing.

• 300 g green papaya (shredded, from step 1)

✅ Done when: the papaya strands look slightly bruised and a little translucent at the edges, but still crunchy

Season to balance

Add the palm sugar, fish sauce and lime juice. Pound and stir gently to dissolve the sugar into the mixture. Taste: it should hit sour, salty, sweet and spicy all at once, with no single flavor taking over. Adjust with more lime for sourness, fish sauce for salt, or sugar for sweetness.

• 2 tbsp palm sugar
• 2–3 tbsp fish sauce
• 2–3 tbsp lime juice

✅ Done when: the dressing tastes balanced between sour, salty, sweet and spicy, and the sugar has dissolved

Serve

Transfer the salad to a plate, scraping all the dressing from the mortar over the top. Scatter with the crushed peanuts and serve right away with raw cabbage wedges, extra long beans and lime wedges for scooping and crunching alongside.

• 2 tbsp roasted peanuts
• to serve cabbage, long beans and lime wedges