---
title: 'Nam Jim Jaew'
slug: 'nam-jim-jaew'
kind: 'preparation'
revision: 1
source: 'mcp'
created: '2026-09-23T08:40:11.424Z'
url: 'https://noble-notations.ryanjnoble.dev/recipes/nam-jim-jaew'
---

# Nam Jim Jaew

_Isaan dipping sauce of toasted dried chilli, toasted sticky rice, fish sauce and lime_

A dipping sauce for grilled meat. It is a wet relish, not a pourable sauce. You drag the meat through it.

Two chillies do two jobs. Toasted dried chilli gives roasted depth. Sliced fresh bird's eye chilli gives a sharp, immediate heat on top.

Toasted glutinous rice, pounded coarse, takes up the free liquid and holds it against the meat. Fish sauce gives the salt. Lime gives the acid. A small amount of palm sugar rounds the edges.

This is the doubled batch. The first batch was half this size and ran out on one bird.

## Why this revision

First version in the store. Records the doubled batch that the cook settled on for one bird. Palm sugar now dissolves in the fish sauce before the lime goes in, because palm sugar dissolves poorly once acid is present.

## Categories

- **Course**: Condiment, Sauce
- **Technique**: Dry-toasting, Grinding
- **Cuisine**: Isaan, Lao, Thai
- **Equipment**: Mortar and pestle
- **Occasion**: Party

## Ingredients


### Khao khua

- 30 g Glutinous rice, raw, dry

### Chilli

- 16 piece Dried Thai chilli
- 6 piece Bird's eye chilli, sliced thin

### Dressing

- 60 ml Fish sauce
- 10 g Palm sugar, shaved fine
- 90 ml Lime juice
- 4 piece Shallot, sliced thin
- 5 piece Spring onion, sliced

### To finish

- 20 g Coriander leaf

## Method


### Khao khua

1. Put the glutinous rice in a dry pan on medium heat. Shake the pan all the time. _(Dry-toasting)_
2. Toast the rice until it is deep gold and smells nutty. _(5 min · Dry-toasting)_
3. Pound the rice in the mortar to a coarse powder. Do not make it fine. _(Grinding)_

### Chilli

4. Put the dried chillies in the same dry pan on medium heat. Press and turn them. _(Dry-toasting)_
5. Stop when they are dark red and smell roasted. Do not let them go black. _(3 min)_
   > The walls are thin. A few seconds separate roasted from bitter.
6. Pound the chillies coarse. Keep flakes and pieces. Do not make a powder. _(Grinding)_

### Dressing

7. Stir the palm sugar into the fish sauce until it dissolves.
   > Palm sugar dissolves poorly once acid is present. Dissolve it before the lime goes in.
8. Add the lime juice. Stir.
9. Add the chilli, the rice powder, the shallot, the fresh chilli and the spring onion. Stir.
10. Leave the sauce for 5 minutes. Then taste it. _(5 min)_
   > The sauce loosens while it sits. Do not correct it before the 5 minutes are over.
11. Correct it with lime juice for sour or fish sauce for salt. Aim for salty, sour, hot and nutty.

### To finish

12. Stir in the coriander leaf just before you serve.

## Notes

### Two chilli forms, two jobs _(science)_

Dried chilli and fresh chilli are not the same ingredient in this sauce.

Dry-toasting browns the sugars and proteins in the dried pericarp. This is the Maillard reaction. It makes pyrazines, which taste roasted. Capsaicin is stable at this heat, so toasting does not remove the heat. It adds the roast on top.

Fresh bird's eye chilli carries volatile green compounds and water. Its heat arrives at once and is sharp.

The sauce needs both. The dried chilli gives the depth. The fresh chilli gives the top.

Conditions: dried chilli toasted dark red · fresh chilli sliced raw

### The sauce loosens after it rests _(science)_

Salt and acid pull water out of the cut shallot. This is osmosis. The shallot softens and the sauce gains liquid.

At the same time the toasted rice takes liquid up.

The two effects settle after about 5 minutes. A sauce that looks dry at once is often correct after the rest. Taste it after the rest, not before.

Do not make it more than about one hour ahead. The aroma of lime juice degrades within the hour, and the herbs wilt.

Conditions: 5 min rest · taste after the rest · serve within 1 h

### White sugar in place of palm sugar _(substitution)_

The cook used white sugar when palm sugar was not available. It worked.

White sugar gives only sweetness. Palm sugar also carries caramel notes from the boil. In a sauce this sour and salty, the difference is small.

There is no cooking step here, so the sugar only balances sour and salt.