There's nothing that can unite Thais quite like foreigners butchering Thai cuisine. A digital creator couple by the names of Katherine and Randy of Katherine Wants recently shared a short cooking video of what they call 'tom kha' soup and it caught the attention of Thai netizens for the wrong reasons.
Their most obvious blunder is the absence of the namesake ingredient, kha or galangal, in the ingredient list that they shared alongside the video. The secondary oops include ingredients that usually aren't included in the traditional tom kha such as garlic, ginger (which looks similar to galangal but it simply isn't) and red chilli paste.
While we give Randay credit for the resulting soup looking appetisingly orange, it was a far cry from tom kha soup, which is white in colour due to the addition of coconut milk.
Thai netizens are quick to make comments and correct them. The consensus is that they can't claim to make tom kha when they didn't even use the key ingredient. Some said the resulting soup looks more like tom yum. Many were concerned that they simply misinformed their followers about the famous Thai dish. A few with eagle eyes noted that lime was added when the soup was boiling, which would make it bitter.
Photo courtesy of Nigel Ng
Of course, several mentioned Uncle Roger in their comments presumably so the famous comedian/YouTuber could do a proper take-down on the video like he did with Jamie Oliver's cooking of Thai green curry.
Perhaps, the couple should have stated clearly that they adjusted the recipe, called it "Thai-inspired soup" for the sake of authenticity or simply Google search the correct recipe beforehand to avoid unnecessary drama. They have yet to respond to the negative comments on the video at the time of publishing.
We leave you with a zinger that John Lemon typed, "The moment when you order 'Tom Kha' from 'Wish'."
