Thai Beef Salad (Yum Nua)

Homemade Thai beef salad served with roasted peanuts, mint and bird’s-eye chilli

5 from 5 votes

Where fresh meats fragrance and flavour. This amazing Thai beef salad (Yum Nua) is light, bright and jam packed with Thai flavours. Sweet, sour, salt & spice - it doesn’t get much better than this.

Prep Time15

Cook Time8

Marination30

Total Time45

Course: Appetizer, Main Course, Salad, Side Dish

Cuisine: Thai

Servings:

Calories: 237kcal

Author: Lee

Ingredients

For the Marinade

1 tsp palm sugar (or white sugar)
1 tbsp fish sauce
pinch white pepper
1 ribeye steak (300g/11oz)

For the Dressing

1 tbsp palm sugar (or white sugar)
1 tbsp fish sauce
½ lime (juice of)
1 Thai chilli (very finely chopped)
¼ cup water

For the Salad

1 shallot (large) (about ⅓ cup - sliced)
1 cup cucumber (peeled & seeded* and cut into chunks) *see notes
2 tomatoes (cut into chunks)
1 red chilli (mild) (cut into slices)
1 Thai chilli (cut into thin slices - seeded or not - you decide)
2 spring onions (scallions) (sliced)
1 cup mint leaves
½ cup cilantro (very roughly chopped)
⅓ cup roasted peanuts (unsalted)

Instructions

To make the marinade

Combine the sugar, fish sauce and pepper and then coat the steak. Leave to marinate for 30 minutes.

To make the dressing

Combine the palm sugar, fish sauce, lime juice, chilli and water and set aside.

To make the salad

Cook the steak for 3–4 minutes per side for medium-rare, depending on its thickness. If you’re using a thermometer, aim for 54–57°C in the centre. Rest it for 10 minutes before slicing thinly.
Toss together the shallot, cucumber, tomato, red chillies, spring onion, mint and cilantro.
Add the sliced beef and half the dressing, then gently toss everything together. Taste and add more dressing if you need it.
Decant to a serving platter or bowl and scatter over the peanuts. Serve with dressing on the side to drizzle over as you wish.
Serve with sticky or Jasmine rice. Personally I love to serve mine with Vietnamese broken rice, which is Jasmine rice broken into pieces. It's like rice couscous!

Notes

A few more tips

Serving: This salad waits for nobody! Toss everything together just before serving so the vegetables and peanuts stay crisp.

Making ahead: You can make the dressing and prepare the vegetables a few hours ahead. Keep them refrigerated in separate containers, then cook the beef and assemble the salad closer to serving time.

Leftovers: Yum Nua is definitely at its best fresh. You can refrigerate leftovers for up to 24 hours, but the vegetables will soften once they’ve been dressed.

Beef: Ribeye is my first choice, but sirloin and rump are excellent alternatives. Whichever cut you use, rest it properly and slice it thinly.

Heat: This version is around 5/10 on my spice scale. For less heat, reduce or omit the bird’s-eye chillies. For more heat, add another—but don’t say I didn’t warn you!

Noodles: Want to make it more substantial? Add some cold rice noodles. They soak up the dressing beautifully and turn the salad into a heartier meal.

Servings: This recipe serves four as part of a larger Thai meal or two hungry people as a main course.

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