Easy Thai Beef Salad Recipe

This easy Thai beef salad recipe is made with fresh summer vegetables, herbs, lime juice, and fish sauce. Once you gather all your Thai beef salad recipe ingredients, you’ll be eating a tasty meal in less than 30 minutes!

These recipes are a must for more declious and healthy Thai beef salads. The best crying tiger recipe with spicy Nam Tok beef waterfall salad. It must be accompanied by this amazing sauce Nam Jim Jaew recipe without sugar. Both have incredible bold flavors!

This easy Thai beef salad recipe is one of my all-time favorites recipes! It's incredibly delicious and healthy, making it one of the go-to meals for clean eating. Let's make it, and it will become one of your and your guests' favorites in no time!

This easy Thai beef salad recipe is cooked over the stovetop rather than grilled. You can always grill the meat, but this recipe is the easy version that you can put together quickly on a weeknight! 

What is this Thai beef salad?

What makes this cold beef salad iconic within the Thai food repertoire is the freshness of the lightly muddled vegetables in a large bowl with zesty fresh lime juice and an umami fish sauce that leaves you wanting more and more.  It’s eating summer in a bowl with every bite of this deliciousness. 

Ingredients for Easy Thai Salad Recipe

Almost all of the ingredients used for this recipe are found at most American grocery stores. The only thing I foresee as a hard-to-find ingredient is the fish sauce. But most groceries now carry some fish sauce on their shelf in the Asian/International section. 

What is Fish Sauce?

Fish sauce is extracted brown liquid made from fermented anchovy fish, tiny prawns, or krill. It is used as a salty seasoning flavor but in a liquid form. Fish sauce is a pantry essential in all of Thai cuisine. 

The taste of the fish sauce is milder than salt, offering a well-rounded flavor that helps balance the sweet and sour dishes for which Thai food is known. Not all fish sauces are created equal. I have a few brands that are my go-to ones, and I tend to stay loyal to them because I know I will get the same result each time I use them for cooking. Don’t be turned off by the name or smell of it. It’s pungent, I know, but Thai food will not be the same without it, so don’t try to get by without using some. If you have ever had Thai food, you likely have had fish sauce already.

My favorite brands of fish sauces are:

• Squid Brand Fish Sauce
• Tiparos Brand Fish  Sauce
• 3 Crabs Brand Fish Sauce

I used three crab brand fish sauces. It's a much lighter fish sauce and less potent in smell than some brands. It's a great fish sauce for making lighter Thai dishes. 

Beef cuts for making this easy Thai beef salad recipe?

While testing this recipe for you, I used three types of beef for the salad:  top round roast, round steak, and flank. My favorite is the top round roast because it holds the most flavors and is the most tender after cooking. A perfect fit for tossing in a bowl of chopped-up vegetables and blended well in this Thai beef salad! I cut the top round roast rather thick and long, around 2-2.3 inches thick and 4-5 inches long. I marinated it for a few hours and then pan-fried it for a few minutes to cook the meat. You can try using any type of grilling beef for this recipe, but I find that the cut with just a tiny amount of fat on the meat really adds extra flavor to the salad. 

Marinating the Meat for the Thai Beef Salad.

Marinating the meat ahead of time will ensure that you’ll get the best-tasting beef. I recommend marinating it for at least 3 hours, but if you are running short on time, 30 minutes is the minimum time for marinating. Here’s a tip if you only have 30 minutes, massage the meat for a few minutes.

What do I mean by this?  Here’s what you do: mix the two sauces for marinating in a bowl, place the large chunk of meat in a gallon-size ziplock bag, pour the sauce over the meat in the bag, seal it tight with minimal air in the bag and use your hands to massage the sauce into the meat for 4-5 minutes.

Use a meat tenderizer for this method but be careful not to tear the plastic bag. Placing a light cloth over the bag of meat can help to not rip the bag while tenderizing. Let it sit at room temperature for 30 minutes before cooking. 

Let’s get started on making this easy beef salad recipe!

• Marinate the meat with fish sauce and lime juice for a few hours. See the above section on marinating if you are short on time.

• Chop up the vegetables and herbs as instructed and put them in a large bowl

• Do your best to chop the vegetables into very thin small, long pieces for this salad, like in the above picture.

• Mix the lime juice, fish sauce, and sugar in a bowl and wait until the meat is ready before adding to the entire mixture at the end.

• On a medium or high heat stovetop, add oil until warm, then add the beef to the cast iron or sautéing pan. See notes for preventing hot oil splashing.
• Do not throw away the extra marinating sauce; add the sauce to the pan and let the meat cook for 6-10 minutes or until the meat is cooked to your preference. Rare, medium-rare, medium, etc. You want to err on the rare side, so the meat is tender when added to the salad.

• When the meat is ready, remove it from the pan to a cutting board and let it rest. See notes below for resting the meat.

• Add the salad sauce/dressing to the vegetable bowl, mix well, and get ready to cut the meat.

• Slice the meat thin and long, and save all the juices from cutting the meat.  Add the chili flakes, mix gently but well and let it chill for a couple of minutes while you set the table.

• Add the sliced meat, including the juice of the meat, into the salad bowl.

• Add chili flakes and stir gently until well mixed; put on a serving platter. ENJOY! See notes on how to authentically eat this tasty Thai beef salad. 

Easy Thai Beef Salad Recipe

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★★★★★

5 from 7 reviews

• Author: Suwanee
• Total Time: 35 minutes
• Yield: 6 1x
• Diet: Low Calorie

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Description

This easy Thai beef salad recipe is made with fresh summer vegetables, herbs, lime juice, and fish sauce. Once you gather all your Thai beef salad recipe ingredients, you’ll be eating a tasty meal in less than 30 minutes!

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Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

For the marinade

1 lb beef. (top round roast, round steak, or flanks)

2 tablespoon fish sauce

3 tablespoons fresh lime juice

For the salad

1 cup cherry tomatoes, chopped in half

1 cup shallots, sliced long and thin (2-3 large shallots)

1 cup English, Persian, or pickling cucumbers sliced long and thin

1 cup celery, top leafy parts chopped into ½-inch pieces

½ cup celery stems, thinly sliced

1 cup mint leaves, lightly packed and chopped in large chunks

1 cup cilantro, sliced ½ inch long

¼ cup lime juice

2 tablespoon fish sauce

½ teaspoon white sugar

1-3 tablespoon chili flakes (Totally optional and adjustable here.)

1 tablespoon oil

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Instructions

• Marinate the meat with fish sauce and lime juice for a few hours. See the above section on marinating if you are short on time.
• Chop up the vegetables and herbs as instructed and put them in a large bowl
• Mix the lime juice, fish sauce, and sugar in a bowl and wait until the meat is ready before adding to the entire mixture at the end. 
• On a medium or high heat stovetop, add oil until warm, then add the beef to the cast iron or sautéing pan. See notes for preventing hot oil splashing.
• Do not throw away the extra marinating sauce. Add the sauce to the pan and let the meat cook for 5-8 minutes or until the meat is cooked to your preference. Rare, medium-rare, medium, etc. You want to err on the rare side, so the meat is tender when added to the salad.
• When the meat is ready, remove it from the pan to a cutting board and let it rest. See notes below resting.
• Add the salad sauce/dressing to the vegetable bowl, mix well, and get ready to cut the meat.
• Slice the meat thin and long, save all the juices from the cutting of the meat, and pour all of it, the meat and the juice into the salad bowl. Add the chili flakes, mix gently but well and let it chill for a couple of minutes while you set the table. Put on a serving platter and ENJOY! 
• See notes on how to authentically eat this tasty Thai beef salad. 

Notes

• The oil will splash a bit. Use a lid until it stops, then leave the pan open to let the meat cook and the sauce reduce.
• ALWAYS let your cooked meat rest for a few minutes on a cutting surface before cutting into it. At least 5 minutes of rest is recommended, but not longer than 15. The rest allows the juice of the meat to fully infuse and redistribute the flavors into the cooked beef.
• Thais normally eat this dish with sticky rice. It can be considered a finger food experience. You can use your fingers to roll the sticky rice into a ball and then just scoop up the salad onto the bite-size rice ball and lick your fingers at the end of each bite! (: Just don’t double dip if you share the plate with someone! Here are my recipes for how to cook Thai sticky rice.
• This recipe is best eaten in one sitting.  It does not do well the next day or even the next meal. The vegetables will get soggy and will take away from the experience of eating a fresh salad. 

• Prep Time: 20
• Cook Time: 15
• Category: Salad
• Method: Stove Top
• Cuisine: Thai

Keywords: easy thai beef salad recipe. thai beef salad. spicy salad recipe. Thai salad recipe