Khanom Babin: Ingredients and Preparation
How to make khanom babin, the young-coconut Thai pancake: ingredients for four, equipment, mixing and cooking steps, the cue for turning, and how it differs from khanom krok.
Contents
What this khanom babin recipe produces
Khanom babin, as presented here, is a batch of small Thai dessert pancakes made from one coconut-rich batter and cooked on a flat, buttered surface. The version in this guide follows Riverside Thai Cooking, which titles its recipe Kanom Babin Maprow Aon and builds it around young coconut flesh. That recipe is one documented young-coconut version of khanom babin. Other cooks may use a different formula.
The recipe makes a batch that serves four. Use it when you want a Thai coconut dessert that needs only a single mixture and a flat cooking surface, with no specialty pan.
Ingredients for four servings
- 230 g young coconut flesh
- 120 g glutinous rice flour
- 70 g sugar
- A pinch of salt
- 100 ml coconut milk
- 1 tablespoon butter, for the cooking surface
The flour in this recipe is glutinous rice flour, not regular rice flour. Keep the two separate when you shop. The khanom krok recipe compared below calls for regular rice flour, so the two bags are easy to confuse.
Equipment
- Electric hotplate, which is what Riverside Thai Cooking cooks on, or a nonstick frying pan, which the same author offers as an alternative
- A mixing bowl
- A tablespoon or similar spoon for portioning the batter
- A spatula for turning the pancakes
Method
- 1. Combine the glutinous rice flour, sugar and salt in a bowl.
- 2. Add the coconut milk and work it into the dry ingredients until they are incorporated.
- 3. Fold in the young coconut flesh.
- 4. Spread butter over the hotplate or pan.
- 5. Spoon about two tablespoons of batter onto the surface for each small pancake.
- 6. Turn each pancake once it starts to brown on the underside.
How to judge progress
The documented cue is browning. When the underside of a pancake begins to brown, turn it.
The recipe gives no heat setting, no cooking time per side and no separate cue for when the second side is finished. Cook the first pancake as a test. Watch how quickly it browns and adjust the heat before you portion out the rest of the batch.
How khanom babin differs from khanom krok
Both are small Thai coconut desserts, but they call for different flour, batter setups and pans. Hot Thai Kitchen's khanom krok recipe makes a useful point of comparison.
| Feature | Khanom babin (Riverside Thai Cooking version) | Khanom krok (Hot Thai Kitchen version) |
| Flour | Glutinous rice flour | Regular rice flour |
| Batter | One mixture, with young coconut folded in | Two separate batters, one for the shell and one for the filling |
| Cooking surface | Flat electric hotplate or nonstick frying pan | Pan with indented cavities |
| Portioning | About two tablespoons per pancake onto a buttered surface | Shell and filling batters dispensed separately into the cavities |
Choosing which recipe to follow
Example: if you have a hotplate or nonstick pan and want to mix one coconut batter, follow the khanom babin method above. If you have an indented krok pan and want a shell with a separate filling, use a khanom krok recipe instead. The two recipes are not interchangeable, because their flours and batter structures differ.
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