Pad Thai Shrimp Burgers

Pad Thai is normally made with a tasty sauce consisting of sour tamarind, sweet sugar, salty fish sauce and spicy chilies so that is where I started but this sauce is a little too thick for what I wanted so I thinned it down a bit with the addition of some coconut milk.

I could have stopped there with the sauce but I could not resist adding some peanut butter, which is not commonly used in pad Thai, but since pad Thai is often topped with chopped peanuts I figured adding some more peanut flavour could only make things better. I filled the pad Thai burgers out with some of the vegetables in pad Thai including bean sprouts and shredded carrots along with plenty of fresh cilantro and I finished them off with some chopped peanuts and crispy fried shallots.

Ingredients

1 1/2 pounds shrimp, peeled, deveined and coarsely chopped
2 cloves garlic
1 small shallot
2 teaspoons fish sauce
1/2 teaspoon lime zest
2 tablespoons cilantro
3/4 cup coconut milk
2 teaspoons tamarind concentrate (or the juice from 1 lime)
2 tablespoons palm sugar (or brown sugar)
1 tablespoons fish sauce (or soy sauce)
1 teaspoon chili sauce (or to taste)
1 tablespoon peanut butter
1 cup bean sprouts
1/4 cup carrot, julienned
2 green onions, sliced
1/4 cup cilantro, chopped
4 buns
1/4 cup peanuts, toasted and chopped
2 tablespoon crispy fried shallots (optional)

Directions

Mince 1/3 of the shrimp in a food processor along with the garlic, shallot, fish sauce, lime zest and cilantro.
Mix the minced shrimp into the chopped shrimp, form 4 patties and chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes.
Oil your grill, heat to medium-high and cook the shrimp until pink, about 3-5 minutes per side.
Heat the coconut milk, tamarind, sugar, fish sauce and peanut butter over medium heat until the sugar and peanut butter melt and the sauce thickens a bit and set aside to cool.
Mix the bean sprouts, carrot, green onion and cilantro and toss in the pad thai sauce.
Place the shrimp patties in buns and top with the bean sprout mixture, chopped peanuts and crispy fried shallots.