Andy Ricker

Stir-fried chicken with hot basil

Rice, in general, is the basis of all Thai cuisine. Food is almost always eaten with rice, and it's more important than any other aspect of Thai cuisine. Jasmine rice is a variety that smells faintly of jasmine, but there's no actual jasmine in it. It's just some sort of compound in the rice.

To me, the egg is kind of the perfect food. You don't have to do much to it; it's very versatile. You can make it into a lot of different shapes and textures. A perfectly boiled egg is good for breakfast, in a soup, on top of rice or as a snack.

In America, we don't seem to steam food very much, but it's one of the great techniques of cooking. In Asian cuisines, steaming is very, very important and probably as popular as frying or baking.