Crying Tiger Steak with Tomato Nam Jim Jaew

Jump to Recipe

Recipe Video

---

My Favorite Steak Sauce in the World Just Got Better

I have strong opinions about steak sauce. Not the kind that comes in a bottle and sits on a diner table, but the kind that makes you rethink what steak sauce is supposed to be. And for me, nothing comes close to nam jim jaew.

Nam jim jaew is one of three fundamental Thai sauces that form the backbone of Thai condiment culture. The other two are prik nam pla, the fish sauce and chili condiment that goes on everything, and nam jim seafood, the bright, herbaceous sauce that accompanies grilled fish and shellfish. Nam jim jaew is the one built for grilled meat. A tamarind-forward sauce with fish sauce, lime juice, palm sugar, Thai chili flakes, shallots, scallion, and toasted rice powder that hits every register simultaneously. Sour, savory, spicy, sweet, and with a nutty, smoky depth from the toasted rice that no other sauce in any cuisine quite replicates.

I have been putting it on steak for years. Then this summer I looked at the heirloom tomatoes in my mom’s garden and had an idea.

---

The Tomato Modification

In-season heirloom tomatoes are one of the most underrated savory ingredients available for about eight weeks a year. They are delectably sweet, packed with umami, and carry a fruity, slightly acidic complexity that is genuinely closer to a condiment than a vegetable when they are at their peak. The moment I thought about what they share with nam jim jaew, the combination made immediate sense.

Tamarind is the traditional base of nam jim jaew. It brings acidity, sweetness, and a deep, concentrated fruitiness that ties all the other components of the sauce together. Ripe heirloom tomatoes do all of the same things and then some. The natural sugars add sweetness. The acidity mirrors the tartness of tamarind. The savory, umami-forward flavor that only a truly ripe tomato has adds a depth that tamarind alone doesn’t bring.

I replaced most of the tamarind with grated heirloom tomatoes and kept a small amount of tamarind paste for depth. The result is a version of nam jim jaew that is unmistakably the original sauce but with an added layer of fruity savouriness that bridges all the components together in a way the classic version never quite does. It still tastes like nam jim jaew. It just tastes like the best version of it I have ever made.

And I stole the tomatoes from my mom’s garden. She knows.

---

Crying Tiger Steak

Seua rong hai, or crying tiger, is a Thai grilled steak preparation where the steak is marinated in a savory, umami-forward mixture of soy sauce, fish sauce, oyster sauce, and palm sugar, then grilled over high heat until charred and served sliced alongside nam jim jaew. The name has several claimed origins, the most colorful being that the sauce is so spicy it makes a tiger cry, or alternatively that the fat dripping from the steak onto the hot coals sounds like a tiger weeping.

The marinade here caramelizes aggressively on the surface of the steak as it cooks, which is both its greatest strength and the one thing that requires attention on the grill. The sugars and soy in the marinade go from perfectly caramelized to burnt quickly. Flipping the steak every 30 seconds keeps the heat even and prevents any one side from sitting on the grill long enough to cross the line from char to scorched.

Any steak works for this preparation. Ribeye for richness, skirt or flank for a more intense beefy flavor and better marinade absorption, striploin for a cleaner, leaner result. The sauce is bold enough to stand up to any of them.

---

Crying Tiger Steak with Tomato Nam Jim Jaew Recipe

Ingredients

Crying Tiger Marinade

• 1-4 steaks of your choice
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 1 tsp dark soy sauce
• 1 tbsp oyster sauce
• 1 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 tbsp palm sugar
• Black pepper, to season
• 2 tsp neutral oil

Tomato Nam Jim Jaew

• 2 stalks green onion, thinly sliced
• 2 tbsp shallot, finely diced
• ¾ cup heirloom tomato, grated (1-2 tomatoes)
• 1 tbsp tamarind paste
• 2 tbsp lime juice
• 1 tbsp palm sugar
• 2 tbsp fish sauce
• 2 tbsp Thai chili flakes, adjust to your spice tolerance
• 2 tbsp toasted rice powder

To Serve

• Finishing salt
• Sliced fresh tomatoes
• Cilantro leaves

---

Instructions

Marinate the Steak

1. Combine the soy sauce, dark soy sauce, oyster sauce, fish sauce, palm sugar, and neutral oil until the sugar has dissolved.
2. Brush the marinade generously over the steaks and season with black pepper.
3. Place uncovered in the fridge for at least 1 hour, preferably overnight. Leaving the steaks uncovered allows the surface to dry slightly, which promotes better caramelization on the grill.

---

Make the Tomato Nam Jim Jaew

Step 1: Toast the Rice Powder

If you don’t have toasted rice powder on hand, toast a few tablespoons of jasmine or glutinous rice in a dry pan over medium heat, stirring constantly, until golden brown and nutty, about 5 minutes. Grind to a coarse powder in a mortar and pestle or spice grinder.

Step 2: Grate the Tomatoes

Cut the heirloom tomatoes in half and grate them on the large holes of a box grater directly into a bowl, discarding the skin. You want the flesh and all the juices captured in the bowl.

Step 3: Combine

Add the green onion, shallot, grated tomato, tamarind paste, lime juice, palm sugar, fish sauce, and Thai chili flakes to a bowl and stir to combine until the palm sugar has dissolved.

Add half of the toasted rice powder and stir through. Reserve the other half for garnishing at the end. Taste and adjust. The sauce should be simultaneously sour, savory, spicy, and slightly sweet with the tomato tying everything together.

---

Cook and Serve

1. Remove the steaks from the fridge and pat dry with paper towels. Removing excess surface moisture helps the marinade caramelize rather than steam.
2. Grill over charcoal for the best result, or sear in a screaming hot pan. Flip every 30 seconds throughout the cook to prevent the marinade from burning on any one side. The surface should caramelize into a deep, lacquered crust.

3. Rest the steak for a few minutes before slicing.
4. Plate the sliced steak alongside fresh tomato slices and garnish with cilantro leaves and the reserved toasted rice powder.
5. Serve with the tomato nam jim jaew alongside.

---

Tips

• Marinate uncovered. An uncovered steak in the fridge develops a slightly tacky, dry surface that caramelizes significantly better than a wet marinated surface when it hits the heat. The marinade penetrates the meat more deeply overnight as well.
• Flip constantly. The sugars in this marinade burn faster than a plain oil-based marinade. Flipping every 30 seconds is not optional here. It is the only way to build an even, deeply caramelized crust without scorching any side.
• Grate the tomatoes. Grating the tomatoes rather than dicing or blending them gives you a pulpy, textured base for the sauce that sits somewhere between a salsa and a liquid condiment. It distributes through the sauce evenly and coats every ingredient rather than sitting as chunks.
• Use charcoal if you can. The smokiness that builds on the caramelized surface of the steak over charcoal coals is the defining aroma of crying tiger. A pan-sear produces an excellent crust but loses that smoky dimension entirely.
• Use the best tomatoes you can find. This modification lives or dies on tomato quality. An in-season heirloom tomato at peak ripeness transforms the sauce. An out-of-season supermarket tomato produces something noticeably flatter and less complex. Wait for the right tomatoes or stick to the traditional tamarind version.

---

---

Serving Suggestions

Crying tiger steak is traditionally served sliced, at room temperature or slightly warm, with the nam jim jaew spooned over or alongside for dipping each slice. Sticky rice is the traditional accompaniment and the right one. The rice absorbs the sauce and balances the heat of the chili flakes in a way that plain steamed jasmine rice doesn’t quite achieve. A simple green papaya salad or sliced cucumber alongside adds a cooling freshness that resets the palate between bites of the sauced steak.

---

Final Thoughts

Nam jim jaew is already my favorite steak sauce in the world. Adding in-season heirloom tomatoes to it did not change that. It just confirmed it more emphatically. The tomatoes and the sauce were always going to work together. It just took a garden raid and a summer of good produce to figure that out.

Make this in peak tomato season. It will not disappoint.

---