grate some green papaya and some carrot
chop in some garlic, peanuts, thai peppers and cilantro. add some lime juice and shoyu

so easy to make and soooo good!

not to be contrary, but in thai traditional style for Som Tam ส้มทำ (green papaya salad) there would be no shoyu/tamari/soy sauce used. The flavor for the 'salt' is derived from fish sauce.

I use a large clay mortor and wooden pestle, actually made for the dish, I place 1or 2 clove of garlic 2-8 mouse shit chilli's and a teaspoon of sugar...the sugar helps the mashing of the ingrediants..traditionaly tamarand and palm sugar are used as flavors as well. I use limes and regular sugar for the acid/sour/sweet balance instead.Using the large clay mortar with the wooden pestle, pound the garlic and chillies to a paste. Stir well with a spoon and pound to bruise so that they absorb the heat and flavor of the chillies and garlic.Juice four persian limes (those are the regualr limes we use here in the states, dont sub key limes heck if you can get key limes you can get tamarind...which if you are using... 1 Tbs. of compressed tamarind in 1/3 cup of warm water. Seperate the tamarind with your fingers to dissolve the soft pulp-you can get this from any latino bodega or asian market-gather up remaining undissolvable pulp, squeeze to extract juice and discard. Add more tamarind or water as necessary to make 1/4 cup of concentrate...now in the thai way you would begin to add dry shrimp, dont need to but if you got em use em...and long beans, in thai the word sounds like Tafuckyaw I thnk we call them mung beans int he chinese markets here., so about 2-3 tbls of the dried small shrimp, then cup cut the long beans into oh say one inch bits or slightly longer and pound them just to bruise. I have a grater tool that I use that is made for papaya but you can any sort of shredding tool that will give you a long thin jullienne. you will need about 4 cups of shredded papaya add that into the mix...at this stage I tend to transfer the mess out of the morter into a large bowl and add the lime juice and fish sauce to taste..about four limes and lots of fish sauce..but TO TASTE!!!! I then garnish with cherry tomatoes, and @ 1/4 cup chopped unsalted roasted peanuts...In "Essan" style- Gai Yang ไก่ย่าง BBQ chicken and Khao Neow ข้าวเหนียว sticy rice round out this dish. "Essan" the north east of thailand is home to the style of food I most love, "Sab" is the word used to describe the sharp, hot and delicious flavours of this food.