Noodle-Free Pad Thai (30 Minutes!)

This is amazing. I doubled the batch, only substitutions were sriracha for chili garlic, and extra serrano peppers. I added all the optional ingredients and after eating it, brought some to my neighbor who said it’s the best vegetable dish he’s ever had. He asked for the recipe and after sending it, he texted ” Holy crap dude, I never thought vegan food could be good”.

Excellent job, and I will be using more of your recipes to up my vegetable intake.

This recipe was so delicious! Thank you so much for such an inventive new take on pad thai :)

This was FANTASTIC!!!!! This is my third carrot recipe I have tried in 2 days. I hated carrots my whole life. Till now. This was spicy, sweet, savory……just delicious. :) Thanks.

Tried this out tonight and loved it ! Even my non tofu eating fiancé loved it.

I just made this and boy am I glad!!! The sauce is so good. I was worried about the collard greens but they tasted fantastic! I doubled the sauce and added some noodles to stretch it out a bit but didn’t change anything else. Yum!!!!!

Made this a while ago and totally forgot to comment! This was soooooo sooooo sooo good!!!! Must make again!

This recipe is truly delicious! And it is so pretty. I serve it over a crispy nest of soba noodles sauteed in a bit of sesame oil (my husband loves noodles). Yet another wonderful recipe from minimalist baker (my go-to source for dinner recipes)!

This recipe is so easy and customizable!! I cannot say enough good things about the sauce, it tastes just like a peanut sauce you would find at a restaurant, only so much cleaner! I am allergic to garlic and have not been able to find a decent garlic-free peanut sauce until now. I used zucchini, carrot, kale, and serrano pepper as the veggies because that is what I had on hand and it turned out amazing. I can’t wait to use the sauce on salad, chicken, and stirfrys. It is a crowd pleaser for sure. Thanks Dana!

I did have a question though what is the sauce you have pictured in the little dish?

This was wonderful! I have a serious problem with needing pad Thai and this may have saved my life! The carrot noodles gave me the texture I need. After a year and a half vegan I switched back to eating chicken and fish due to some belly fat that just wouldn’t budge so instead of tofu I used a pound of chicken marinated the same. I had to use two pans to cook everything than mixed it all together in a big soup pot at the end. My husband, five year old son and I ate it all. Absolutely delicious and that takeout place ain’t got nothing on this!

This was delicious – I wish all my favorite restaurants made something like this. My husband has been toying with going Vegan and while eattting this dish he said – “why wouldn’t I, this tastes satisfying, filling and amazing”. Thank-you for perfecting this vegan Pad Thai. And – those carrots are a great noodle replacement, wonderful mouth experience and carried the sauce well.

Thanks for this one! I made it last night and it was fantastic. In case anyone else was wondering, the leftovers from this work really well in a breakfast burrito with extra scrambled tofu or eggs if you eat them.

MADE this tonight and LOVED IT! I added a clove of garlic at the same time as the carrots, and used Trader Joe’s power greens mix (spinach, chard, kale) instead of collard greens cause I couldn’t find any! Worked great!

Hi!! I made this yesterday with substitutions I had around the house. My guest does not like peanuts so I made it peanut free! I used tahini in the sauce and crushed cashews for the topping. I didn’t have all the vegetables so I used carrots and zucchini as noodles. I added fresh corn. It turned out absolutely amazing !! I am sooooo impressed. The tofu was delicious. I’m obsessed with pad Thai; it’s probably my favourite dish. We order take out a couple times a month. From now on I’ll be making this instead!! Much healthier, very easy and even more delicious. I’ve been following minimalist baker for a couple months and could not be happier with the recipes. Thank you so much !!!

Made this today and it was delicious and beautiful! Thanks for sharing!

Okay, I am APALLED at how much I enjoyed this. I ate the whole thing. THE WHOLE THING. And while I don’t really advise that — that’s quite a lot of peanut butter and sodium to ingest in one meal — I can take solace in the fact that it was basically 100% veggies.

I just made this recipe and it absolutely delicious. I’m always looking for plant base recipes. I have to say this one hits the spot. THAnk you! By the way I just order your book. I hope the recipes are as delicious as this one and the Cinnabon recipes which is a big hit in my home.

I made this tonight and it was fantastic! I added sweet potato noodles to really amp up the feeling of pad thai, and it worked perfectly. I added them in right before adding in the carrots and collard greens.

This took me about an hour but it was well worth the investment. I’ve since used the sauce for dipping Spring rolls. BTW, love your cookbook, Everyday Cooking.

This dish is amazing and the sauce is dynamite. Adored by 5 carnivores – so that says it all.

Dana, I made this last night and am eating it for lunch now–oh. my. goodness. It is fantastic! Can’t wait to make it again for my husband. Thank you for sharing yet another delicious recipe with the masses!

I just made this & it was amazing!! So freaking good! We love all the flavors!

This was absolutely delicious. My favourite vegan g/f dish I’ve made yet. Thank you for making recipes like this that make it easy for me to stick to a plant-based diet. I never leave comments but had to with this. ??

I don’t usually comment on, well, anything, but I have to tell you this sauce is truly amazing. I saw a link on Reddit to this recipe a few weeks ago and made the sauce in the Vitamix for lunch that very day, mixing it with shirataki angel hair noodles and garnishing with sliced almonds. It was divine. I used maple syrup, substituted Bragg’s Liquid Aminos for the coconut aminos, and added the sesame oil to the sauce in the blender. I’m making it tonight for my family with the veggies as written and I cannot wait. Thanks for the delicious, healthy recipe. It’s a keeper.

I made this tonight. I baked some tempeh, and then marinated it in the sauce while prepping the veggies. I used cabbage, ribboned carrots and zucchini, and it was amazing. What a great recipe!

I made this for dinner and OMG it is sooo good! Flavor is on point, thank you for this recipe!

I just made this! Seriously SO GOOD! I added zucchini noodles and used Kale instead of collards! SO GOOD! I made it a little spicier than I was prepared for – so I added some chick peas in and it is so yummy! Nutty, filling! Delicious! Great Recipe!

Made this last night and it was DELICIOUS! SO colorful, flavorful, and healthy. Also really really time consuming. It took me over an hour to make. Cooking time was not long at all, but washing, slicing, peeling, chopping the veggies took an eternity. I think next time won’t take as long now that I know what I’m doing. I would probably also cut down on the soy sauce a bit but I am definitely going to be making again and again. Thank you, Dana!

Awesome meal. We made it at the fire house and everyone loved it. And leftovers the following day OMG!!!!

Wow the flavor of this is insane! I really think that almond or peanut butter with lime juice and aminos give this a great umami flavor. I followed the recipe except I used soy sauce. SO very flavorful. Thank you! This is a keeper!

This is seriously amazing! I used soy and honey in the sauce as it’s what I had in the cupboard and it was delicious. Added some ribboned zucchini in addition to the carrot.
I always love your recipes, this one was next level, thank you!! x

Absolutely the best vegan recipe I have come across in a while? Love it!

One of the most delicious dinners I have ever made. Also loved by my meat eating boyfriend so you know it has to be good!

Really good! I have a soy allergy so I appreciate the coconut aminos!

I just made this for dinner and absolutely loved it. Thank you for yet another healthy, quick, and amazingly tasty meal!

This was such a fantastic recipe! My family started eating vegan three weeks ago and though my kids are both good eaters, I was curious whether they would adjust well to the diet. They slurped this up hungrily tonight. Definitely one of my favorite recipes of yours so far! Thank you for making becoming vegan easier!

I made this last week since I had all the ingredients on hand. The only change was the addition of a pad thai sauce ( tamarind, TJ’s spicy yuzu sauce, soy, ginger, garlic) to give more flavor to the “noodles”. I’m a saucy gal!
Served on a bed of fresh greens from the garden. My husband LOVED it! Wants it on regular rotation. It makes a good summer meal served raw or al dente.

I made this last night and it was absolutely delicious! I was skeptical that it could be better than take-out but as usual, you pulled through. It was definitely yummy but how on earth did you pull this together in 30 minutes? It took me a little over an hour, and I even has a spiralizer to use for shredding the cabbage and bell peppper! (I used a veggie peeler for the carrot noodles though.) Was this 30 minutes after you’d prepped the veggies already? Do you have any tips for making the carrot noodles? I struggled so much and wasn’t sure how to proceed when I’d shaved most of it and was left with a piece that was too thin to peel but too thick to be a noodle… I’d love tips on making this faster because it was delicious and I’d like to make it more often if it could be faster…

Thanks for the recipe!

Another fantastic recipe! I made this tonight with green cabbage instead of purple, but that was the only substitution. Making the carrot noodles with the peeler was so smart and simple. I was so impressed with how it all came together, it was very much like pad thai. The sauce was my favorite part :)

This recipe will definitely be on rotation! I can’t wait to have the leftovers for lunch tomorrow!

I made this today and it was great; I tried to use a special peeler that makes long julienne slices for the carrots, but my carrots were not that big (next time I will do the ribbons). I used Gardein vegan Chik strips instead of tofu. This was another delightful dish; I would say it took about 45 minutes to chop and peel vegetables and make the sauce. The cooking time is included. I love the fact I did not need rice or noodles to feel full. Thank you for this dish.

Thank you for this amazing recipe! I made this exact; just added some ribboned zuchini as well as I had a couple in the fridge. I also made your cinnamon buns as well…soo good! How can anyone not want to go Vegan with dishes like this? You will see nothing but positive results – I wish people could see that. I am purchasing your book to add to my Vegan collection and I must say, yours will be the one that I will regularly reach for and will probably be covered in food splatters.

Thank you Dana!

made this last night – it was friggin’ amazing, and I couldn’t stop picking at the leftovers even though I was ridiculously full. my only complaint is that there’s a TON of salt; I doubled the amount of tofu (thus, doubled the glaze), which brought the total amount of soy sauce used to 7 1/2 tablespoons. yikes. any future recipe users could probably take out at least 2 tablespoons somewhere and it would probably still be just as good.

I made this tonight, minus tofu. It was AMAZING and will now be in our regular rotation! So colorful and flavorful! Thank you for creating this fantastic recipe!

Made this incredible recipe !!! Sooo good.. I just substituted sweet potatoes noodles for the carrots.. I was too lazy to ribbon carrots and Whole Foods had already noodled sweet potatoes.. thank you so much!! YOur recipes never disappoint

“I am altering the recipe. Pray I do not alter it further.” – Darth Reader
The sauce, the balance of vegetables are perfect. I used kale and added garlic sauteed shrimp. Cooked the peppers separately to spare my wife The Heat.
One complaint: you switch back and forth between measured ingredients (lime juice – how many tablespoons are in a lime?), cabbage (by the cup – how many cups of cabbages are in a cabbage?), and whole ingredients (5 collard greens). I prefer the whole ingredient approach. In the frenzied head of a stir-fry, clarity and consistency count.
#WifeLovedIt

Wow. I had high hopes for this dish but I had no idea it would be this freaking good You know how you meet a promising guy on Saturday night and then you spend the day with him on Sunday and you can’t imagine going back to work on Monday because you don’t really want to be apart? That’s how I feel about your pad Thai. If I have to call in sick tomorrow I am blaming you…

I made this today and it’s so delicious I’m already looking forward to the next time. I subbed Green Cabbage for the Red, Spinach for Collards, added Zucchini Ribbons and omitted oil. Thanks for yet another delicious recipe.

Thank you for this beautiful recipe!
I made it last night and I absolutely loved it… like all the the recipes I’ve tried from your blog so far!
You are such a talented minimalist culinary creator ! I regularly recommend your blog to my friends (and even my students) !

Amazing recipe! I used it with leeks, sweet potatoes, white corn, carrots and 2 eggs and 3 whites. Used lemon instead of lime, which requires a bit more coconut sugar and maple syrup-jist a splash…and put the scramble in lettuce wraps! I had to is all the veggies I had before buying specifics for this recipe…I will never need to order take out again. Thank you for all your inspirational ingredients!

The sauce was absolutely delicious. I didn’t have most of the veggies, but I poured it over zoodles, grilled red peppers, sungold tomatoes, jalapeños, shishito peppesr, onions and quinoa.

I wasn’t in the mood for greens so I used extra cabbage and peppers instead. But wow, this was amazing. So amazing that I ate a batch for lunch and dinner and then prepped another 2 batches as meal prep dinner for the week since I try to keep dinner a low carb meal. Yum, yum, yum. Will definitely be on repeat.

Just made this recipe for dinner this evening. It was a hit!
You never disappoint Dana! Thanks for another delicious recipe:)

Love this!! Totally worth turning on the stove on the hottest day of the year (in the PNW, but still ;) ). Had to stop myself from eating all the leftovers before bed.

Yum! Made this tonight for my sister and boyfriend (the boyfriend is a carnivore). Instead of scrambling the tofu, we pressed, cubed, baked, and then pan seared 14 oz. of tofu to go on top. Super yum. We ate the whole recipe. I think sweet potato noodles would be amazing here, although I am partial to the collard greens. We also doubled the peanut sauce to serve extra on the side, and served the dish alongside this delicious thai cucumber salad.

My sister and I made this recipe and we loved it! We added a lot of extra veggies and made some extra carrot “noodles” make up for not having some of the veggies that were called for but it was still just as delicious. This recipe will definitely become a regular in our house!

Carrot noodles!! Flippin’ brilliant. My kids ate every bite. I put them in first and used the greens from cauliflower instead of bok choy. So amazing – thank you!!

Well THAT was a success!! The peanut sauce changes flavor slightly when cooked …thank goodness bc I was so nervous about it despite many adjustments (which probably brought right back to the original ratio ?). Ginger is a plus/must. THANK YOU!!
–newby vegetarian

This was tremendous!!!! We loved every bite and all the flavor depth. WOW!

Thanks, Minimalist Baker! We are a big fan of your recipes!

Made this last night and wow this blew me and my friend away! I wasn’t expecting something life changing because all those pretty raw veggies as a main course I wasn’t totally on board with but wow they were the star of the show! Especially the bell peppers which turned out to have such a amazing flavor which the sauce brought out! I’ll definitely be making this very regularly thank you so much!

This recipe was delicious! I made it for dinner tonight. I never thought an asian dish was so easy, I had all the ingredients. I will be adding this recipe to my favorites list! Thank you, Dana

I forgot to add, I did use a traditional vegetable peeler to make the carrot noodle ribbons which was a first for me. It took me a couple carrots into the process to get the method down. The easiest way for me was to lay the carrot on a cutting board holding the thin end and holding the peeler blade side down and sweeping the peeler blade along the length of the carrot. When it started to get tougher to peel I would rotate the carrot a quarter turn. When finished I was left with larger pieces from each carrot which I will use for another purpose, but the 4 carrots gave me enough ribbons to make the dish.

Some things just can’t wait until tomorrow, and this recipe was no exception. After seeing the post, I was smitten with the idea of making a noodle free Pad Thai and later this evening off to the market I went . The promise of the dish in 30 minutes did not seem possible but I was able to prep the ingredients within 20 minutes and cook the dish within 10 minutes and was pleasantly surprised. I did not change much to the recipe but I would definitely make extra sauce for serving on the side (it’s really good/salty/sweet/sour/spicy). The veggies were lightly coated with the sauce so it would be nice to have a bit extra. For cooking, I used a wok and appreciated the extra room to cook this dish in considering the large amount of veggies involved, it made tossing and cooking a breeze. I’m not a huge fan of tofu, but decided to use it in the recipe since it is so commonly found in Pad Thai. Similar to many Thai restaurant versions of Pad Thai, I cubed the extra firm tofu. It was hard to get a nice sear on the tofu cubes even with the veggies pushed to the side of the pan. Next time I will sear the tofu first and remove it from the pan and then add the tofu back at the end with the ginger and sauce to keep the crispy texture. This is one of the most fun and creative ways I’ve had eating my veggies in a while and was thrilled to get so many different veggies packed into this dish! In the past, I’ve made traditional noodle pad thai and spent over an hour just making a traditional sauce. I absolutely loved the simplicity of this recipe and would agree that it is a great stand in for the real thing…and without a doubt much healthier! I’ve found with plant based cooking as long as you use similar herbs, flavors, sauces, you can really recreate some traditional favorites. Keep up the great work Dana, and keep the inspirational recipes coming! You have once again saved the day for me as a new plant based eater. I’m having so much fun with your recipes and appreciate being able to create so many flavorful dishes!

Hi Dana,

Hi have followed you for a long while and made many of your recipes, all wonderful. This one is so extraordinary that I just have to give you a shout out! Thank you! I have been veg for nearly 50 years now, and have a super plant based diet with homemade meals most of the time. For this dish I did part rice noodles and part spiraled carrots and upped the ginger, but otherwise, as written. SO so so so delicious! thank you! I might even have to take to instram next time! xxooooo

Thank you for a really easy and delicious meal. Made this for dinner tonight and we were blown away by how good it was. Subs I used (on hand) spinach instead of collard greens and jalapeño instead of Serrano – worked out great.

Loved this! I made it with all green cabbage instead of red, spinach instead of collards, skipped the tofu. I served it with steamed rice. It fed our family of 5 and plenty of leftovers for 2 lunches.

I just made this recipe and it was amazing! thanks for sharing this! Your website is so inspirational, I’ve made so many things and all was super delicious! you are the first blog that I come by that does things completely how I like it!