Khanom chin are fresh, thin rice noodles in Thai cuisine which are made from rice sometimes fermented for three days, boiled, and then made into noodles by extruding the resulting dough through a sieve into boiling water. Khanom chin is served in many kinds of stock: coconut milk, fish curry, and chilli. Although chin means "Chinese" in Thai, this type of noodle originated from the Mon people who inhabited the region which is now central Thailand The word khanom chin is probably derived from the Mon words hanom cin, or "boiled noodles."
These noodles are used as a staple food in a variety of Thai dishes. Some popular dishes are:
- Khanom chin nam ya, served with a hot and spicy fish-based sauce
- Khanom chin nam phrik, served with a sweet peanut-based sauce
- Khanom chin kaeng kiao wan kai, served with green chicken curry
- Khanom chin nam ngiao, a northern Thai speciality, the sauce contains pork blood
- Khanom chin sao nam, a salad with coconut milk, ground sun-dried prawns, and fresh pineapple
- Khanom chin tai pla, a southern Thai spicy soup
- Khanom chin miang pla, noodles with deep fried fish and spicy chili sauce wrapped in a big salad leaf
Another popular combination is to serve Thai papaya salad together with this noodle.
There are two types of khanom chin noodles:
- Khanom chin noodles made with fermented flour, usually made in the northeast. The brown noodle is stickier than fresh flour and can keep for a long time. This is the ancient method of khanom chin making.
- Khanom chin noodle made with fresh flour. The noodles are bigger than fermented flour and softer too. Khanom chin noodle is white and easy to make.
Similar noodles are also found in other cuisines: mont di from Burmese cuisine; mi xian is from Yunnan Province, China; num banhchok from Cambodia; and bún from Vietnam. It also bears similarities to idiyappam, a rice noodle dish eaten in the southern Indian states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala and also eaten in Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia.