Thai Cooking at Home, 2005 - 2006

[snowangel]

Thai tonight here. My kitchen is a pit. Three stir-fries, a soup and larb. I had lemongrass, the shrimp looked great, the bunch of Thai Basil was so darned pretty, I just had to. There was also that divine ground pork, and a bunch of whatever looks just like yu choy with white flours that was prettier than a picture. I had a lot of ingredients, and was glad that my folks felt like Thai tonight, as well.

Before I report on the meal, I must report on an odd winter behavior of my kaffir lime tree. Here is a leaf, fresh picked:

Those are not water droplets you see. They are a sticky, very fragarant oil. I don't rinse it off, and it hasn't killed us. This disappears just as soon as the tree goes outside on the deck in the summer. ????

For a starter, we had larb, along with some raw veg and chili jam (from Thai food). I did not take pictures.

Then, tom yum:

Shrimp and a can of straw mushrooms that has been in the way. My mom helped me with this, and she added the lime juice too early. Don't add the lime juice until the last minute, or the liminess (???) disappates. So, after I put this in the bowls, I rummaged around the fridge and realized that I was out of limes, so it was lemon wedges to the rescue. This soup really does want the sour from limes, but lemons work OK in a pinch.

The "adult" stirfries were this yu choy ala HSSS and the chicken with holy basil, which was actually pork.

This is a crummy photo, which does not represent the amount of Holy Basil in the dish. This dish is absolutely outstanding. Do not scrimp on the peppers, garlic or the basil. The more the merrier; the meat seems to be merely a vehicle for the three "veg" items. I'm just sorry there aren't any leftovers, or there would be remants on the keyboard. Put this on your "must do" list, please.

As I contemplated this meal, I used both HSSS and Thai Food. I've become far more fond of HSSS than Thai Food. The latter is not nearly as accessible. It's so large it's hard to find things, and like Austin mentioned above about the suggested substituion of sch. peppers for another ingredient make me question things. I'm also learning that my gut and memories of food in Thailand are a great guide.

[Austin]

snowangel: Looks brilliant! If you really want to go Thai, try slicing bits of long bean into your phai kraphrao ("chicken with holy basil"), and serve it with a fried egg on top!

You have first-hand experience eating in Thailand, which is better than any cookbook. I'm not too familiar with HSSS, having only flipped through it once, but it looks pretty good. I'm a lot more sceptical about Thai Food, having borrowed it from my library here. Although it's big and appears well-researched, some of the recipes are definately quasi-Thai, and some of the substitutions downright bizarre. I tried making only one dish (a savory coconut-milk based "dip" known as lon, and frankly, it was disgusting. Normally when making Thai dishes I tend to disregard the amounts given in recipes, going instead by my experience and the flavors I prefer. But when making Thompson's lon I followed the recipe to the exact amount, and the result was bland, watery and insipid. (I later made a fantastic lon using a Thai-language $2 cookbook!) Don't want to slag the book off, as again, I've only made one recipe, but my impression is that it's really overrated and underwhelming.

Austin

[Austin]

If you haven't yet noticed, I've done as promised, and have posted a guide to the different chilies commonly used in Thai cooking. It can be seen at this thread, or at my blog.

Enjoy!

Austin

[Susan in FL]

That Thai feast looks wonderful, Susan. My kitchen is always a mess after I've cooked Thai. Even if I mostly clean up as I go along, with all the last-minutes stuff at once, in the end it looks like a disaster area.

[snowangel]

Thanks, Austin. I would have added long beans, but the ones I can get here in the winter are pretty sad looking -- they have travelled to far to be pretty. And, since I'd dirtied just about every pan in the house, no fried eggs, but one of these days, I'll be able to get pretty long beans, and will add the egg. But, I do have year-round access to very nice Thai and Holy basils, which is comforting.

One of the reasons I bought HSSS was that I found a copy at half price books for $6.00, and my kids have really enjoyed reading it. I'm glad I'm not alone in a not so positive assessment of Thai Food.

Thanks, too, for the pepper photos!

[C. sapidus]

I made mamster's thai omelet (kai yat sai) this morning. Oh, my, I may have found the breakfast for the rest of my life. Eggs, key lime juice, fish sauce, white pepper, and cilantro, topped with a little sriracha. Infinite future variations. A vista opens.

No pictures – I goofed up the flipping part. More peanut oil next time should help. Note to self: remember to get more eggs on the way home.

Bruce

[Austin]

Ironically enough, the author of Thai Food, David Thompson, is presently in Bangkok and today I'm going to interview him for a piece I'm working on, as well as attend a press dinner featuring his cooking on Saturday! Should I mention the Szechuan pepper thing...?

Austin

[snowangel]

Ironically enough, the author of Thai Food, David Thompson, is presently in Bangkok and today I'm going to interview him for a piece I'm working on, as well as attend a press dinner featuring his cooking on Saturday!  Should I mention the Szechuan pepper thing...?

Austin

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Absolutely!

[Austin]

As mentioned earlier, I was in fact able to meet Mr Thompson today, and as he was both so extremely kind as well as knowledgeable about Thai food that now I feel severely guilty about being so critical of his book earlier! I didn't adress the szechuan pepper issue directly, but I did ask about the problem of writing recipes for obscure regional dishes for which all of the ingredients might not be available in the west. His reply (and I quote) was, "I had no problems in disregarding that, because I think one has to be faithful to the cuisine first, and increasingly there's more and more ingredients that are becoming available. One of the problems I've always had with cooking is, if you limit it to the ingredients available, you might as well just be opening a can [...] and that kind of cooking is at odds with good cooking [...] whether it be of any cuisine, but especially Thai cooking."

So I think this is one area where we would differ. My personal opinion is that, if you can't get your hands on the right ingredients (or at least something quite close), than you probably shouldn't even try to make obscure/regional dishes to begin with, as in most cases, they won't even come close to the original. If I'm understanding what he said correctly, I think Mr. Thompson would disagree with this.

In any event, as I said he was very nice, and we had a lovely hour chatting about Thai food. We have a tentative appointment to go eat khao mok plaa at a place near my house, which if it works out, should be lots of fun.

Austin

[snowangel]

Austin, do you often cook Thai at home?

[mamster]

I made mamster's thai omelet (kai yat sai) this morning. Oh, my, I may have found the breakfast for the rest of my life. Eggs, key lime juice, fish sauce, white pepper, and cilantro, topped with a little sriracha. Infinite future variations. A vista opens.

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Bruce, I'm delighted to hear that. I haven't made one of those in too long. Hmm, no plans for breakfast tomorrow...

Matthew

[Austin]

Austin, do you often cook Thai at home?

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Yes, several times a week (I am in Bangkok after all!). Why do you ask?

Austin

[snowangel]

Austin, do you often cook Thai at home?

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Yes, several times a week (I am in Bangkok after all!). Why do you ask?

Austin

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Just curious! Want to give us a few sample "home meal" menus?

[Austin]

Certainly, did you look at my blog? I just did a couple recently. In particular, the fried vegetable dish is something I make very often, probably every week.

I will be doing more! Someone mentioned nam phrik phao, so I'll be doing that soon, but I'm always up for suggestions.

Austin

[snowangel]

Certainly, did you look at my blog?  I just did a couple recently. In particular, the fried vegetable dish is something I make very often, probably every week.

I will be doing more!  Someone mentioned nam phrik phao, so I'll be doing that soon, but I'm always up for suggestions.

Austin

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Austin, could you take a picture of the vegetable? That dish looks wonderful (and like something that would be a conversation piece for my son at school)!

One of the problems I have is that my Thai is rusty (at best) and I didn't pay much attention to the names of ingredients, so photos of the raw ingredients are very helpful. I have great access to fresh ingredients, but there's the whole communicating with the market staff problem.

[Austin]

If were thinking of the same recipe, then it's this vegetable above (pic courtesy of Susan in FL), called in Thai, phak khanaa.

But you can do this with virtually any leafy, green vegetable.

Austin

[C. sapidus]

We made a mostly-Thai dinner yesterday for a long-time friend and his family. The menu included:

Spinach salad

Tom yum goong

Green curry beef

Jasmine rice

Coconut rice

Kabobs for the kids

Grilled pineapple with vanilla ice cream

I made the green curry paste in the mortar, doubling the chilies because the locally-available green phrik khii noo are pretty tame. I think I’m getting the hang of this dish, but I’d love to try it with the small green eggplants that Austin has recommended. Elder son ate a goodly amount of the green curry. It was a bit spicy for him, but he doesn’t like to mix foods so he eats the rice separately.

I’m also getting the hang of jasmine rice. Compared with basmati rice, jasmine rice seems best with less liquid and about 5 minutes shorter cooking time. Elder son made a nice sweet/sour/salty salad dressing for the spinach salad. My wife made some wonderful kebabs with beef, pearl onions, Thai eggplant, zucchini, and variously-hued bell peppers.

For the tom yum goong, I simmered shrimp shells in chicken stock. It gave the soup a nice flavor. Unfortunately, I overdosed the soup with chilies. Despite immediately removing the chilies (after maybe 30 seconds!), the flavor balance was off. Live and learn – it was my first time making this soup. Next time I will try to find shrimp with their heads on and make a shrimp broth a la David Thompson.

For dessert, my wife grilled pineapple with a coating of coconut milk, sugar, lemon zest, and ground cloves. It was delish, especially with vanilla ice cream. After living in Hawaii, she was able to give excellent advice on choosing a good pineapple.

No pictures of the groaning table, but here is what the leftovers looked like for breakfast. The small glass bowl holds all of the surviving green curry.

Susan (snowangel): the sticky deposits on your kaffir lime look like scale insect residue. Scale insects suck the plant juices and leave the sticky residue behind. Scale insects are very difficult to eradicate, and it probably isn’t necessary unless the plant is struggling.

Bruce

[Susan in FL]

Bruce, that looks and sounds wonderful. I love having grilled pineapple with ice cream for dessert, and that's a good idea for after Thai food.

It's cool that you mention that you're getting the hang of Jasmine rice. So am I. In fact, the last time I cooked it, I was so thrilled with the result -- both the flavor and the looks of it -- that I almost posted the picture. On second thought I didn't, wondering if you all would think I've surely gone off the deep end for getting so excited about how my rice looked. But now, I'm going to anyway.

Just as hoped, when I finally took off the lid, the grains of rice were "standing up firmly."

[snowangel]

Susan (snowangel): the sticky deposits on your kaffir lime look like scale insect residue. Scale insects suck the plant juices and leave the sticky residue behind. Scale insects are very difficult to eradicate, and it probably isn’t necessary unless the plant is struggling.

Bruce, I'm always disappointed when there isn't much curry leftover! It makes such a great easy breakfast or lunch.

BTW, I put my kaffir lime in the shower and it looks great. I just realized it's home in the sunroom is very close to a heat register, so I've moved it. BTW, this stuff disappears in the summer when the plant lives in my garden, so I am suspecting that perhaps it was it's proximity to the register.

Susan, only here would people be delighted to see a pot of rice!

[C. sapidus]

Susan (Florida version): that is one fine-looking pot of rice. I'll have to look for the "grains standing up firmly" next time.

Susan (Minnesota version): yes, a shower will wash off the "honeydew". Outdoors, rain probably does the same thing.

Bruce

[C. sapidus]

I took the day off for final inspection on our kitchen (we passed - yay!). With the luxury of an of a leisurely breakfast, I made a variant of Mamster's Thai omelette. I cooked the omelette with red curry paste, julienned phrik chii fah, and holy basil, then garnished with sriracha and fluorescent-pink pickled ginger.

OK, leisure is over, time to clean the fish tank, fix the doorbell, change the oil, finish doing taxes . . .

[little ms foodie]

Last night we cooked out of my 'Sweet, Salty, Sour' book for the first time.

Dayne made gingerini's to have with dinner.

Spring rolls wrapped in lettuce leaves with dipping sauce.

Chicken and potatoes with curry over jasmine rice.

I know it's not all Thai but it's all good!!!

Edited April 16, 2006 by little ms foodie (log)

[C. sapidus]

Wendy: Your dinner looks delicious. Tonight we had stir-fried chicken with Thai holy basil from Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet. I have been working on cooking herbs and spices until they just release their aroma. With this dish, the basil released a burst of fragrance as it reached the wilting point. Ms. sapidus liked the dish a lot, but I craved a dash of fish sauce and chile heat. Next time I’ll make prik nam pla for accompaniment (Thai fish sauce with hot chilies).

I have also been experimenting with Asian cucumber salads. The basic version (heat rice vinegar, water, sugar, salt, and cayenne, pour over sliced, peeled cucumbers) is quite good. I will try the two versions in Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet this week.

Bruce

[Susan in FL]

I'm looking forward to hearing about your experimentation with Asian cucumber salads. I love "American" cucumber salads, and I've enjoyed the Thai-style I've put together.

[C. sapidus]

Tonight I made Thai Fried Rice from Hot, Sour, Salty, Sweet. We make fried rice at least once a week, and this is my favorite so far. For the optional pork, I used (definitely non-traditional but good quality) chorizo from the local Latino market. Per the recipe note, I added some store-bought roasted chile paste (nam prik pao). Four people made four cups of rice (two batches in the wok) disappear very quickly.

As an accompaniment, I made a variation of the Simple Cucumber Salad from HSSS. I substituted balsamic vinegar for black rice vinegar. It wasn’t bad, but I prefer the basic Thai cucumber salad that I made before.

The main problem with cucumber salads is keeping our boys from eating all of the cucumbers raw. If I get a chance to pick up more cucumbers on the way home tomorrow, I will try Yunnanese Spicy Cucumber Salad. The main course will be Grilled Chicken with Hot and Sweet Dipping Sauce (gai yang, ping gai).

Bruce