Labb…

                                        

Labb is a northeastern Thai food made with ground meat, herbs, spices and rice powder (in Num Tok blog).  It tastes sour and spicy almost like a salad.  We eat it with sticky rice and fresh vegetables like cabbage and Thai basil.  When I worked at a restaurant this menu was a special menu, because not too many American people (in my town) know about this, but after checking online this is one of the top ten menus  people are searching online.  It’s not hard to make Labb.  In Thailand the most popular Labb is made from ground pork or beef also you can use chicken or for vegetarians use mushrooms still making this dish taste good.  But remember you have to mince or ground the meat or mushrooms otherwise we don’t call this Labb….

Ingredients : 1 serving

1 cup ground pork (any kind of meat or mushroom)

2 tbsp. fish sauce

2 tbsp. lime juice

1 tbsp. rice powder

1 tsp. chili flack

2 tbsp. shallot or red onion

1 tbsp. chopped green onion

1 tbsp. chopped mint

3 tbsp. water

Cooking instructions

1.       In a medium sauce pot add water and turn the heat on until it boils then add ground meat.  Break the meat while it is cooking.  When the meat is cooked turn the heat off.

2.       Add all of the ingredients except green onion and mint into the cooked ground meat and toss it until mixed well then add green onion and mint at the end (to prevent over cooking the herb)

3.       Serve with sticky rice, fresh cabbage, cucumber or carrot for cooling down the heat.

Ka-Noom Som-Ma-Nus : Thai coconut Meringue

In the last blog I told you about my obsession about cooking.  Since I already made med-kha- noon that uses egg yolk and I have egg whites left over what can I do!!!  Of course Thai people in the past have never thrown anything away and they use it to make this Thai dessert  called “ Ka-noom Som ma nus” it means happy dessert

In the past most of the Thai desserts will have coconut milk, rice and sugar but we don’t use eggs in the ingredients until western cooking came to Thailand around the Ayutthaya period the reign of King Narai (1656-1688).  Marie Guimar, a foreign lady who introduced several exotic desserts to Siam(Thailand’s old name).  She brought several desserts from Portugal with egg and sugar as the main ingredients, and this dessert is one of them.  So this dessert has a very long story and it came from a long time ago and it was hard to find it in the present Thailand and believe it or not  a lot of Thai people don’t know this dessert exists!!!

Ingredients

¼ cup egg white

½ cup sugar

1 tsp. Cream of tartar

1 cup shredded coconut

 1 tsp. cocoa powder

 Cooking instructions

1.       Toast coconut in the oven at 250 F about 30 minutes or until brown.

2.       Spray oil into the baking sheet.

3.       Pour egg white into the mixing add cream of tartar.  Beat with an electric mixer on medium speed till soft peak form (tips curl).  Add sugar, 1 tbsp. at the time, beat about 7 minutes on high speed till stiff peaks form( tips stand straight up)

4.       Add cocoa powder and toast coconut, use spatula and fold until mixed well

5.       Use spoon scoop the meringue out of the bowl and with another spoon scoop out to a plate into a prepared backing sheet.  Make the space about 1 inch.

6.       Bake in a 250 F for 50-60 minutes, turn off the oven and let it sit for hour in the oven

7.       Serve with tea or coffee, leftovers put in to tight container.

I love this dessert!!! 

Med-Ka-noon: sweet mung bean coated with sweet egg

      

               I don’t know what happened to me this week.  I’ve been obsessed about cooking (I mean more than normal).  I want to cook or make something that is complicated, so I go through a lot of Thai difficult desserts and food recipes that I’ve never made and this recipe is one of my experiments that I made this week.

                Actually I talked about this dessert in a couple blogs before (in Thai tea cream buree and 9 good luck Thai desserts).  This is just a one of a kind dessert that you never have had it anywhere else before. It tastes really sweet and has a bean with coconut milk inside it.  I made this dessert to offer to the monks at the Thai temple.  This recipe is a little bit more complicated but if you want to know what real Thai desserts are then try it and you might like it or not you will see.

Ingredients

½ cup split mung bean

1 cup Coconut milk

 6 tbsp. sugar

4 eggs

For Syrup to cook

3 cup sugar

3 cup water

2 tsp. jasmine flavor

Cooking instructions

1.       Wash split mung bean then let it sit in the water at least 3 hours

2.       Steam mung bean in a steamer about 15 minutes then pour into a blender with coconut milk and blend it about 30 seconds or until it is mashed.

3.       Pour mung bean mixture into a non-stick pot turn to medium heat while stirring it often until it gets thick about 10 minutes add sugar, then keep stirring more until the mixture from into a ball and you put the finger don’t have the mixture stick on it.  Turn the heat off and let it cool.

4.       Wash whole eggs really good then separate egg york and egg white and reserve egg shell

5.       In the pot add 3 cups of sugar and egg shells, use hand mashed egg shells into sugar then add water turn on the heat and let it boil about 20-25 minutes.  Then pour over a sheet cloth in order to take all of the shells out.  Clean the pot and add syrup back into the pot reheat at medium heat.  Reserve 1 /2 cup syrup into bowl.    

6.       Brake the egg yolk until mixed well

7.       Take the bean mixture about 1 tbsp. and make into an oval shape. (All mixture is made into about 50-60 pieces)

8.       When the syrup boils again turn the heat off then dip the bean ball into the egg yolk and drop into syrup. (make about 8-10 balls per batch)

9.       Let it cook about 3-4 minutes.  Take them off and put it into the syrup that deserves in the bowl. keep doing it until the bean mixture is gone.

10.   Serve at room temperature or cold.

Just like I told you before this dessert is complicated!!!

Green bean salad

This dish is an inspiration by when I went back to Thailand this spring I had winged bean salad in one of the restaurants in Khanchanaburi (the picture on the top of the blog).  This salad is not too spicy (most of Thai salad is very spicy) and it has interesting ingredients in this salad like coconut milk and served with hard boiled egg that not like any kind of Thai salad.  Unfortunately it’s hard to find wing bean around my house.  (What ‘s winged bean? Winged bean is the beans with four winged edges.  The fresh young pods are similar to green beans with a chewy texture and a slightly sweet taste. )  Since I can’t find my winged I use green beans instead.  Want to know how it all came together….here is the recipe

Ingredients : 1 serving

¼ cup ground pork

4 shrimps

1 cup thin sliced green beans

1 shallot

2 tbsp. fish sauce

2 tbsp. lime juice

2 tsp. Num prick pow (details in Tom yum kung blog)

1 tbsp. sugar

1-2 tsp. choped Thai chili (optional)

1 tbsp. roasted peanut

1 tsp. fried shallot

3 tbsp. coconut milk

1 hardboiled egg

Cooking instructions

1.       In the mixing bowl put fish sauce, lime juice, sugar, num-prick pow, and chili (optional) mix well or until sugar dissolves.

2.       In the pot add water and bring it to a boil then add sliced green beans cooked about 1-2 minutes then drain it put it into cold water for keeping the green color.

3.       Add 2 tbsp. water into same pot bring it to a boil and add ground pork and shrimp stirred until it is cooked then turn the heat off

4.       Add cooked meat into the sauce in the mixing bowl(1) then add green beans and shallots tossed until mixed well then pour the salad  onto the serving plate.

5.       Top with roasted peanuts, fried shallots and coconut milk

6.       Serve with hardboiled eggs.

Now enjoy healthy green bean salad yum!!!

PS: This week I'm going to Disney World with my family, so this is my last post for this week. I'll see you next monday then!!! 

Ground pork rice soup

                A lot of people asked me what do I feed my baby?  Did you feed her Thai food?  Is that too spicy for the baby?  Ok, I have my 21 mouth old girl and I want her to get used to Thai food.  So I cooked a lot of Thai food for her that is not spicy (not every Thai foods are spicy right!!)  Thai omelet, fried rice, chicken soup and one of her favorite recipes is rice soup.  This food is not just for the baby, but is one of my favorite especially when I’m sick.

                In Thailand we eat rice soup as a breakfast or for some people they like it as a midnight snack.  For me this is more like comfort food.   Actually we have 2 different kinds of rice soup, one is called “Khaw Tom Kui” it is a rice that boils in water at least 1 hour making it really thick and with a soft consistency.   We eat with all kinds of side dishes called “Kap Khaw”  Ex. fried Chinese sausage , salty eggs,  pickles ect.(I will talk about that sometime) For another kind of rice soup that I made today is called “Khaw tom Kraeng” and it is very easy to make, you just need to make soup and add any kind of meat like shrimp, chicken, seafood or fish, but today I have a ground pork in my refrigerator and it is easy to eat for my baby too and top with some green onions , celery leaves and fried garlic so let’s get started!!!

Ingredients; 1 serving

1 ½ cup chicken stock (sometime I use 1 1/2 cup water and 1 chicken cube)

½ cup ground pork

½ cup cooked rice

1-2 tsp. fish sauce

1 tsp. green onion

1 tsp. celery leave

1 tsp. fried garlic (optional)

 Cooking instructions

1.       In the pot add chicken soup boil then make it in to a ball ground pork and add into the pot then add fish sauce.

2.       Let it boil until pork is cooked then turn the heat off

3.       In the serving bowl add rice then add green onions, celery leaves then add pork soup on the top then top with fried garlic. Now it is ready to serve!!!

PS: in Thailand we serve sugar, fish sauce, chili powder, vinegar on the side to let the folks adjust the rice soup to their own tastes.

Thai Basil Roll

    

            Actually you cannot find this dish in a Thai restaurant in Thailand.  It is pretty much like Vietnam food in Thailand.  I saw this dish for the first time when I worked in a Thai restaurant in the USA.  I’m not sure how the dish came about, maybe this dish was fused with a Vietnamese spring roll, or one of the Thai restaurants invented it and it became popular.  Who know’s!!!  But I know how to make it… I got this recipe from one of my Thai restaurants that I used to work with.  Most of the ingredients are vegetables and rice noodle(for this kind if you want it like the restaurant use Japanese rice noodles, but if you can’t find it use angel hair) wrapped in rice paper with a choice of meat, but the famous is shrimp also you can use tofu and turkey.  The key of this dish is dipping sauce… (that the chef never told me but I found out and I will tell you the secret).  It’s a hoisin sauce with peanut.  Hoisin sauce is one of the Chinese dipping sauce is almost like plum sauce that you can find in an Asian section in a grocery store.  This dish is so delicate and healthy so you can eat as much as you want guilt free!!! 

Ingredients : make 5 roll

5 cooked shrimp cut into a half (you can use tofu or turkey)

uncooked rice noodle

cooked rice noodle

½ cup cooked rice noodle or angle hair (cooked like pasta)

½ cup bean sprout

½ cup shredded carrot

5 strip of romaine lettuce (cut into 2 inches long) 

10-15 basil leave or mint

rice paper warp

5 rice paper warp

2 cup warm water

Cooking Instructions

soaking a rice paper

1.       Soak a rice paper wrap into warm water about 8-10 seconds

2.       Lay paper wrap on the plate or on the cutting board

3.       Take shredded carrot, bean sprout, rice noodle about  1 ½  tbsp.  Arrange into the bottom of the paper wrap then put 1 romaine leave.

4.       Start by gently pulling bottom of the wrap over the ingredients, then tuck it under the ingredients.

5.       Fold both of the paper wrap sides.

6.       Put in 2-3 Thai basil or mint leaves then roll one more time then add 1 shrimp (cut into 2 pieces)  then roll it until the end

Shrimp cut into a half

7.       Cover the finished roll with a wet paper tower or plastic wrap

8.       Cut into 2-4 pieces serve with sauce

Dipping sauce

¼ cup hoisin sauce

2 tbsp. water

2 tbsp. crunched peanut

Cooking instructions

1.       In the small sauce pan add hoisin sauce and water lets it cook until boiling.

2.       Pour it into the dipping bowl top with crunched peanut.