I love snow pea shoots sautéed in EVOO with lots of garlic, cider vinegar .
I purchased some on Wednesday when I was in Va, ready to cook but my son left to visit friends.
So, am not cooking but save it till tomorrow.
I made this and it turned out great. So good that we had it the next day on pork shoulder for tacos - for that dish i added sliced jalapenos to the sauce and let it simmer to add heat. it’s a wonderful, very simple sauce.
first pic is of the melting palm sugar (the microwave trick did not work for me at all - stayed hard as a rock!)
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Lovely meals! I love a lot pea or bean sprouts.
Wow, you growed your own pea sprouts! Was it difficulty? Which variety of peas did you use?
I have tried growing peas last spring, the rate that it turned into a plant wasn’t high. I didn’t try growing indoors though.
Thanks for posting your result of @thimes chicken. I have some chicken thighs, I think I will go for it too.
Gosh, I read the recipe on the blog, actually I have the Slant Door book. I didn’t remember at all buying it a few months back when it was on sale! Thanks everybody for the reminder!
Reading it now…
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hello naf, remember sometime ago, you wrote about Oh Chien? I believe it was sometime in June
I answered and gave my 6 cents recipe for handed down Oh Chien recipe from my mother?
Well, we do eat a lot of oysters now, all from our owns tock but my son is only fond of raw oysters as they are really big fresh and won’t even think about my using the oysters in my oh chien
recipe, so I do not cook oh chien nowadays with my hubby gone.
When I used to make them, I hat buying and picking bean sprouts as they are often not fresh.
Here is a recipe for making fresh bean sprouts. I use the big yellow mung bean, never tried sprouting other beans.
Since it is easy enough to sprout, I make just enough for my Oh chien and left overs, I use them in fried rice or drop them in my soup
This is how I sprout my beans . I use the big yellow mung bean in a bag from the Asian store.
Grow mung bean sprouts in the dark - light causes bitterness.
SOAK- Cover the bottom of the sprouting tray with one single layer of seed. Place the tray and seeds in a dish of warm water and soak for 4 to 8 hours. …
RINSE - 2-4 times a day, rinse the seeds. …
ENJOY - Ready to eat in 4-6 days.
Alternatively, here is another technique which may even be better.
Good Luck
Thanks a lot ccj for sharing the sprouts growing!
It was what I was doing this whole week, picking beans, so much time lost and so boring!
The Oh Chien link is here (if anybody is interested). The Chinese, the Vietnamese, and Malaysian Chinese, the Philippines Chinese have their own versions, but they are quite similar.
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One of my favourites: chicken curry. Vietnamese curry is mild and delicious. It’s not like Indian or Thai curries. Coconut water is used a lot in Vietnamese cookery, also in curries.
I always add extra minced lemongrass. Can’t get enough of it. Eat with baguette for breakfast, with round rice noodles or rice at other times.
Grilled pork (I used shoulder, SV) with lemongrass.
http://i.imgur.com/hsH9L3Q.jpg
Grilled fresh corn brushed with chive oil. A street snack in Vietnam. You are supposed to use scallions but I have a strong aversion to scallions and spring onions so I used chives here.
This is a similar meal I ate in Vietnam.
There’s usually shredded pork rinds but I totally forgot about them. Next time.
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Presunto, that is how I love my corn , slowly cooked over corn then rolled over butter. Reminds me walking home from school and the street vendors grilling corn, plantan bananas rolled in brown sugar over coal in a BBQ stick which they call banana que.
I do not know if you would like to try this on your chicken curry., a tip from a Vietnamese chef in Monaco back in 1972. I was enroute to the French Riviera in the erupt train, stopped at Monaco , wanted to visit casinos. My husband was sick then and so, I had gone to this nearby restaurant to order food. It was a very small restaurant, with only a couple waitresses. However, they were not enthused with my bringing food with dinnerware back to the hotel as they were not used to carry out ( There was no disposable carry out square lunch box t ) She finally agreed to let me bring all the dinnerware etc back to the hotel . When I returned the plates and dinnerware, we struck up a conversation. She told me that she is of Chinese descent, born in Vietnam but has been living in Monaco, has a son who plans to study medicine in the US. She finally decided to close her shop and took me to tour casinos as I told her I did not want to go to the casinos alone. One tip from her, is that they add a little vanilla yogurt to offer the bitter taste of curry which I do when I make chicken curry. I think just a bit towards the end. Hope u try it next time… It was a great tip for me,. I gave her my address for her son to visit if he is in my part of the world but never did. What a nice lady.
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sorry about typos, too late to edit
I used regular garden peas. It was not difficult at all. I soaked a layer of them between paper towels in the tray. Once they started sprouting, I removed the top layer and sprinkled soil to cover them. When they get tall enough, it’s time to harvest.
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One of my all time favorite Vietnamese dishes*: Banh cuon - rice crepes rolled around a pork/wood ear fungus/onion filling. The best versions are super thin and cooked by steaming the batter on a silk cloth. The crispy fried shallots are a delicious garnish.
*I did not cook this. I just wanted to share one of my favorites from this cuisine of the quarter.
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For weeks, I’ve been promising myself that I really must get to grips with making summer rolls. I’ve tried before but they end up looking like the dog’s breakfast, rather than the neat parcels you get in Viet restaurants and cafes (OK, my experience of the professionally made is limited - I only know of one Viet owned cafe in the metro area).
But, I’m now looking for an easy main course to follow the rolls. One that could be regarded as properly Vietnamese in essence, if not fully traditional. And, more to the point, I don’t want to be having to go out to buy loads of specialist ingredients that I may not use again. I do have a reasonably good selection of Chinese ingredients (mainly bottled sauces) and some limited selection of other east asian stuff (like kecap manis, fish sauce, etc) - the sort of stuff you can get from a decent supermarket.
Any suggestions of what I might cook with those limitations.
If you want to try spring rolls, here is a step-by-step:
Don’t worry, mine still looks like dog’s breakfast now (I cheated it with camera angle, they were not closing properly!) because I always put too many ingredients. Try to put less in the beginning, and they will be easier to fold. At the end of the day, even if they aren’t pretty to look at, they are good to eat.
If you have fish sauce, lime and coriander, mint and ginger you can cook most dishes…if you have bean sprouts, lemongrass, chili, it’s even better. I use basil instead of Thai basil.
How about this pork ribs, you need Chinese 5 spices and lemongrass… I used the lemongrass powder. The dish was good, meat was tender and full of favours. Scallions, I substituted with shallots.
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I love this too, I have never made this yet. But only ate in restaurants or bought them frozen from the Asian stores.
Harters, you are not the only one lousy at rolling. I just can’t roll anything, even with practice.
Regarding your Vietnamese main course, what kind of meat or seafood are you using?
I’m looking at this Australian book and I think it might have something that meets your criteria. The index is 1 1/2 pages. I can make a photo of it so you know what sort of dishes are listed.
I plan on prawns in the rolls so, for a main course, probably pork or chicken.
naf - thanks for the herb suggestions. I should be OK on all of that - not least as I replaced the mint I grow in the garden last month and the new stuff is growing really well. Good to know I can substitute ordinary basil for Thai basil (which I’d struggle to find easily).
I have never made anything from the book, having just had a quick scan the ingredient list is not complicated/exotic.
- Chicken with pineapple and cashews
- Spiced caramel pork
If you have (minced) lemongrass you could easily make several dishes with it as the seasoning is nearly identical (fish sauce, pinch of sugar, garlic, lemongrass etc). For instance, stir-fry chicken with lemongrass and chilies is a very common dish made with the ingredients I have just mentioned.
Just saw this recipe that looks easy. Braised Chicken with Ginger - Gà Xào Gùng
I seldom followed only 1 recipe but like to read many and have my version:
I think it should be more or less the same concept as spiced caramel pork proposed by Presunto
Thanks, both.
I’ve not come across caramel sauce before, at least not in a savoury dish, so I think we’ll go with either of your suggestions that use it.
I copied this recipe from the New York Times, apparently 11 years ago, but I have never made it. The large amount of sugar puts me off.
January 25, 2006
Recipe: Vietnamese Caramelized Pork (Thit kho to)
Adapted from Michael and Thao Huynh
Time: About 45 minutes
1½ cups sugar
2½ pounds pork belly or butt, sliced into thin, inch-long strips
1 tablespoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
¼ cup fish sauce
2 heaping teaspoons minced garlic
1 dash sesame oil
1 medium Vidalia onion, sliced
4 scallions, sliced, green part only
Rice for serving.
- Cover bottom of a large, heavy skillet with one cup sugar and place over medium low heat. As soon as it melts and turns golden, add pork, raise heat to medium, and stir until coated. (Sugar will become sticky and may harden, but it will re-melt as it cooks, forming a sauce.)
- Stir in remaining sugar, salt, pepper and fish sauce. Cover and cook 2 minutes. Uncover, stir in garlic and oil and lower to simmer to reduce sauce for about 20 minutes.
- Stir in Vidalia onions and cook until translucent, 5 to 7 minutes. Pork should be caramelized; if not, raise heat and sauté while sauce further reduces. Transfer to serving bowl, and sprinkle with scallion greens.
Yield: 4 servings.
