Fishinnards

In Virginia, Bangkok 54 and Duangrat usually have frozen kaffir lime leaves, and sometimes fresh ones. They always have frozen galangal and sometimes fresh. There is usually fresh galangal at Grand Mart. Frozen kaffir lime leaves would work fine in rendang. Frozen galangal is often better than fresh.

Young ginger fresh grachai fresh turmeric white turmeric holy basil galanga fresh fenugreek (methi) curry leaves pandanus drumstick (moringa oleifera) cilantro with the roots attached (or roots sold separately) culantro Thai lemon basil

Leftover masoor dal with butternut squash, cauliflower (mustard seeds, fennel seeds, garlic, chili, turmeric) potatoes (cumin seeds, mustard seeds, coriander, hing, turmeric, chili) Hari Chutney (mint, cilantro, lime, green chillies, chaat masala), chapatis [

It was just lamb. "Kolhapuri mutton" is the name of the dish. It would be tasty with mutton, but lamb works just fine.

I made some masoor dal with butternut squash to go with our leftover Kolhapuri mutton. Used a tadka (tempering in hot oil) of mustard seeds, cumin seeds, hing (asafoetida), onions, ginger, and chillies, and added chopped fresh mint, lime juice, salt and sugar. It looked like this:

Kolhapuri mutton, one of my favorite lamb preparations. 12 dried hot chillies, whole cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, and coriander seeds are toasted in a lightly greased skillet and then ground. It smells great! Also lots of onions, half are sliced and fried crisp, the other half chopped and lightly sauteed. I forgot to buy tomatoes, so I substituted tamarind and it worked wonderfully. Yogurt, garlic and ginger also make their way into this fiery concoction. I used my pressure cooker so it wouldn't take all night. I also made green beans with mustard seeds and garlic, mooli (daikon radish) raita with mint and garlic, and brown jasmine rice. Drank Brooklyn Local # 2 mostly while cooking, but I had a little with dinner.

Northern Thai pork curry with wild boar (gaeng hunglay แกงฮังเล) , northern Thai pork and tomato dipping sauce with vegetables and pork rinds (nam prik ong น้ำพริกอ่อง), soup (แกงจืด), red curry with chicken (gaeng pet gai แกงเผ็ดไก่ ), green papaya salad (som tam ส้มตำ), pork jerky (mu diet dow หมูแดดเดียว) with dried chili dipping sauce (jaew แจ่ว), sticky rice (ข้าวเหนียว), beer (Hennepin)

I had some wild boar hunted by a friend I decided to make gaeng hunglay (แกงฮังเลหมูป่า) a Northern Thai pork curry with Burmese origins. It smells even better than it looks, We will eat this tonight with sticky rice and other dishes. Happy new year!

LOL and thank you!

Last night I found pomelos at Harris Teeter. Today I celebrated with pomelo salad (yum som oo ยำส้มโอ, I write in Thai just because I can, can't let all those lessons go to waist, still not fluent, but I remember all the food words ). Made the salad with roasted peanuts, toasted coconut, fried shallots, poached chicken and a dressing of coconut cream, roasted chili paste, tamarind, fish sauce, and palm sugar. I combined recipes from Chef McDang and Thai Food Master (click for recipe and video). Also made fried chicken wings (ไก่ทอด) (with deep fried holy basil for a seasonal Christmas look) and red chicken curry with kabocha pumpkin (แกงเผ็ดไก่กับฟักทอง), jasmine rice and Brasserie Dupont Avec Les Bons Voeux, which was super with Thai food.

My wife went to Birch & Barley with a friend, so I made egg salad for myself. Fried eggs, cashews, mint, shallots, lime juice, fish sauce, chillies, and garlic, with jasmine rice and New Belgium Trippel

I don't like European food. I find it bland and insipid. Kidding! But, It's not like there is a huge range of regional South Asian cuisine represented by Indian restaurants. In my experience they almost always have the same tandoori/Punjabi/Mughal menu. Besides a couple of (generic) South Indian places (dosas, idlis, etc.), I can't think of any restaurants specializing in the cuisines of Kerala, Parsi, Gujarat, Rajasthan, etc. etc. Tom and the poster may be right in that there is a huge range of cuisines being dismissed when one states that they do not like Indian food, however almost none of this diversity is represented in "Indian" restaurants.

Friday was chapatis, papads, batata kheema (potato kheema), ghobi (cauliflower with mustard and fennel seeds), moong masoor dhal, and (cucumber) raita Saturday was rice and (leftover dhal). No time to cook as I had to work (well, DJ, not really work). Sunday my neighbor smoked (BBQed) a deer leg The Deer came out really well. He was kind enough to share a bit, which I added to my formerly vegetarian spread of papads, ghobi paneer (cauliflower and cheese), moong chana dhal, raita, sweet potato, and chapatis. Drank a bottle of the St. Bernardus Christmas ale. It was good!

Made red curry paste this weekend (look! almost cilantro roots) Last night, som tam Thai (green papaya salad), nuea pad priew wan (sweet and sour beef), gaeng pet gai (red chicken curry), jasmine rice, Lips of Faith Super Cru

Did you happen to notice the price? Here's another blog post about Red Boat that I just happened across.

Friday, Kheema (beef, onions, garlic, ginger, whole garam masala, tomatoes, spices), Chana Dal (garlic, coriander seeds, cumin seeds, green chilles, tomato), Pumpkin (cumin seeds, cream), chapatis Saturday, Green apple salad (shallots, mint, cilantro, toasted coconut, peanuts, chicken, lime, fish sauce, green chillies, palm sugar), egg, mild soup (pickled mustard greens, tofu, chicken stock, garlic), Cauliflower (garlic, chicken fat, crispy chicken skin, stock, oyster sauce, fish sauce, dark soy, palm sugar), jasmine rice

Chef Will Artley, formerly of The Evening Star, has been hanging out in there all weekend. Looks to be cooking and tasting with the Pork Barrel guys. Hopefully good news for the food when the place finally opens in 2013. Speaking of The Evening Star, their renovation seems to be almost through. I am excited by the new beer program and the many new taps. I saw numerous kegs being loaded in on Saturday.

Just the peel. It defrosts quickly because you only need the outside, just run it under warm water and it's ready. The flavor of the frozen/fresh peel is wonderful and a must for my homemade Thai curry pastes. I have 12 limes in the freezer. Actually, 11 and one defrosted one in the fridge with half the peel remaining. I need to grow some cilantro just for the roots. I hate not having them. They are so tasty.

It was green curry weekend for my wife and I. I haven't made green curry in a while. Had all the paste ingredients (except I had to use cilantro stems instead of roots, boo , and fermented black beans for shrimp paste, wife is allergic to shellfish). Kaffir lime is frosty from the freezer. Paste came together nicely Saturday, Sunday and Monday we had green curry (with just beef, stewed till soft and tender) with various other things. For example, fish cakes (tod mun), bak choi with crispy chicken, green mango salad, vegetables and rice

I finally bought "The Principles of Thai Cookery" by Chef McDang, so we had Thai food this weekend. I also bought a whole chicken so we had chicken dishes. Ideally a Thai meal should have at least five different different dishes, contrasting in flavor, texture, color etc. Over the years I have found cooking five or more dishes, no matter how simple some of them are, gets to be a little overwhelming and I end up not making everything as good as I would like it. If I have all day, extra people to feed, and help in the kitchen, then it's great. But this weekend I had other things to do as well. In my mind I had five dished I wanted to make, red chicken curry with pumpkin (kabocha), chicken laap (larb), sweet and sour chicken stir fry, tofu and pickled mustard green soup (with chicken stock), and a Thai omelet. To make my life easy I spread these dishes out over three days. On Saturday we had laap gai (minced chicken salad, extra spicy!), geang pet gai sai fak (red curry with chicken and kabocha squash, basil and kaffir lime leaves, homemade curry paste, this was great), kai jiew (Thai crispy "omelet") and lots of jasmine rice. Sunday the curry returned with gai pad priew wan (sweet and sour chicken stir fry with cucumbers, cauliflower, and tomatoes). Thai sweet and sour is very light and easy to make. I also made some prik nam pla (fish sauce with chillies, made it fancy with shallots, garlic and lime juice) which goes great with the eggs. Last night I added the tofu and pickled mustard green soup (with stock from the chicken carcass).

This claims to be real "Phu Quoc" fish sauce from Vietnam. For a long time real Vietnamese top grade fish sauce was not available in the US. All Vietnamese fish sauce available in the states was manufactured in Thailand. Here's a good article on Phu Quoc fish sauce from last year. If Red boat is real Phu Quoc it may be worth the $. Use it for salads and making nouc cham (dipping sauce). Use the cheaper stuff for cooking. Hey, I just noticed Dean Gold is quoted in this article.

This looks to be northern Thai food, which is different from Northeast Thai (Isaan) food. That makes more sense to me. This is the type of food Andy Ricker has been doing successfully (much less spicy, a lot of pork, Burmese influence, great stuff). But the metro curean article said "Monis will prepare family-style menus of Isaan cuisine from Northeastern Thailand" and "Isaan food has a flavor profile that I love eating on our days off and have been cooking for our staff family meal and behind the scenes for the last few years. Traveling through northern Thailand with Anne (my wife and the other half of Komi) furthered solidified the fact that we wanted to do this." Isaan is northeast Thailand. Northern Thailand is considered a separate cultural (and culinary) region. I am confused by his quote of wanting to make Northeast Thai food (and specifically saying Isaan food) and presenting a menu of Northern Thai food.

I second this. My Thai language teacher used this brand and it was popular among the Thai ladies at the temple I used to frequent. Squid brand was also popular.

Friday was fridge cleaning day, wild boar curry with potatoes, broccoli, and green beans. (Boar was shot by a friend) Used "East Indian bottle masala" from 660 Curries, my go to quick one dish curry. Saturday, cauliflower and potatoes with mustard seeds, fennel seeds, and garlic. Mung bean dumplings in a tomato/cilantro/fenugreek sauce, and chapatis Sunday I added saag paneer (except I used tofu instead), leftovers, and made more chapatis. Tonight leftover saag paneer and Ethiopian masoor dhal (yemisir kik wet), and basmantii rice, still cooking, maybe a photo later.

Northeastern Thai (isaan) food is furiously hot and uses pickled fresh water fish instead of regular fish sauce (Pla rah, which even some central Thai's find too pungent). They also eat sticky rice instead of jasmine rice, which needs to be eaten with your hands (just your right hand, actually). He'll probably have to make some serious concessions to the local palate. A really cool idea though. I'm kind of excited. Isaan food is good country food, maybe closer to Laotian food than the central Thai food most people are familiar with.