I Like My Thai

If I were told I could only have one cuisine forever...I would likely choose Thai. I love the flavor profile - the subtleties of the heat, the sweet and the salty - in all presentations, from papaya salad to Tom Yum soup to Kee Mao, more commonly known (when Pad Kee Mao) as Drunken Noodles. This dish features the fresh flavor of Thai, or Holy, Basil (pictured left) with chiles and garlic. While it certainly has some heat, it has a lovely, balanced mix of flavors.

This week my CSA had an abundance of Thai basil, so I helped out by taking a few large handfuls! It was perfect for making some Drunken Noodles, and I knew I could also use my baby onions and some garlic scapes.

By now you've noted my interest in mise en place, having all my ingredients ready to go before I turn on the heat of the stove top. With a stir fried dish like this, it's even more important to have everything ready to go.

I started by cutting up three Thai chiles (often called Bird chiles). One, I sliced into thin strips, and the other two I chopped and crushed a bit with the side of my knife. I then chopped and crushed five cloves of garlic, and thinly sliced the soft stems and bulbs of two garlic scapes. These are the flavorful aromatics that form the base for this dish.

I then sliced up a milder chile - I used an Anaheim pepper - in thin strips. I cut a plum tomato into wedges, and thinly sliced three baby onions. These are additional vegetables for the dish.

I measured out the sauces. In one bowl I added oyster sauce and light soy sauce. In another I measured out fish sauce. A bit of lime zest and an equal bit of sugar were also prepared.

Finally, I laid out the ground chicken meat (though any protein, from ground pork to cubed tofu, will work!) and separated a small (at least I tried for it to be small!) portion of rice noodles.

I put on some water to boil and salted it. This was on a back burner, to be out of the way. In a large frying pan or wok, some oil was heated and then the garlic, scapes and hot chiles were added. Over medium heat, they rendered down a bit. When the garlic started to turn golden and the mixture was very aromatic, I quickly added in the oyster and soy sauces, swirled the pan, and added the chicken.

After stirring to ensure the chicken breaks apart enough and mixing the sauces and spices into it, it was almost cooked through. Overall, this was about 6-8 minutes; no need to rush it! When the chicken was almost cooked through, I added the tomatoes, onions and mild chile and stirred so they could soften.

When the vegetables have softened a bit, the fish sauce, sugar and lime zest are added and mixed in. After about 30 seconds of sautéing, the basil went into the pan. I adore basil, and love the flavor it adds here, so I added lots.

After a few more minutes of stirring to wilt the basil, the dish was complete. Total cooking time was about 15 minutes - manageable on a hot summer night.

This picture makes me hungry, and I just ate this!

This dish was delightful! While I think I'll adjust the amount of sauces added (downward) next time, the flavors were wonderful, and I ate all of it...and loved it! I even enjoyed in with a Brooklyn Brewery Pennant Ale '55, in honor of my favorite Brooklynites.

Teriyaki Table

Tonight's dinner was a stir-fry of the last of my CSA ingredients for this week. As with all my stir-fries, I first complete my mise en place to ensure I'm ready to go. I chopped garlic scapes, washed pac choi, sliced tomatoes and sliced a Hungarian wax pepper that a coworker was kind enough to give me!

I also stirred up a little teriyaki-like sauce, made from equal parts sake and soy sauce, with about 2/3 as much brown sugar (give or take).

I started the stir-fry with some store-bought chicken sausage, sliced thin and sauteed.

When it was almost done after about six minutes, I added the tomatoes, scapes and pepper. I also added some of the sauce and let it all simmer away.

The juices from the tomatoes mix in the sauce to thin it a little, which is fine. I tend to let the sauce cook down to a little more than a glaze, about 8-9 minutes.

At the very end, I added the pac choi, large leaves first, to simmer in the glaze quickly and wilt a little. As the bigger leaves cook down, I add the smaller ones, and add in a few fresh herbs as well.

By now the kitchen smells fantastic, and the sauce has reduced down to a lovely glaze on all the vegetables.

I quickly added a couple turns of the pepper grinder, gave it all a stir, and dumped it onto a plate. It was a lovely plate of vegetables, with a little Asian flair. Yum! I am also particularly proud that, for the second week, I've eaten all of my vegetables! This is proving to be a good exercise in both cooking for one and in eating all my vegetables. Waste not!

Hot Friday Night Dinner

It's getting warmer here on the eastern seaboard, so I wanted to cook as little as possible. I had a plan for this evening, and fortunately it involved some quick sautés, which meant the kitchen did not get as hot as it might!

My CSA haul on Wednesday night included garlic scapes, these lovely green curlicue stems of garlicky goodness. I sliced them up on a diagonal, rather thin.

Then I washed my CSA pac choi (commonly known as bok choy) in the sink - it did require a couple rinses, as all farm fresh veggies likely will - and sorted the leaves by size, with the smallest on the bottom of the bowl. Then I decided to utilize some dried mushrooms I've had in the cabinet for some time, so I reconstituted them in hot water, with a splash of wine; after 35 minutes, I sliced them.

I pulled out some butter, some sesame oil (mine is toasted sesame), some fish sauce and some rice vinegar. Now my mise en place (to put in place) was complete (the French way of saying I had prepped all my ingredients and had them ready to cook), so I hauled out my big saute pan. I do not own a wok, but use this curved saute pan in the same manner, even flipping veggies in it.

I started with some butter, which I let melt, and then added the scapes. After a few minutes, I could smell the lovely garlic aroma wafting through the house, and turned the heat from low to medium to give them a little more caramelization. After I was satisfied with their doneness, I took them out, leaving behind as much of the garlicky butter as possible.

I added the biggest pac choi leaves. I added a dollop of sesame oil, and swirled them. After about 45 seconds, I added the next smaller size of pac choi leaves, and about another 45 seconds later, added the last of the small pac choi leaves. They quickly saute and wilt, looking beautiful. I couldn't help but eat one then! I removed them to the same bowl as the scapes.

I added a bit more sesame oil, a bit of the mushroom soaking liquid, and the sliced mushrooms. After some of the liquid began to evaporate, I added some shrimp. I shamelessly purchase frozen peeled, deveined shrimp in the bags in my grocery store frozen seafood section whenever they are on sale - they are great for such meals! I sauteed carefully, stirring to ensure the mushrooms and shrimp got even heat. When most of the liquid had evaporated, I added a splash of fish sauce, a splash of rice vinegar and turned the heat up.

I know it takes longer to cook all the veggies separately, but I like doing it because it allows me to control the doneness of every ingredient. When there was very little liquid left after those additions, I added the pac choi and scapes back to the pan, swirling all of the food together. I also added some chives and basil, but that's just me.

I tasted, added some sea salt and fresh ground pepper, and when I was satisfied with the flavors, I simply dumped the pan of food onto a plate. Gorgeous! I really hope to keep up this type of cooking with the CSA - it is nourishing in so many ways!