Faux Soy Sauce

We eat a ton of rice. I know! Hyperbole:) In all honesty, we consume approximately 25lbs of rice a month. A hot pot of rice is a blissful thing......meat, vegies, rice. What could be better? My son thinks soy sauce is necessary component of the above "blissful" combination. My son can actually eat soy; however, the San-J gluten free soy sauce sold in stores is not guaranteed to be 100% wheat/gluten free. Do to the severity of his wheat allergy, we are not comfortable taking the slightest risk. This recipe is the alternative.

Faux Soy Sauce

1 cup organic unsulphured blackstrap molasses

1/3 cup organic apple cider vinegar

2 Tablespoons pure sea salt

1 teaspoon pure cane sugar or 100% pure honey

Put all in small saucepan and heat, stirring well until mixed and very hot, but not boiling. Cool and pour into bottle and refrigerate. Original instructions say it will keep for a month on the shelf.

Mung Bean Pudding

I am married to a Vietamese guy. He loves his sweets. But they aren't like American sweets. They are very different but good. One of them is a whole collection of "puddings". This is a Thai recipe but very similiar to the deserts I have seen at Vietnamese restuarants.

The pictures included were taken by my kids and "Aunt" Kim one night.

Mung Bean Pudding

Taken from http://www.thaitable.com/Thai/recipes/Mung_Bean_Pudding.htm

2 Servings

2 cups water
1/4 cup tapioca flour (this is sometimes called tapioca starch.)
1/4 cup sugar
1 pinch salt
1/2 cup Mung beans (see note)
1/3 cup coconut milk

Boil mung beans in 2 cups of water until tender. It should take about 20 minutes.

The beans should be very soft. Cook them until they aren't stiff in the middle anymore. We realized too late that we hadn't cooked ours enough. It was still good but the beans had a little chew to them still.

Dissolve tapioca flour in a cup of water and add to the boiling mung beans.

Stir quickly and constantly to prevent the bottom from burning. It should thicken.

Add more water if it gets too thick. Add more flour if too watery. A consistency of gravy is ideal.

Add sugar, bring it back up to a boil and turn off the heat

In a separate bowl, mix 1/3 cup of coconut milk with salt. Heat it up in the microwave for a few second just to warm it up. Don't let the coconut milk boil, otherwise it will separate.

DD is stirring coconut milk getting it ready for eating. My two oldest kiddos gobbled this stuff down quickly! By the time we got to the pot there was only one small bowl left!

Serve hot with coconut milk on top.

NOTE: There are two ways mung bean are sold. Whole and Split. The split mung beans are yellow and look like split peas - except yellow. These are the ones you want to buy for this pudding. They usually run about .79 a bag.

Fish Sauce? Really with allergies????

There is a lot of bad rap on the Internet about fish sauce and allergies. Some sites say to stay away from it if you are allergic to soy. Others warn you that they can be made with either fish or shellfish. So what is the truth? My kids have crazy allergies to sooo many things. So do I have problems? The answer is no.



May I tell you what I have learned after 12 years of cooking for my wonderful DH? From my experience - All of these things are wrong.



Fish sauce is a fermented product made from anchovies. Nothing else! The following website has a good explaination on how it is made: http://www.thaifoodandtravel.com/features/fishsauce1.html



There are dozens of brands of fish sauce. Many with names that would make you think that they are made out of shellfish. One brand that I really like is Crab and Scallops brand. It has pictures of crabs and scallops all over the front of the bottle. Read the ingredients though and all it has in it is: anchovy extract, water, salt and sugar.



Be careful though! There are several brands that DO have wheat protien in them. Not all but a few - - and they are usually the more expensive brands.



There are other sauces that do contain shellfish, soy, wheat, etc: oyster sauce, hoisin sauce, soy sauce and some specialized dipping sauces that will contain shrimp.



My favorite brands fish sauce are:


Crabs and Scallops

Golden Boy

Oyster

Squid is fine to use if you have allergies - but it is REALLY REALLY stinky!!!!

Green Papaya Salad

It has been a week since I posted last - YIKES!

This was an instant hit the other night when I made it. My SIL has made it before for DH and me, but it was never safe for the kids. I am including the full recipe and making notes on where I changed things.

This is the recipe pretty much as written from http://www.thaitable.com/

Green Papaya Salad

1 1/2 tablespoons palm sugar (normal sugar can be substituted - but you may need to add a little more

3/4 of a lime

2 cups green papaya, shredded

6 green beans

1 clove garlic

1 1/2 Tablespoons fish sauce

1 tablespoon dried shrimp (left this out)

2 thai chili peppers (used less than was called for)

5 cherry tomatoes

2 tablespoons peanuts, toasted

Tips and substitutions from http://www.thaitable.com/ : For a vegetarian som tum, omit the dried shrimp and substitute soy sauce for fish sauce. Some people use tamarind in place of lime. Regular sugar can be substituted for palm sugar. The balance of fish sauce, lime juice, palm sugar and peppers listed here are guidelines.

About Green Papaya: Many Asian supermarkets have shredded green papaya. However, if you can only find whole green papaya, the papaya can be peeled and shredded using a regular cheese grater with medium to large sized holes. When you get closer to the center, you will see the white immature seeds inside. Stop and move onto another part of the papaya. Discard any seeds that got into your bowl.

In Thailand, green papaya salad is made using a clay mortar, wooden pestle and a spatula. Smash a clove of garlic first. Then add green beans and halved cherry tomatoes. Pound a few times just to bruise the beans and get the juice out of the tomatoes. Add chili peppers and crush them just enough to release the hotness, unless you like your salad really hot. Add the green papaya, dried shrimp, toasted peanuts, fish sauce, lime juice and palm sugar. Use the pestle to push the mixture up in the mortar and the spatula to push it down so that the mixture is mixed well.

However, if you do not have a big enough mortar you can crush garlic, tomatoes, green beans. Set them aside in a large bowl. Add dried shrimp, fish sauce, lime juice and palm sugar to the bowl. Add green papaya and mix well. Serve with sticky rice and a sliver of cabbage, green beans and Thai basil.

Kimchi.....

My husband loves fermented foods: sauerkraut, kimchi, pickles, pickled mustard greens, etc. I have grown to love them and the kiddos can devour large amounts of them:) I recently found this kimchi recipe and my family is extremely happy with the results! My friend Miran just told me on Saturday that she wants to throw a Kimchi party and teach us how to make 3 or so types. I was so excited!

The recipe is taken from Eating Korean by Cecilia Hae-Jin Lee.

1 cup plus 1 tablespoon coarse sea salt or kosher salt
Water
2 heads Napa cabbage, cut into quarters or 2-inch wedges, depending on size of cabbage
1 bulb garlic, cloves separated and peeled
1 (2-inch) piece of ginger root
1/4 cup fish sauce or Korean salted shrimp (used fish sauce)
1 Asian radish, peeled and grated
1 bunch of green onions, cut into 1-inch lengths
1/2 cup Korean chili powder
1 teaspoon sugar (optional)
Sesame oil (optional) (left this out)
Sesame seeds (optional) (left this out)
Preparation
1. Dissolve 1 cup salt in 1/2 gallon water. Soak cabbage in the salt water for 3 to 4 hours.

2. Combine garlic, ginger, and fish sauce or shrimp in food processor or blender until finely minced.

3. In large bowl, combine radish, green onions, mustard greens, garlic mixture, chili powder, 1 tablespoon salt and optional sugar. Toss gently but thoroughly. (If mixing with your hands, be sure to wear rubber gloves to avoid chili burn.)

*****If you do get chili burns - pour straight white vinegar on your hands. My mom learned this from some friends when she spilled a container of jalapenos on her hands. *****

4. Remove cabbage from water and rinse thoroughly. Drain cabbage in colander, squeezing as much water from the leaves as possible. Take cabbage and stuff radish mixture between leaves, working from outside in, starting with largest leaf to smallest. Do not over stuff, but make sure radish mixture adequately fills leaves. When entire cabbage is stuffed, take one of the larger leaves and wrap tightly around the rest of the cabbage. Divide cabbage among 4 (1-quart) jars or 1-gallon jar, pressing down firmly to remove any air bubbles.

5. Let sit for 2 to 3 days in a cool place before serving. Remove kimchi from jar and slice into 1-inch-length pieces. If serving before kimchi is fermented, sprinkle with a little bit of sesame oil and sesame seeds. Refrigerate after opening.