I haven’t spent as much time eating/standing/awake in Bangkok as I would like to — during my many trips there when I worked in corporate in Asia, I was either stuck in a conference room, or if there were any free hours, getting heavenly massages at the many wonderful spas there!  My company put us up at the Westin Banyan Tree which has an amazing spa and a wonderful buffet dinner spread (yeah, buffets are pretty popular higher end dining in Asia) and I loved walking into the buffet lounge lobby smelling the lemongrass incense and hearing the soft pounding sound of Som Tum being prepared.  The green papaya station is always my first stop at the buffet.  Ah, Sawadee!

Chef’s tip:  Green papayas are essentially unriped papayas.  You can get them at Asian food stores.  They often times wrap it in newspaper to prevent it from ripening.  Other finer points: “Som Tum Thai” has peanuts and dried shrimp mixed in, “Som Tum Bu” has small pickled crabs pounded in, or “Som Tum Lao Sai Pla Ra” has fermented mud fish mixed in it.

Dressing

4 Tablespoons fish sauce
4 Tablespoons palm sugar/ brown sugar
4 Tablespoons fresh lime juice
1 Tablespoon tamarind concentrate

Salad

1 green papaya, peeled – yields 4 cups shredded
2 roma tomatoes – yields 1 cup of sliced roma tomatoes or 1 cup cherry tomatoes
1 handful Chinese string/long beans (or baby haricot vert) – yields 1 cup
4 cloves garlic, peeled
2-4 small Thai red chilies, deseeded, finely sliced – number depending on heat level
2 Tablespoons dried shrimp – presoaked in water
1 shallot, peeled, sliced
½ cup peanuts, roasted

1 cup cilantro leaves

To prepare the dressing
1. Mix together dressing ingredients.  Taste.  Adjust if needed. Set aside.

To prepare the vegetables:
2. Using a food processor (medium grate) or grater, shred the green papaya flesh
3. Deseed the tomato and cut into long slivers (or if using cherry tomatoes, half them)
4. Cut the beans into 1 ½ inch lengths.  Blanch in hot water for 3 minutes or until bright green and quickly plunge into cold water.  Drain.

Assembling – make per serving.  Divide ingredients into 6 parts.
5. In a mortar and pestle, pound the garlic, chili and dried shrimp into a paste
6. Add the sliced shallots and pound slightly to bruise the shallots
7. Add the long beans and pound to bruise the beans.
8. Add the peanuts and lightly pound again to crush the nuts
9. Add the shredded papayas and lightly pound until it is limp and soft
10. Add sliced tomatoes and press gently to blend
11. Add dressing and toss to combine.  Garnish with cilantro.
12. Serve immediately.  Repeat per serving.

Serves: 8

Tags: salad, street foods, Thai.

Radish cake is eaten during Chinese New Year as a symbol for togetherness.   My friend, Ophelia, made the dish this year again….I wish she lived closer coz I would love to get together and have a slice delicious law bak goh!  She shares the secret from her mom — the oil keeps the batter together.  In addition, she recipe-tested my recipe and this is what she says:  “I added one cup less water than your [original] recipe – I judged it by the consistency … when it looked too watery, I added a little more rice flour.  It was 11pm by the time I was done steaming.  I decided to put the whole pan outside the door, and by the Monday it was nice and firm, ready to be fried for New Year breakfast! “  Looks like the 2010 Washington DC snowmageddon did come in useful afterall!

Anyways, I promised her if she shared the picture, the recipe will be on the blog forever so she needn’t search high and low for her copy each new year!  Here we go! Do note to add more water/ rice flour as needed.

2 lbs Chinese white radish, grated
1 cup water + about 1  1/2 cups water

4 Chinese sausages, finely diced
1/4 cup dried shrimps*, soaked in warm water with 1 tablespoon sherry, drain and chopped roughly
2 + 2 tablespoons oil
4 dried shiitake mushrooms, soaked, or use fresh, finely diced
2 cups rice flour
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon white pepper
1/4 teaspoon five spice powder

1 tablespoon cilantro, finely chopped
1 tablespoon scallion, finely chopped

1. Peel and grate radish. Place shredded radish in a small pot or saucepan with 1 cup of water. Bring mixture to a boil, than reduce the heat to a low and simmer for 15 minutes or until tender, stirring occasionally. Remove from heat.  Transfer to a large bowl.  Let cool.  Drain radish.  Save cooking liquid.
2. Pour cooking liquid into a measuring cup. Add remaining water to make 2 1/2 cups of liquid.
3. Start a steamer over a wok of boiling water.
4. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in wok. Stir-fry sausage, 1 minute.  Add the shrimp; fry 30 seconds and mushrooms, 1 minute.  Remove from heat. Set aside.
5. To the cooking liquid mixture, whisk in rice flour, sugar, salt, pepper, 5 spice powder and reserved radish and mix until consistency of thick oatmeal.  You may need to add more water or rice flour.  Add remaining 2 tablespoons of oil.
6. Add in sausage & mushroom mixture, scallion and cilantro.  Mix well.
7. Line a 6 inch by 9 inch (or a 9 inch diameter) cake pan with parchment paper and grease with oil liberally. Pour mixture into it. Place on rack in steamer. Steam over briskly boiling water 1 hour.  The cake is somewhat gooey at this stage.
8. When cold, refrigerate overnight to firm up the cake.
9. To serve, slice 1/4 inch thick, 2 inches wide, and 3 inches long. Fry slices in 1 tablespoon canola oil until golden brown. Serve hot.

Serves: 6-8

Tags: Cantonese, Chinese, dim sum.

For the many of you who are googling for a dumpling recipe on Chinese New Year! Have fun!  When I lived in HK and China, I always enjoyed getting together with friends and rolling out the dough and shaping the dumplings during CNY.  Somehow this tradition didn’t make it to South East Asia.

Chef’s tip: You can also use “sui kow” skin instead of making the dough from scratch.

Dough:
1 ¼ cup of all purpose flour
½ teaspoon salt
2/3 cup of water

Filling:
1/2 lb of ground pork
2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger2/3 -1 cup of cold water
1/2 egg
1 tablespoon Shaoxing wine or sherry
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon black pepper
2 tablespoons scallions, finely chopped

Dipping sauce:
1/2 cup light soy sauce
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon sesame oil
2 teaspoons fresh ginger, cut into thin matchsticks
2 tablespoons brown sugar
2 cloves finely chopped garlic
2 spring onions (green onions, scallions), chopped

Preparing the dumpling skin
1. Mix salt and flour together.  Make a well in the middle and add water to make a stiff dough.
2. Knead till dough is smooth and elastic.
3. Cover with a damp kitchen cloth and let rest 20 mins.
4. Roll out dough into long rods, cut into small pieces – the size of a cherry
5. Roll each dough into a round ball, flatten with your palm, and then roll out on a floured surface till it forms a small disc about 2 inch in diameter
6. Sprinkle corn flour on each piece so that they would not stick together

Preparing the dipping sauce
7. Whisk together all the dipping sauce ingredients

Preparing the dumplings
8. Finely chop the bokchoy stems. Mix with 2 teaspoons salt and set aside for 5 minutes. Squeeze out the excess moisture.
9. Mix meat, bokchoy, egg, ginger, wine, salt and pepper.  Add water till it becomes a paste.
10. Brush the upper half edges of the dumpling skin rounds with water.  Place a dumpling skin on your palm and mound about 1 teaspoon of filling in the center of each skin.  Fold into a half moon.  Very carefully, insert your left index fingers between the wrapper on the open edge, then using your right index and thumb, create 3 small pleats on the upper skin, then press firmly to seal with the lower skin.   Press lightly to seal.  Make sure seams are well-sealed and place on a tray dusted with cornstarch.
11. Boil water to a rolling boil.  Add dumplings.  When the water has returned to a boil, pour in a cup of cold water.  Allow water to return to boil again, and add another cup of cold water.  When the water returns to boil the third time, the dumpling should be cooked through.

Assembly:
12. Place 4 -6 dumplings in a bowl, serve with dipping sauce

Serves: 6-8

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