Thai Breakfast of Champions

Khao Tom Moo (Rice Soup) is a delicious comfort food and a great way to kick off your morning. It is also a standard Thai breakfast, created as a way to use the previous evening's leftover rice. Because it lacks the usual "kick" of most other Thai foods, it is sometimes considered to be bland and therefore better suited for breakfast.

Although it is a soup, it should not be served as a side-- this dish is quite filling on its own. It consists of minced pork, shitake mushrooms, rice, fresh herbs, and a savory broth.

This traditional Thai Breakfast is a delicious and easy way to start your morning, and only takes about 10 minutes to prepare.

Water guns for New Years?

Anywhere in Thailand you go during this time, you will see all the children squirting water guns at each other in celebration. Naturally, you ask yourself, “What is going on?” This is how Thai celebrate the New Year! The most celebrated and popular New Year’s festival is the Songkran Festival (Thailand celebrates three New Years). Songkran means New Solar Year in Sanskrit.

If you're not in thailand during this period, why not visit a Thai Temple in your area? There are several in the Bay Area, and you'll have to dash through the kids shooting off their water guns to make it to the actual festivities like Thai dancing and yummy Thai dishes being sold there. Good luck staying dry!

"The Asian Vanilla"

or a.k.a. Pandan Paste

Experiment with this Asian paste, familiarly called “The Asian Vanilla” that is used all throughout Asia, particularly Thailand. The smell and flavor is truly addictive because it smells so good! Its alluring aroma is a little nutty and similar to freshly-cooked jasmine rice. You can add this to cookies or icing for holiday cakes.

Right now, Import Foods (http://importfood.com/current120809.html) is having a sale – I recommend checking it out!

Turkey Tom Yum with your leftover turkey from Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving and enjoyed many delicious servings of food.

It's incredible how one can even imagine being hungry after a giant feast like Thanksgiving supper...but think about trying this with all your leftover turkey when you do get hungry and want to figure out a new, easy recipe. Turkey Tum Yom!

It is just like the class Tum Yom Goong but use turkey instead of the shrimp. My husband has been looking forward to this soup for weeks now.

Tum Yom is best known for its hot and sour flavors and fragrant herbs. This soup delivers an intricate weave of spicy, invigorating flavor with its blend of ingredients including galangal, lemongrass, kiffer lime leaves, lime juice and cilantro. Try it out and let me know how it goes! Enjoy!

Thailand for the Holidays

Did you know that you can purchase gift certificates for my cooking classes? Yes you can! You can never start too early to buy gifts for friends and family for the holidays. And the earlier, the better so you have more time to enjoy the holidays because your shopping will be out of the way.

You can buy the certificates in any denomination and we can either mail or email the certificate to you. This way, you can add the certificate in a card. What better way to give your friends and family a Thai treat this holiday season.

Experimenting with measurements

Many of my students notice that while I teach a lesson, I don’t necessarily measure out exact proportions for my recipes. Why is this? It is because much of the Thai cooking technique relies on being able to create the recipe to your personal liking.

Thai cooking is much more lenient as it allows cooks to customize a dish to make it as sweet, sour, salty or creamy as you like. For instance, I usually vary the amount of sweetness (sugar) and saltiness (fish oil) in each dish.

For beginner cooks, I still recommend you follow my recipes’ proportions and measurements but as you grow more confident and experienced in your cooking, try to vary your measurements to learn how to let your taste wander.

Pumpkin in Coconut Soup with Shrimp

Now that Halloween is over...what are you going to do with all your pumpkins?? Try out this new soup.

This looks a lot like a rich buttery French style cream soup, but it's a velvety smooth, creamy Thai-style coconut soup with hearty chunks of squash.

It goes well with jasmine rice, but it also tastes great with some noodles or even western-style pasta if you prefer. It especially hits the spot if you're a pumpkin lover, the combination of ingredients really highlight the pumpkin flavor.

If you want to spice the soup up a bit, feel free to add Thai ground chile pepper, and/or add more lime juice so it's more sour like tom kha. Try to use the largest shrimp you can find too!

Ingredients

3 1/4 cups squash, prefer Kabocha or Buttercup variety, cut into large cubes
2 cups coconut milk
1/2 cup coconut cream (see note below)
1 1/2 lbs large shrimps or prawns, peeled and deveined, tails on
1/4 cup shallot, sliced
2 tablespoons shallot, coarsely chopped
4 kaffir lime leaves, thinly sliced
12 whole white peppercorns
2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons palm sugar
4 tablespoons fresh lime juice
2 cups soup stock
1 large egg, lightly beaten
4-6 kaffir lime leaves, whole, torn to release flavor

Method

In a mortar and pestle pound the peppercorns, sliced shallot, and 1/2 teaspoon salt until it forms a nice paste.

In a large soup pot, heat coconut milk over medium-high heat, then add the peppercorn mixture and bring to a boil. Add soup stock and pumpkin, stir and let cook for about 10 minutes or until pumpkin starts to get soft. Add shrimp, season with salt, palm sugar and lime juice. Stir in chopped shallots. Let it cook to a mild boil, stirring soup with a circular motion.

Gradually drizzle the egg into the soup, stirring gently until the egg is cooked. Add coconut cream (see below) and kaffir lime leaves, stirring quickly. Remove from heat, ladle into a bowl, serve hot and enjoy!

To get coconut cream, remove the lid from a can of coconut milk and, without stirring the contents, remove the top cream and discard the thin liquid.

Recipe Source: ImportFood.com Thai Supermarket