Southeast Asia's Best Recipes. Wendy Hutton

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      Eggplant (also known as aubergine) comes in many different shapes, sizes and colors, ranging from tiny pea-sized eggplants (generally lightly pounded and added raw to dips), to egg-shaped vegetables and short or long slender eggplants. The color ranges from white through bright orange to pale green, pale purple and deep purple and there are even streaked green and purple varieties. Apart from the bitter pea-sized eggplant and a round, tough-skinned orange variety which is very sour, most Asian eggplants have the same mild flavor, which lends itself well to all types of seasoning. Try to use slender Asian eggplants, which are less bitter than their Western counterparts and do not need pre-salting; they also have tender, edible skins. Some eggplants, especially Japanese varieties, are very short, about 5 to 6 in (12.5 to 15 cm) in length, while others can be up to 10 in (25 cm). The length is not important, so long as you can obtain slender Asian varieties, you’ll find them much more palatable than the Western type.

      Fish, preserved is preferred to dried shrimp paste in Cambodia and Laos, where it is known as prahok and padek respectively. The Vietnamese call it mam ca sac and use both this and fermented anchovy sauce (mam nem) as a flavoring. Chunks of fresh fish are salted and packed in barrels with a little cooked rice to aid the fermentation. Preserved fish is available in glass jars, often exported from Thailand. The English names vary, from Pure Pickled Gouramy Fish, to Pickled Grey Featherback Fish, to Preserved Mudfish, or something similar; the brand I am currently using also bears the French name poisson en saumure. You can recognize it by the pale beige or grey color of the thick paste, which has a few chunks of fish visible. This should be used sparingly. A jar will keep in the cupboard for at least a couple of years. Anchovy sauce or even fish sauce can be used a substitute.

      Fish sauce is to most of Southeast Asia what soy sauce is to the Chinese and Japanese, the most widely used salty seasoning. Fish sauce has a unique fragrance which gives so much of the regional food its characteristic flavor and aroma. Made from the liquid poured off salted and fermented fish, fish sauce is a clear golden brown color. Thai and Vietnamese brands are usually readily available abroad; in general, Vietnamese fish sauce is slightly stronger in flavor than Thai brands. Keep fish sauce in the cupboard; it lasts almost indefinitely.

      Five spice powder is a Chinese seasoning sometimes used in Thai and Vietnamese cooking. This finely ground mixture of cassia, cloves, fennel, Sichuan pepper and star anise has a warm fragrance and flavor and is commonly used in braised dishes, or a pinch added to pork sausages or paté. To keep its freshness as long as possible, store in the refrigerator.

      Galangal is preferred to common ginger in much of Southeast Asia. It is pale cream with delicate pink tips while still young and becomes quite tough and fibrous as it ages. The fragrance of this rhizome seems to embody the smell of the tropics: warm, exciting and faintly spicy with a hint of camphor. Just the aroma alone is enough to get the taste buds going. If you can obtain fresh galangal, scrub it well, peel off any thick papery skin (but don’t worry about the tender skin, which can be left on). Cut the galangal in thin slices and store in a sealed bag in the freezer; use the slices as required while still frozen. Dried galangal slices are sometimes available and can be soaked in hot water for about 30 minutes to reconstitute, but a better alternative to the fresh product is galangal packed in brine, usually sold in jars. This may be labeled with the Thai name, kha, or simply referred to as “rhizome.” (Do not confuse it with Chinese keys or krachai). Avoid ground galangal, which does not have anywhere near the same flavor as other substitutes.

      Garlic chives, also known as Chinese chives, resemble coarse СКАЧАТЬ