cuisine

Khmer cuisine: Koh saek chrook k’nao (Pork stew with jackfruit)

10 May 2015 by Nathalie Abejero Leave a Comment

Koh saek chrook is usually a plain beef stew (of garlic, onions, soy sauce, fish sauce and small amounts of tubers) when our nanny Sopheap makes it for us. This variation below is with jackfruit, which lends a sweetness so that there’s no need to add sugar. (With growing affluence and its associated sweet tooth, sugar is increasingly added to Khmer dishes like this one.)

Tender shreds of meat are what’s left after the yellow fruit is taken out and the tougher rind and tendrils discarded. The seeds of jackfruit are edible when boiled. It has a hard shell that’s easily cracked and removed. They can be tossed into the dish as well. Sopheap leaves this shell on, but if I were to cook it myself I’d take them off.

First, garlic is stir fried in oil (Sopheap didn’t add onion this time). When it starts to brown, she added the pork. After about five minutes of medium heat, she tossed in the jackfruit. After about five minutes more she added some water, and let it stew. (Unfortunately there’s no recipe as she cooks by memory not units).

This dish needs serious food photography effort because of its drab color – the first image is the one I took in the kitchen with my camera phone, and the other is taken under natural light with a Canon 7D. It’s almost not that much better! :-( But the dish is really good (the kids love it), so don’t let the lack of professional photos put you off it!

Insect cuisine: Ongkrong saek koo (Beef stir fry with red tree ant larvae)

22 April 2015 by Nathalie Abejero Leave a Comment

The first time I had this dish was in Kampot, at a small stall by the side of a building away from the busy center of town. I loved it! Then one night I sat underneath a particularly bright light source and saw all the ants in my meal. After my initial shock, I managed to have a civil conversation with my Khmer colleagues about the food they had me eating. These ants lend a tangy taste to dishes, especially when paired with meats in a stir fry. I did end up finishing my meal that night, getting over it very quickly. All manner of insects make it onto the menu in Cambodia, so psychologically-speaking it wasn’t the worst thing I’ve ever eaten, and besides it was rather good.

There are several names for this ant — Fire ants, Red tree ants, Weaver ants. They’re large, red, have huge pincers and are unbelievably aggressive. They weave their nests into leaves up in the trees which become monstrous in size. If you find a line of them, carry out an experiment. Take a stick and wave it at a part of their regiment. The ones closest to the stick being waved at the group will rear up and attack. Reinforcements will be called via chemical alarm, and soon you’ll have a swarm of angry little buggers trying to get at you.

It and its larvae are a prized culinary ingredient for the delicate sour flavor it lends to the meat, but it isn’t easy to find in Phnom Penh restaurants. So we normally ask Khmer friends to make it for us. Unfortunately, it seems like the ants in Phnom Penh are also quite large. I have no problem eating this dish, but the bigger ants (up to 3cm!) aren’t pleasant visually to someone who hasn’t grown up with these dishes. Here it is stir-fried with ginger, lemongrass, garlic, shallots, cuts of morning glory and thinly sliced beef. As with other stir fried dishes, it isn’t complete without lots of chilies.

Quick eats in Phnom Penh: Bánh hỏi for lunch

3 April 2015 by Nathalie Abejero Leave a Comment

This shop on busy Sihanouk Blvd has been serving fantastic bánh hỏi for years! They serve a set menu that includes sandwiches and meat skewers. It’s a picture menu, and easy to point to one of the two big platters of meats and vegetables. Before the food arrives, a small pan of water and slices of lemon is brought to the table for washing hands.

Bánh hỏi refers to the rice vermicelli noodle woven into a fine mesh, which looks like gauze. It’s paired with foods of different textures and richness – starchy green bananas, sweet pineapples, crunchy cucumbers, meats and fats – all to be wrapped into a fresh spring roll. These fillings are laid out on several platters.

One of these platters contains skewered pork meat sliced very thin and wrapped around a piece of fat. It’s accompanied by the pickled vegetables that’s served with many barbecued Khmer dishes (slivers of unripe mango or papaya, cucumber, carrot in vinegar, salt, sugar and chili).

Rice paper wrap is served dry and stacked on the plate; before rolling, a wrap is dipped in warm water to soften and make it pliable. It’s a bit tricky because once wet the wrap is fragile so it tears easily. But with a little practice it can be stretched expertly to roll an unwieldy amount of filling together. The dipping sauce, nuoc cham, is a delicate balance of spice, sweet, sour, and salty, and topped with roasted ground peanuts and chili.

Below is the process photographed step-by-step:

On Sihanouk Blvd the small “hang bai” is easily lost in the mix of salons, retailers and other eateries on the north side of the street between Monivong and St 63. It’s about 7 shops towards Monivong if starting on St 63 – look for the yellow awning with the address #83AEo St 274. Today they were sporting the famous (brightly colored) pajama apparel!

Khmer food: Svay bok Trai cha-aa

8 March 2014 by Nathalie Abejero Leave a Comment

(Smashed grilled fish) I’m always discovering new Khmer dishes I haven’t tried yet. My colleague brought some of this the other day for her lunch. The photo doesn’t capture it well, but it’s a very tasty dish (for those not turned off by pungency, that is)!

It’s made of fish (grilled river catfish was used here), smashed in a mortar and pestle with grated green mango and spices. I asked Sopheap to make it and watched. Into the mortar with the mango went chopped red and white onion, a little garlic, salt, peanuts, some fish sauce and herbs that they call chee (gee?), for which I don’t know the English names. (I’ll add to this post when I find out.)

Similar to it is the more famous green papaya/mango salad. This salad has river crab, often added raw then smashed into the other ingredients. But svay bok trai cha-aa uses fish. They lend a lot of pungency to the already multiple layers of flavor. It won’t go into the family’s recipe rotation very often, because the flavors are a bit strong for the kids right now. But it’s definitely a good lunch option! (I just have to make sure to stock Menthos in my desk!)

Jiminy crickets and arachnid cuisine

30 December 2008 by Nathalie Abejero Leave a Comment

These crunchy crickets the Khmers are so wild about are about 2.5inches long, the females huge with eggs at the end of rainy season. Crickets owe their place in the culinary landscape to the art of survival during the starvation period of the Khmer Rouge era.

Today this delicacy has surged in popularity, creating a robust trade with neighboring countries, the heart of which is in Kampong Thom, a requisite stop between Phnom Penh and Siem Reap where they particularly thrive. At night fields light up with the bug-catching contraptions: a flourescent bulb to attract them is hung about 2m off the ground on a bamboo frame 2m wide, with sheets of plastic to catch them mid-flight, and a trough of water below for them to drop into and drown. A farmer investing in such a trap can net up to 10kg of the bugs.

A colleague particularly enjoys it stuffed with a peanut or cashew, fried in garlic and spices. Another wants me to bring fresh ones back from the province when I next go, so she can try stuffing it with cheese. These were 50/$3.50 but that’s quite steep since we were on the tourist track. Trying to describe it is a bit hard, since it isn’t like anything I’ve had before– crispy-crunchy texture (like a tarantula), nutty, earthy… It’s not an unpleasant taste, if you can get past the revulsion…

And remember this post? Today tarantulas are 1000riel each (25cents). Believed to contain medicinal properties for the heart and lungs, they’re farmed in a small town called Skun, which is also in Kampong Thom province. The crispy legs aren’t so objectionable, it’s almost like a potato chip. It’s the rump that brings on the cringe– this has a meatier texture than the cricket’s torso, and has a nutty taste seasoned with garlic and lemongrass.

A gastronomic adventure awaits the uncompromising palate!
mmmmm….Bon appetit y’all!! (Don’t worry, your chowhounds’ holiday fare wasn’t so aesthetically or gastronomically objectionable! ;)