Kaeng khiew wan gai (sweet green stew of chicken)
Oft referred to as the queen of Thai c-c-c…(must I say it? Nope!!) stews, kaeng khiew wan is lushly herbal and fragrant, and most provocatively pale-green from its infusion of krung kaeng khiew wan…
In honor of Jihva for Ingredients: June of 2007: Jackfruit, hosted by Bee and Jai of Jugalbandi, I have constructed a special kaeng khiew wan: I have paired green jackfruit with breast of chicken and added pieces of red capsicum, as well as shelled green peas and sliced mushrooms, to complement the colour scheme. It is finished with a handful each of torn kaffir lime leaves and Thai basil.
I must be honest with you: this is the first time I have cooked with young, green jackfruit. I have tasted the ripe fruit, but it is a very different thing in vegetable form. Everything I had seen in the mature fruit is here miniaturized, with a unique texture, and a delicate flavour perhaps somewhere between green bean-pods and lychee nuts, or thereabouts! I have seen the swooning of other food-bloggers, but now I understand why; I was forced to purchase another can as I had nibbled my way through an entire one that was reserved for this dish! Thanks to all you swooners out there for introducing me to a new, and very likeable, vegetable.
Somehow, the pallid-green pieces of jackfruit turned to an interesting shade of lavender while cooking, but it’s all in the fun…and while making the krung (masala paste) for this stew might be a bit arduous, the actual preparation of a Thai stew is as easy as breathing- honestly! I put the whole thing together while chatting with my mother and her long-time friend and never missed a beat! They even had fun sniffing and tasting some of the ingredients before they were tossed in. The end result, simmering away in my wok, reminds me a bit of a quiet lake with fallen leaves floating on the surface- nothing could be calmer or more relaxing.
Kaeng Khiew Wan Gai
(with green jackfruit, red capsicums, green peas and mushrooms)
(I don’t know the Thai for all of that! 
)
2/3 C krung kaeng khiew wan (green curry paste)
1/2 C coconut cream, 3 C thin coconut milk, 1 C thick coconut milk (or use 2 tins of coconut milk, let it sit for awhile before opening and divide accordingly)*
4 chicken breasts, skin and bones removed, sliced in 1/4″-1/2″ strips (the bones can also be left in for more flavour, and although I often do this, I was in a filleted-kind-of-mood)
3 C green jackfruit, diced into wedges of about 1/2″ (I used two tins as this is all that is available here)
1 lg. red capsicum, diced into 1/4″ x 1″ pieces or sliced into 1/4″ strips
about 7 button or other mushrooms, sliced 1/8″-1/4″ wide
1/2 C shelled green peas
about 12 or so hot, red Thai chiles, stems intact, split along the length
4 T or so nam pla (fish water/sauce)
1 t sugar, or to taste
a handful of kaffir lime leaves, carefully torn on each half
a handful of Thai basil leaves
1)Heat the coconut cream over low heat in a wok or similar utensil and, stiring frquently, allow the oil to separate from the solids. It will just begin to smell roasted.
2)Add the krung and stir and fry until the raw smell disappears.
3)Add the chicken pieces and continue stirring, raise the heat a bit, until the chicken begins to change colour and is well-mixed with the paste.
4)Add the thin coconut milk and allow to come to a boil, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to very low and allow to simmer slowly.
5)When the chicken is just tender, add the mushrooms and continue simmering for about 5 minutes or so. If using fresh jackfruit, this should probably be added now as well.
6)Add the remaining vegetables and simmer, stirring now and then until they are almost cooked, but not soft.
7)Add the nam pla and sugar to taste.
8)Add the torn kaffir lime leaves and stir gently. Simmer for 2-3 more minutes.
9)Remove from heat, ladle into a serving dish, and, with a flourish of elegance, pour the thick coconut milk over the surface; use a spoon to swirl it if desired. Scatter over it the basil leaves as well, and serve with hot, steamed Thai jasmine rice, and accompaniments such as Thai cucumber salad and chiles-in-fish-sauce (these you’ll have to search for recipes yourself to try, for now, as I was too hungry and enraptured by the scent of this dish to bother…) 
This would serve at least 6 I think, 8 -10 with other dishes. Enjoy!
*When using tinned/canned coconut milk, the cream floats at the very top, the thick milk is just underneath, and the watery, thin milk sinks to the bottom.
8-cup Barfi (7-cup barfi- enlightened)
This is really a recipe for 7-cup barfi, a very popular Indian sweet with many different known formulas, all centering on the use of 7 cups of various ingredients. I like this one because every cup is a different thing, and I added another cup because I felt that the nuts, which are often included in the recipes, should be given their own cup; in short, I felt bad for them… 
Sort of… the whole truth is that I was experimenting with my favorite 7-cup recipe and botched a batch that needed remedying: I had left out a cup of moong flour, not because I was out of stock- I wasn’t, but because I felt it a bit redundant to use two different bean-flours in one sweet. Plus, I wanted a nice, green-free colour…
So, to summarize: I had increased the nuts to one cup and omitted the moong flour. It didn’t work. Sue me. When the mixture was poured into a thali I had pools of unabsorbed ghee floating about. Ghee is far too precious of a substance to not be occupied somewhere… so, after staring into the pools for a while, looking at the room reflected in the depths, I thought of a possible solution: I roasted an eighth, non-legume ingredient (7th if the nuts aren’t counted- apparantly nuts don’t absorb ghee as well as starchy flours do!) and dumped the thali-contents back into the pan to re-heat and marry it to the new addition. Thankfully, it worked out splendidly, and I shall have no need now to keep searching for the best 7-cup barfi recipe out there, because the best one has 8 cups! 
Here is an interesting excerpt from Wikipedia’s entry for the number 8 and its significance to Buddhist thought:
The Dharmachakra, a Buddhist symbol, has eight spokes. The Buddha’s principal teaching — the Four Noble Truths — ramifies as the Eightfold Noble Path. In Mahayana Buddhism, the branches of the Eightfold Path are embodied by the Eight Great Bodhisattvas (Manjushri, Vajrapani, Avalokiteshvara, Maitreya, Kshitigarbha, Nivaranavishkambhi, Akashagarbha, and Samantabhadra). These are later (controversially) associated with the Eight Consciousnesses according to the Yogachara school of thought: consciousness in the five senses, thought-consciousness, self-consciousness and unconsciousness-’consciousness’ (alaya-vijñana). The ‘irreversible’ state of enlightenment, at which point a Bodhisattva goes on ‘autopilot’, is the Eight Ground or bhūmi. In general, ‘eight’ seems to be an auspicious number for Buddhists, e.g., the ‘eight auspicious symbols’ (the jewel-encrusted parasol; the goldfish (always shown as a pair, e.g., the glyph of Pisces); the self-replenishing amphora; the white kamala lotus-flower; the white conch; the eternal (Celtic-style, infinitely looping) knot; the banner of imperial victory; the eight-spoked wheel that guides the ship of state, or that symbolizes the Buddha’s teaching). Similarly, Buddha’s birthday falls on the 8th day of the 4th month of the Chinese calendar.
Also, an octopus has eight arms, a fallen 8 is a symbol for infinity, and 8 this will be after it is made and gone!
8-cup Barfi
- 1 C ghee (don’t you dare use anything else!)
- 1 C sugar (I used white, but any dry sugar of your choice will work)
- 1 C milk
- 1 C raw almonds, skinned (soak almonds in hot water for an hour to easily remove the skin)
- 1 C coconut, shredded (fresh, frozen or dried will work)
- 1 C semolina
- 1 C besan
- 1 C brown rice flour (will white rice flour work you might ask? Possibly… probably. I like the added nutrition and fiber of brown rice, in certain cases.)
- 1/2 t cardamom, whole seeds (elaichi)
- a few strands of saffron, crushed
- a pinch of salt
1)Blop two spoons of the ghee in a large cooking vessel (I used a wok) and set it over medium-low flame. Smear a bit of ghee on a thali and set aside.
2)Combine the sugar with the milk in a small sauce-pan and set it over low heat, stir occasionally until it just comes to a boil and the sugar dissolves. Remove from heat and sprinkled the crushed saffron threads and the salt over it and set aside.
3)Simultaneously, add the nuts to the hot ghee and fry, turning constantly, until fragrant and golden-brown. Remove to a bowl.
4)Fry/toast the coconut in the same pan, using the ghee that remains in the pan which was used for the almonds, turning constantly, until it is golden and fragrant (use caution when roasting coconut; it will go from tan to black quite quickly!). Remove to a separate bowl.
5)Roast the three flours separately in turn, using the same pan, until each is golden and fragrant. Remove these to rest in a bowl together (be sure to remove as much as you can from the pan before roasting the next).
6)Crush the cardamom seeds in a mortar, add the toasted coconut and crush this to a coarse paste.
7)Pick out a handful of the most beautiful, evenly-coloured roasted almond halves from the bowl and reserve these for decorating. Add the remainder to the coconut in the mortar and crush to a coarse paste.
8)Add the remaining ghee from the cup to the pan (as well as any ghee that clings to the bowls you used for the almonds and coconut)and set it over med-low heat; add the roasted flours and mix well. Add the milk-water mixture and continue heating and stirring until the mixture leaves the sides of the pan and moves as one mass. Add the paste from the mortar and mix well.
9)Turn out onto the thali and pat it down well until quite smooth using a metal spatula. Score the surface into diamond shapes using a dull knife. Press an almond-half into the center of each diamond and allow to cool. (place any nuts that remain after decorating in a small bowl and hide it in a cabinet to secretly munch later)
10)When cool, use a sharp knife to cut all the way through the score-marks. Serve with tea, coffee or cooling drinks.
Amazingly, this melt-in-the-mouth sweet seems to be impervious to humidity… so try it now; don’t procrastin-8!
Dhaniye aur Kaju wale Murgh (Chicken with Coriander-leaves and Cashews)
I own a truly fascinating cookbook, by Smita and Sanjeev Chandra, entitled Cuisines of India. Besides having an eye-catching dust-cover, it really is a good read. The chapters are divided into broad, historical summaries, coupled with a discussion of the cuisine developement of the parties involved. There are political maps included as well! Every single recipe in the book also includes an interesting tale as its introduction, and because of all this, one could definitely spend hours just reading, as I did when I first acquired my copy, and not enter the kitchen at all!
My favorite recounts are those of Fanny Eden and her brushings with Ranjit Singh- that colourful Sikh leader who made himself king of Punjab in 1801. I still find myself truly laughing at loud when I read one of the Punjabi/Punju recipes that includes one of these! Here, for your amusement, is the one which heads a very good recipe that I just tried, taken from chapter 4, Decline of the Moghul Empire: Flowering of Regional Cuisines:
The table was covered with gold bottles and cups and some specimens of Sikh cookery- spiced balls of meat, or rather essence of meat, of very strong composition, pomegranite seeds, etc…The composition he calls wine is like burning fire, much stronger than brandy, and his great delight when he sets in to be gay is to make people drink it…I got on very well for some time, pretending to drink it and passing it to his cup-bearer. But he grew suspicious, put it up to his one eye, looked well into the cup, shook his head and gave it me back again. The next time he put his finger into the cup to see how much was gone. I made Major Wade explain to him that ladies did not drink so much in England, upon which he watched till George’s [her brother, governor general of India] head was turned away and passed a cup to me under his arm, thinking George was the horrid tyrant who prevented me.
Poor Fanny… In other exerpts from her journal we find her suffering through other banquets and dishes that, heaven forbid, were made to look like precious metals…
This recipe, though simple to prepare, is quite delicious! I have no idea how authentic it is; I’d like to hear feedback from anyone who might know! I made a couple additions to keep a theme going and make use of things I had handy: I sprinkled two finely-sliced green onions and a pinch of shredded mint-leaves over the top at the end of cooking. Either way, it is a very green, very vitamin-infused sauce that complements chicken deliciously well. It is sugested by the authors to serve it with rice and bhindi ki sabzi (sabzi-fied okra?!)
Dhaniye aur Kaju wale Murgh
8 skinless chicken thighs, bone in, washed and drained (I cleaved each into three pieces, bone included)
For the marinade:
1/4 C raw cashews, ground
1 t ground coriander seeds
3/4 t ground cumin seeds
1/2 t ground chiles
1/4-1/2 t ground black pepper
1/2 t garam masala
1/2 t turmeric
2 garlic cloves, sliced
1/2″ piece of ginger, sliced
1 C coriander leaves and stems, washed, drained, chopped
1 hot green chile, seeded and sliced (I used 3)
1 C plain yoghurt, not low-fat
salt to taste
1)Make a paste of the garlic, ginger, coriander leaves and green chiles.
2)Combine this with the rest of the marinade ingredients and mix with the chicken pieces well in a bowl. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours, but preferably overnight.
For finishing:
2 T or so of oil
1/2 t cumin seeds
2 medium onions, peeled and thinly-sliced
1/4 C raw cashews, whole
1 T lemon (or lime) juice
1/2 C coriander leaves, chopped
2 green onions, finely-sliced(my addition)
4-5 mint leaves, finely shredded (stack, roll into a little log and slice thinly- my addition)
1)Heat oil in a cooking vessel over med-high heat and add the cumin seeds; after a few seconds add the onions and whole cashews; fry stirring fairly constantly until the onions are golden and just beginning to brown.
2)Strain these, using a slotted spoon, from the oil and set aside. Add the chicken and its marinade to the pan, stir well, cover and allow it to come to a boil. Reduce heat to med-low and cook for 40 min, stirring occasionally to avoid catching, until tender.
3)Add the reserved onions, cashews and lemon juice and cook 5 minutes more. Check for salt.
4)Sprinkle coriander leaves, green onions, and mint leaves over the top and serve hot with rice.
My deepest gratitude to Musical and her Kitchen for her assistance in translating the title of this dish for me!
Krung Kaeng Khiew Wan
This is a recipe that is absolutely integral to preparing one of my favorite dishes. At 19, while on a day-long expedition to Chicago with an art class from college, I was fortunate, when dinner-time came, not only to be persuaded to try Thai food, but to have chosen a dish from the menu made from this preparation as my introduction to the cuisine. I have never forgotten the flavour of that dish; few do who have ever tasted it. And, while store-bought pastes are readily available for this and other popular Thai dishes, none approach the flavour and aroma of the hand-made-from-scratch ones.
Khiew means green. Wan is sweet. Krung* means a paste of fresh, aromatic things used to season a dish…. “Wet masala” or “masala paste” might be the best English translation of krung, as the word masala itself is becoming assimilated into the language… Kaeng is a more difficult word to translate. In my opinion, the best English equivalent would be a loose use of the word stew…..
Kaeng is often translated as “curry”, but that seems to be a catch-all word in English for anything cooked in a well-seasoned liquid, or even something that happens to have a pinch of “curry powder” in it; I avoid the word for the most part. There are, in the Thai repetoire, dishes called kaeng cheud (sometimes spelled jeud), which are “clear stews” directly descended from the Chinese “clear soups”, as they are called in English. Also, there are dishes called prik kaeng, which are nearly-dry dishes cooked in a thick paste of mostly chiles. And to top off my argument, there is a paste and associated stew called (krung) kaeng kari……. “kari” seeming to follow suit with the British term “curry”, (of still-unknown exact extraction, but perhaps from the Tamil word kari); recipes for it contain a quantity of prepared “curry powder”…… Obviously then, in the Thai language, the word kaeng does not, in their minds, denote “curry”, as all of their food contains aromatic substances, naturally, for flavour and health….So, in lieu of all this, I use the word stew as the closest English word to kaeng. Therefore, I will translate the Thai title of this preparation to “Masala paste for sweet, green stew” or “sweet, green stew flavouring paste”. Does that sound okay with you? You will find this paste used to make what is known on Thai menus simply as: “green curry”.
Nomenclature aside, let us delve into the pleasures of making our own krung, shall we? This particular paste is always made using fresh green chiles, and also traditionally includes the addition of fresh chile-leaves. Spinach leaves, or any other well-coloured, mildly-flavoured green can be substituted, and often are, even in the best Thai restaurants. This paste, and subsequent stew made with it, is known for it’s beautiful, jade-green colour, delicate harmony of spices, and somewhat intense heat. It is often stated to be the most refined and sophisticated of the many Thai kaeng, and I have read that it is the favorite of the Thai Royal Court. Many, many recipes for this one, special paste exist; oddly, they are all in agreement with most of its components, but differ greatly in proportions. I am continually making notes with every attempt I make, and reading and listening to Thai cooks speak with obvious enthusiasm about it. I share with you what I have today.
I implore you, when making this for the first time, to use a mortar-and-pestle; this gives the correct consistency and texture to the paste, as well as an unforgettable sensual experience coupled with a certain meditative quality often spoken of when performing repetitious tasks that require patience. Try to aim for every slice of the fine mincing to be 1 mm or less; your mincing skills will ultimately determine the smoothness of your finished paste. If you must use an electric wet-grinding machine, do add as little water as possible; be sure to allow a little extra time for frying (when the time comes to preparing a kaeng) to allow the extra water to evaporate before proceeding.
You will need:
Garlic, finely minced, 3 T
Coriander roots and/or stems, finely minced, 3 T
Chile-leaves or other greens, two handfuls, finely minced
A mix of mild and hot fresh, green chiles, seeded if you wish, and finely minced, about 2 1/2 C (I used two poblanos, 16 serranos, 6 long Thai chiles)
Coriander seed, whole 1 T
White peppercorns, whole, 1 t
Cumin seeds, whole, 1 t
Anise or fennel seeds, whole, 1/4 t
Turmeric, ground, 1/8 t
Nutmeg, ground, a pinch
Galanga**, about 1″, peeled and finely minced, 2 T
Lemon grass, 2 stalks, pale-crisp parts only, 2 stalks, finely minced, about 4 T
Kaffir lime peel/zest***, finely minced, 3 t
Shallots or onions, finely minced, 2 T
Kapi/ shrimp paste****, 2 1/2 t
Salt
1)Dry-roast the coriander seed and white peppercorns lightly, just until fragrant. Remove and let cool. Do the same with the cumin and anise seeds. Grind all of these together to a powder, add the turmeric and nutmeg; set aside.
2)Sprinkle the minced chiles with a little salt and mix well. Allow to stand for 30-45. Place these in a piece of cheesecloth or muslin and squeeze out as much liquid as you can. Set aside, reserving the liquid in a separate bowl.
3)Wrap the kapi/ shrimp paste in a small piece of aluminum foil and roast over medium heat until fragrant, 4-5 minutes, flipping several times. Set aside to cool.
4)In a large mortar, use the pestle to pound the minced garlic into a smooth paste. Add each ingredient in the exact order listed, adding the next only when a paste has been achieved with the preceding ingredient (the dry, roasted spices are added together obviously, and can be used to absorb any liquid that starts splashing at any moment before this). At the end, unwrap the kapi and blend this very well into the paste. Add the reserved chile-liquid.
This paste will keep for a week or two in the refrigerator, or longer in the freezer.
As an afterthought, if anyone has any ideas about how to make the experience of hand-pounding this paste a little less sensual, I’m all ears!
*This is also sometimes called nam prik kaeng: chile-water [for] stew.
**Galanga or Kha is in the ginger family and has a unique flavour worth seeking out; it is always available fresh in Thai markets. If it is truly unattainable, substitute 3-4 T finely-minced ginger.
***Kaffir limes or magrut are available fresh in December-January in Thai markets in the U.S. The dried peel is available year-round from a few mail order companies. It has a very unique fragrance and flavour. Substitute with 4-5 t of regular lime zest if absolutely necessary.
****Vegetarians may substitute kapi with a slightly greater quantity of miso paste or mashed cubes of fermented bean-curd; skip the roasting in foil step.
Nam Prik Wan kap Mamuang Khiew
I have no idea if that’s really what this is called in Thai, but it works until a better name can be found. You see, I keep forgetting to ask the right people when I have a chance… That title would translate appropriately to “Sweet chile-water with green mangoes”, of which I have very fond summer memories…
In the traditional cuisine of Thailand and Laos, there is an endless variety of chile-waters, which is a bit like a relish around which entire meals can be served, including many vegetables and fruits, grilled or fried meats and fish, and balls of rice. Each chile-water, or nam prik as they are known in Thai, has a distinct balance of flavours that demand different accompaniments. I have tried a few; but this simple one was taught to me by a dear and long-time friend of mine who is Hmong by nationality. Besides being multi-lingual, having lived in both Laos and Thailand for a number of years before coming to the U. S., and operating a very popular “Asian” grocery store, she has also worked as a physician’s assistant, a school-teacher, and, when she very young, she helped her parents with the chores needed to maintain a flourishing, productive fruit-orchard. She has shared quite a few recipes with me over the years, and I bring this one out to share with you now.
On one particular day that I took a venture to her store, May was in the back, at a small, makeshift kitchen- complete with electric rice-cookers, where she would often make things to sell. She was busily cutting up semi-ripe mangoes and tossing them into a large bowl. Out of curiosity, I asked what she was making. She replied, “This is something that goes really fast in the summer. This will all be gone in just a few hours!” She was such a tease that way. She kept right on cutting the last few mangoes and, just as I was eyeing up some grilled sausages, she said, “You just watch; you can learn a new recipe that I know you will like a lot. It is much too hot for me, but I think you would enjoy this”.
So, I watched. She took out a large, earthenware mortar and a wooden pestle, set it on the counter, and threw in a single clove of unpeeled garlic. Using the pestle gently, she managed to crack the skin of the garlic, and then reached in and removed the paper-like shards deftly with her other hand. In the next few seconds the garlic was paste. Then, she grabbed a jar containing a dark, fragrant substance and, with a serving-spoon, removed the tiniest smidge, perhaps the size of a chickpea, and shoved it off into the mortar using the tip of another spoon. This special preparation, I already knew, was kapi [kah-PEE], and is made of small, black-eyed shrimp that are ground into a paste, salted and fermented. It is quite potent, and usually used in small quantities to add a subtle, but rich undertone to many dishes. This new addition she pounded with the garlic paste until it was smooth. Then, she did something that I must admit shocked me a bit: she reached into a large plastic bag that was clearly quite full of small, dried bird-dropping chiles, and extracting as much as her hand could hold, released the lot into the vessel waiting with the paste! “Gosh May! All of those?!” I exclaimed. I knew full well from experience how hot just one of those chiles were…
“Oh, yes…”, she said, “That is how most people like it. Hot enough to make a tiger cry…” Indeed! I let my eyes relax from their temporary widening and continued to watch, fascinated, as she turned them into a coarse powder before my eyes and with one of the spoons in her other hand, turned the mixture now and then. She took out a small tub of white sugar and scooped out a quantity- it was just a bit more- about 1 1/2 times- the amount in volume as the crushed chiles with its two potent accessories- and let this fall into the well, as well. Again she pounded and turned until it was well-combined. I thought she was done. I was hoping that this could be judiciously sprinkled on the mangoes. I was wrong. She reached for a bottle of nam pla- a thin, amber-coloured liquid strained from salted, fermented anchovies, and started pouring it in… I was really having my doubts about her cooking skills by this time. How could this concoction be at all edible? She had set her pestle aside, thank god, and was using just the spoon now to stir. All I could see was the red of chiles and their wan seeds floating about in sluggish liquid the consistency of thinned honey. With a brave lack of hesitation, she put the spoon to her lips and tasted it, without gasping or blinking. “Very good I think….” She then turned to look at me, “You wanna try?” I took a deep breath and stepped forward. This is going to kill me I thought. I took the spoon and tasted just the tiniest “sip”. No heat at all! It was as sweet as…..
“Oh……..dear…..” I gasped. My lips, my mouth, my throat: all apparantly on fire. The sugar had dissolved and now a definite warmth was spreading across my face, radiating from the now-searing parts I used to talk with. My head felt light. My eyes watered. My mouth salivated to flush away this gastronomic furnace of a sauce or…whatever it was! She upturned the whole thing into the bowl of cut-up mangoes, even scraping out the traces that still clung, and mixed it up.
“Normally we dip pieces of green mangoes or other green, sour fruit into this, but I do it this way so customers can take what they want and eat it on the way somewhere. Only one container for me to deal with too!” She was so nonchalant about it, and seemingly oblivious to the fact that my hair was about to melt, and continued, “I use these semi-ripe mangoes for this before they go bad; this way I still make money from them, and the people who don’t have time to make this always buy up all that I have. You come back in four hours. This will be gone!”
I didn’t come back later that day. I asked her to ladle some into a container for me right away and with it headed home.
Perfectly green, fresh mangoes are hard to come by here; once in a while I can catch a few at the Asian grocery stores before they’re snatched up. Most often I just search the mango piles at the large supermarkets for firm ones and call it good. They truly aren’t anything near splendid when ripe anyway! So, in this photo you will see semi-ripe mangoes, very much like the ones that May would use for this dish; my fellow Umreeka residers will understand I think, but if you do have access to green mangoes or green guavas or anything sour- or grilled fish and grilled meats or balls of sticky rice- all of them, I assure you, transform when dipped in this…. this, nam prik. There is no English word for the mischievous pleasure that I receive when offering this to the uninitiated, with the highest of hopes that they will chew and swallow before the sugar dissolves….
Until then, sanuk will do…
