The weather has been beautiful lately. Gorgeous, in fact. I’ve thought about cooking, but it’s not as much fun to cook for one. The last time I cooked was when the Velez family came down for a visit. I had a blast cooking for them!
First up was a fresh mint and roasted pork salad dressed with fresh squeezed lime juice mixed with a touch of sugar and fish sauce, thin sliced shallots and garlic. The key to this salad is the toasted rice, ground up and tossed in there right at the end to add texture and a fantastic roasted flavor. Of course, the huge amounts of fresh mint leaves made it a cool and happy salad.
The salad is called “nam tok” or water fall salad. It can be made with pork or chicken, but I personally like it with pork. Besides, I’d roasted chicken to go along side as well as had chicken as the base of the next dish.
I also made red curry chicken, my way. It’s Thai style, with coconut milk and bamboo shoots, but you’ll find every Thai cook does things in her own way and the curry comes out different for every cook. I use fresh holy basil from my garden in my curry, and probably more coconut milk than most. Plus I add a kaffir lime leaf or two in there and a touch of sugar to balance out flavors. Instead of serving the curry with rice, the way I normally do, I made nom gene or Asian white rice noodles instead. They’re lighter and nicer with the curry for summer time.
I also made “sticky rice” or sweet rice to go on the side with some roasted chicken. That’s a summer favorite as well. You gotta be careful with sticky rice though, stuff continues to expand in your stomach.
See? It’s so much more fun to cook for friends than it is to cook for just one. I get a lot of joy out of feeding my friends and putting my heart into my cooking for them.






