Saturday, February 7, 2015

Thai Celery Salad and the Importance of Fish Sauce



I've been making this Thai Celery Salad, courtesy of the good folks at Bon Appetit, for a few months now. It, as they say, is Super Good. There are just a handful of ingredients and they some together for a delightfully clean and crunchy side salad.

It's one of several menu items that contain fish sauce, a condiment I now always have on hand. In my early days experimenting with fish sauce I bought the small glass bottles produced by Thai Kitchen. Now that I use it more frequently (fish sauce also goes into my Cauliflower Curry and Pad Thai) I've graduated to larger bottles sourced in the Thai market on Broadway or in the well-stocked isles of Treasure Island. Lately I've been using Tiparos which comes in a plastic bottle, but I prefer big glass bottles, tho lately they're hard to source.

I'm going to lose some of you here with this fact: Fish sauce is anchovy. And yes, I'm a huge fan of the anchovy, but I really don't think that drives my fondness for the sauce. It's an integral flavor in Thai cooking, and one almost singlehandedly makes whatever you're preparing taste like Thai food. What I'm saying is this, if you like Thai food and are interesting in adding some Thai recipes to your repertoire - don't let being an Anchovy Hater hold you back. Here's that recipe:

INGREDIENTS
6-8 stalks celery, trimmed, washed and sliced on a diagonal 3 green onions, thinly sliced on a diagonal
1 cup cilantro, chopped
3 T canola oil
2 T lime juice, freshly squeezed
1 T fish sauce
Fresh ground pepper 1/4 cup roasted peanuts, chopped

METHOD
Chop celery, green onion and cilantro and add to a small mixing bowl. Add fish sauce, lime juice, canola oil and a few turns of pepper and mix to combine. Let sit about 15 minutes to marinate. Transfer to a serving bowl. Top with chopped peanuts and serve.

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