How to Stock Your Pantry for Asian Cooking

Pantry

1. Always have lots of Asian short-grain or Thai jasmine rice, dry egg noodles and/or dry rice noodles handy. Every Asian delight is accompanied by a filling starch

2. Store a variety of sauces, such as soy sauce, tamari (Japanese soy sauce), oyster sauce, hoisin sauce, chili-garlic sauce, and black bean sauce, to name a few. These sauces are used in both marinades and stir-frying.
3. For Southeast Asian cooking, stock red or green curry pastes, coconut milk and fish sauce.

4. Keep plain or rice vinegar, dry sherry or Chinese cooking wine (Shaoxing), and sugar for stir-fry sauces.


5. Get some dried shiitake mushrooms, which add incredible depth of flavor to stir-fries and other dishes. Plus, after you soak the dried mushrooms in water, the water itself is delicious to use in your cooking.


6. Stock a block of firm tofu at all times for instant protein.


7. Refrigerate pre-prepared wonton skins and egg roll wrappers. These are readily available in most supermarkets and are great for making dim sum, spring rolls, wontons and pot stickers.


8. Keep a variety of oils for use in the wok and to flavor your creations. Vegetable oil is great for the wok; dark sesame oil provides a popular Asian taste.


9. Store garlic, garlic, garlic. It's as popular as rice. Fresh ginger root is great to have around, too.


10. Keep an assortment of Asian teas handy (one green, one black, one oolong) to serve with and after food.


11. Get some cornstarch. It's often used to thicken sauces and hold together the ingredients in wontons and dim sum.


12. Buy a wok and other Asian utensils, such as a bamboo steamer, a rice cooker and a cleaver.

Things You'll Need:

• Wonton Skins
• A Variety Of Teas
• Black Bean Sauce
• Chili Sauce
• Coconut Milk
• Cornstarches
• Curry Pastes
• Dried Shiitake Mushrooms
• Dry Sherry Or Shaoxing Cooking Wine
• Egg Noodles
• Egg Roll Wrappers
• Fish Sauce
• Garlic
• Ginger Roots
• Hoisin Sauce
• Oyster Sauce
• Rice
• Rice Noodles
• Rice Vinegars
• Sesame Oils
• Soy Sauces
• Sugars
• Tamari
• Tofu
• Vegetable Oils
• Bamboo Steamers
• Cleavers
• Rice Cookers
• Woks And Utensils

Tips & Warnings

• Prepare your mind before you begin creating your newly appointed Asian kitchen. Asian cooking is founded on the principle of yin and yang, or the balance of opposites: dark and light, soft and crunchy, sweet and sour. Some perfect examples to get you started are: ginger and sesame oil, plum sauce and vinegar, soy sauce and garlic, noodles and bean sprouts.
• For the simplest of stir-fry sauces, combine one part soy sauce, one part vinegar, one part sherry or Shaoxing, a pinch of sugar, a dash of chili oil or chili-garlic sauce, and one to two parts water. Whisk in a few teaspoons of cornstarch.

Read more: How to Stock Your Pantry for Asian Cooking

Southeast Asian cooking

Asian food

Southeast Asian cuisine is famous for its fresh, aromatic ingredients and colorful dishes. No matter Thai food, Singaporean or Indonesian, dishes from this part of the world offer new and exotic taste sensations and fragrances.

Besides that, many Southeast Asian countries such as Malaysia and Singapore have multi-ethnic populations. Immigrants from all over the world bring their home country dishes and then create diverse dishes, a fusion cuisine of various culture's cooking styles.

For example, Singapore's Nonya food is based on Chinese and Malaysian traditional cuisine, using basic Chinese cooking way but blending in Malaysian spices; Malaysia's Teh Taric is created by the early Indian immigrants who sought to preserve India's historic tea culture. Sweet pineapple, fragrant curries, and spicy satay transport visitors from Shanghai to a tropical beach, enjoying lazy days.

Thai food is famous for its hot chilis, harmonious blend of the spicy, sweet and sour, and the abundant fresh ingredients. Each dish appeals not only to the palate but to the eyes and nose.

Aquatic animals, plants and herbs are major ingredients; the herbs in traditional Thai cooking are also beneficial to the health.

The Thailand Pavilion at the World Expo offers food ranging from the piquant and challenging to milder sensations and flavors.

They include noodles in spicy prawn soup, chicken Khao Soi and Pad Thai with prawns, among others.

A proper Thai meal consists of a soup, a curry dish with condiments, and sometimes fish and vegetables. Though the small restaurant in the Thailand Pavilion can produce only relatively simple dishes, it uses the freshest, high quality ingredients to create a range of food.

Visitors can enjoy traditional Thai food just through three dishes at prices lower than those outside the Expo Park.

The Singapore Pavilion showcases Singaporean food and has organized varied food festivals during the Expo.

The food center at the Singapore Pavilion has four sections offering Indian, Malay, Chinese and Nonya food, around 80 different dishes. The open kitchen is glassed-in so visitors can watch the preparation.

The Indonesia Pavilion serves its unique cuisine at its enak (snack) eatery beside the pavilion in the shade. The grounds contain a small pool and boat, suggesting a tropical island. The most popular Indonesian food -- satay, chicken or beef kebobs, and Indonesian fried rice, also known as the national food -- are served.

Satay is a distinctive Indonesian spice and the satay in the Indonesia Pavilion is different from the satay common in Shanghai.

I Made Wana Ambara, head chef of an Indonesian five-star hotel, said Indonesian food is known for its variety of spices. It's hotter and sweeter than food in other Southeast Asian countries, commonly using spices, curry and coconut milk.

All the fresh ingredients are transported to Shanghai by air.

Fried rice is a must at almost every meal, including presidential banquets for foreign visitors. Thai fragrant rice and a special sweet soy sauce is used; the soy is made of black beans.

Other common ingredients are curry, pepper and raisins. Fried rice and satay are typically eaten together.

Ambara beef soup is recommended by the chef and is delicious without the MSG that is common throughout Asia; it also contains curry, rice noodles and egg.

The pavilion also features iced cendol, an Indonesian specialty drink made from fresh coconut milk, grass jelly, red beans and other ingredients.

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Asian Cooking Style

Asian cooking

Asian cuisine has become a very famous food known to the world. It has brought tremendous good memory of the great mouthwatering taste. The favorite sort after cuisines are form countries like Thailand, Indonesia, Malaysia, China, India and Japan. There are few other countries' food that has started to attract the attention of the world are like food from the golden triangle countries, that is Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.

Rice is the staple food and common among the Asian countries, therefore dishes cooked in Asian cuisine are always served with rice or noodles. Even rice by itself has a great many types with different cooking style in the different countries. Experience the aroma and different texture of different types of rice in different way of cooking will surely make you come back for this great food of the Asian countries.

In Asian countries, the ingredients prepared are normally fresh from the market. From generations to generations, it has been a home cook recipes where the ingredients such as fruits and vegetables are easily found in the garden or the field nearby the house. Herbs and spices are also the common ingredients used by the Asian in the delicious dishes cooked.

The Asian style of cooking method though has created different types of great taste, we understand that the ingredients are generally common and easy to find in any part of the world. There is no secret to the great taste as today we are pampered with many choices of canned, frozen ingredients or the ready made paste available to cook a good Asian cuisine anywhere, anytime we want.

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By Oh Chia Huey

The Origin of Kung Pao Chicken

Kung Pao Chicken

As one of the most famous traditional Chinese dishes, Kung Pao Chicken is a typical Szechwan dish made with peanuts, diced chicken and chili pepper. This dish is very popular in USA and many European countries and it is often used as the test item in the professional chef test to evaluate the skill level of a chef. But why people call it "Kung Pao Chicken", in this article, I would like to tell it origin.

In fact, Kung Pao is the name of a person, who called Ding Baozhen. Ding Baozhen was born in Ping Yuan town, Guizhou province. He was a Jinshi (Jinshi: a successful candidate in the highest imperial examinations in feudal China) in late Qing dynasty. In feudal china, if you were selected in the imperial examinations, it means that you would be the high-ranking official. First and last, Mr. Ding was served as the governor in Shandong (the hometown of Confucius) and Szechwan province. Also he was a gourmet and liked to treat his friends with his dish "stir-fried diced chicken" developed by himself. This dish was not famous then. When Ding was served as the governor of Szechwan, he improved his dish with chili pepper since all the local people liked dishes with chili pepper. As a result, the original version of this dish combining spicy flavor formed. All his guests loved the new dish very much and it became more and more popular among local people. Later, Ding was granted the title"Tai Zi Shao Bao" (a kind of official, literal means the protector of crown prince), and the Kung Pao is the short name of this title. After Mr. Ding died, people named this dish as "Kung Pao Chicken" in memory of Ding Baozhen.

Now, Kung Pao Chicken has many versions and all of them are liked by people.

For any other information about Kung pao chicken and other delicious Chinese food,please visithttp://www.kung-pao-chicken.com/kung-pao-chicken/

Phad Thai (Pad Thai)

Phad Thai, Thai: ผัดไทย, "Thai style frying") is a dish of stir-fried rice noodles with eggs, fish sauce (Thai น้ำปลา), tamarind juice, red chilli pepper, plus any combination of bean sprouts, shrimp, chicken, or tofu, garnished with crushed peanuts and coriander. It is normally served with a piece of lime, the juice of which can be added along with Thai condiments. In Thailand, Phad Thai is also served with a piece of banana flower.

Two different styles of Phad Thai  have evolved: the version most often found in the streets ofThailand, which is relatively dry and light, and the version that seems dominant in many restaurants in the West, which is heavier and may be covered in red oil.
Though Phad Thai  has been known in various forms for centuries – it is thought to have been brought to the ancient Thai capital of Ayuthaya by Vietnamese traders – it was first made popular as a national dish by Luang Phibunsongkhram when he was prime minister during the 1930s and 1940s, partly as an element of his campaign for Thai nationalism and centralization, and partly for a campaign to reduce rice consumption in Thailand. The Thai economy at this time was heavily dependent on rice exports; Phibunsongkhram hoped to increase the amount of it available for export by launching a campaign to educate the poor in the production of rice noodles, as well as in the preparation of these noodles with other ingredients to sell in small cafes and from street carts.

Phat Thai

The name Phad Thai literally means "Thai-style stir-fried noodles", which suggests an originthat isn't Thai. Indeed, noodle cookery in most Southeast Asian countries was introduced by the wave of immigrants from southern China settling in the region in the past century. They brought with them rice noodles and their ways of cooking them. During the recession following World War II, the post-war government of Field Marshall Pibul, desperate in its efforts to revive the Thai economy, looked for ways to stem the massive tide of unemployment. Among the occupations the government aggressively promoted to give the populace a way to earn a living was the production of rice noodles and the operation of noodle shops. Detailed instructions on how to make the noodles and recipes were printed and distributed around the country. From these efforts, rice noodles became firmly rooted in the country and have since become a widespread staple food.

Outside of Thailand, Phad Thai  is one of the best-known Thai dishes, and is very popular in Thai restaurants in the United States and Australia.

The Cuisine of Thailand

floating market 

Thailand is a small country in Southeast Asia, sharing a peninsula with Burma, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam and sits between India and China, and its food is clearly influenced by both India and China. Yet Thailand's food, like Thailand's people, has maintained its own distinct identity.

The country of Thailand forms a crescent around the Gulf of Thailand and has a vast array of rivers and canals. This gives the Thai an abundance of water to irrigate rice paddies as well as lots of fish. Plenty of fish, fish sauce and shrimp paste can be found in a lot of Thai meals. The other distinct flavors of Thai cooking come from the often ground, indigenous spices and produce: coconut milk, lemon grass, tamarind, ginger, black pepper, galangal, garlic, cilantro, basil, palm sugar, turmeric, cumin, shallots, green onions and chili. 

Thai food is either stir-fried, steamed or sometimes grilled and as with most Southeast Asia meals, a Thai meal has no courses. And like most cooking of the region, the Thai meal is built around rice. Southern Thai people eat long-grain rice, while the northerners favor short-grain or 'sticky' rice. Noodles, probably introduced from China, also play a role in Thai cooking. curries and other hot dishes are eaten by the Thai as sauces to compliment and flavoring the rice.

Meat is expensive across most of Asia due to limited grazing space so meat dished use less meat than the average western dish. The meat is often mixed with a sauce or stir fried through veggies to bulk up the dish. A common misconception is that all Asians use chopsticks. In Thailand the Thai people eat with a spoon and fork, in fact only the Vietnamese use chopsticks in Southeast Asia.