I have so many recipes that I want to try out but when it is time to choose one I usually can’t decide. Then also comes that inner me asking myself should I go buy all those ingredients? Who is going to help me eat it? How many times can I handle the leftovers? Will I ever use those other ingredients or is it just a one time deal? With these kind of questions running inside my head this is why you don’t see me sharing many American or Italian dishes. I don’t have milk, cream or cheese handy. Nor do I have tomato sauce or dried Italian herbs and noodles in my small pantry. It is currently occupied with bottles of fish sauce, different types of soy sauce, rice wine vinegar and oyster sauce. On the other end it is filled with aromatic spices like star anise, dried kaffir lime leaves, dried shitaki mushroom, tamarind base powder, all sorts of dried noodles like mung bean thread (glass noodles), rice noodles in various shapes and egg noodles. For this reason, I tend to stick with Asian recipes just because most of the ingredients are readily handy. Perhaps one day in the near future when I have a large enough pantry I can stock additional ingredients from other parts of the world.

Cambodian grilled pork salad, ញុំាសាច់ជ្រូកអាំង (Ngorm Sach Jrook Arng) is just one of those quick and easy things to put together. The only thing I had to run to the store for was to get the meat. All others I stock on a regular basis. You can substitute pork with either chicken or beef. You can even use left-over grill meats for this. But because the spicy garlic dressing that accommodate this salad is a bit strong I would not recommend marinated grill meat unless you tone the dressing down a bit. Everything in this recipe can be prepared in advance hence ‘quick & easy’.  Asian Mint or Vietnamese Mint is now one of my favorite herbs to pair with Cambodian salad but you can always sub it out for other fresh herbs such as basil, fish-wort, or even cilantro. Just go with what you like. You can also enjoy this salad as is, but do increase the amount of shredded cabbage or as part of a meal with rice and other dishes. Another alternative is to eat it as a wrap. For this you will omit the shredded cabbage and use lettuce instead to wrap everything. Add some rice noodles in the wrap for a fulfilling meal.  Prepare the dressing but use it as a dip instead.

Video Tutorial:

Cambodian Grilled Pork Salad
(Ngorm Sach Jrook Arng) ញុំាសាច់ជ្រូកអាំង

Ingredients
1 tablespoon palm sugar
3½ tablespoons lime juice, about 2 limes
1½ tablespoons fish sauce
7 garlic cloves, minced
10 bird’s eye chili, chopped (adjust amount to your liking)
¾ lb. pork, season with salt & pepper to taste
1 cup shredded cabbage
a couple Asian Mint stems or use your favorite fresh herb
sliced lime rings for garnish

Method:
Grill pork until fully cook. Then slice about ¾ in. thick and set aside.

To make the dressing add palm sugar, lime juice, and fish sauce in a bowl. Whisk until the sugar dissolves.

Whisk in minced garlic followed by the chili peppers to complete the dressing. Taste and adjust to your liking. It should be sour and garlic-ky.

Add in the sliced pork and toss gently to coat.

To serve, arrange the shredded cabbage on one side and the tossed pork on the other. Pour any remaining juices on top. Garnish with fresh herb and lime rings. Alternatively, you can toss the shredded cabbage, and the herb (using the leaves only), into the salad bowl. ENJOY!

The last batch of Grilled Pork Patties lasted me through 3 meals so this time I doubled up on the recipe and divided into three separate recipe one being this Grilled Lemongrass Pork Skewers, Sach Jrook Arng Doawt Kul Sluk Krey សាច់ជ្រូកអាំងដោតគុលស្លឹកគ្រៃ and another Asian Style Spaghetti & Meatballs which I will share with you later.

This was also another one of my cooking experiment episode. I find that my pork patty mixture taste so great the last time I figure why not kill 3 birds with one stone? Adding lemongrass to the mixture really brings out  a heavenly aroma when grilling. I couldn’t even wait to taste it. Using the lemongrass stalk as a skewer not only makes a wonderful presentation but as the meat is cooked it is also infused by the flavors from the lemongrass stalk.

Grilled Lemongrass Pork Skewers
(Sach Jrook Arng Doawt Kul Sluk Krey) សាច់ជ្រូកអាំងដោតគុលស្លឹកគ្រៃ

Ingredients
8 tablespoons of pork patties mixture
½ cup minced lemongrass
1 thick lemongrass stalk or 2 thin ones

Method:
To make the skewer take a thick stalk of lemongrass and cut about 5 inches from the bottom. With the tip of your knife split the stalk in halves. If the stalk is small you can use two separate lemongrass stalks. Set aside.

Mix in  ½ cup of minced lemongrass massage it into the pork.

Divide the mixture in half and use your hand to shape the mixture around the lemongrass skewer. Repeat the same for the other one.

Set it on a hot grill and turning them ocassionally until golden brown and thoroughly cooked. Serve hot with fish sauce for dipping, cucumber relish or pickled carrots & daikon.

Grilled Pork Patties with Cucumber Relish

Here’s a tasty recipe that I’ve found from various resource online and adapted to fit my taste bud. It is very easy and oh so delicious that I wanted to share with my readers.

My Mother had made fish cake and chicken patties in the past but I don’t think I recall her making patties out of pork before. Or maybe she had and I just don’t remember. LOL Anyhow, the other day I bought a lot of ground pork for various dish but as soon as I came across these recipe for pork patties I immediately wanted to try it out, even more so when it is “grilled” and not “fried” like fish cake. The recipe called for simple ingredients I had handy but my concern was more on how I was going to form the patty. I remember my Mother used to complained tell me that her fish cake came out a bit uneven on sizes and shape and that she used a plastic lid from a pickled jar to form the patties. So once I got my mixture ready my mind was ticking. Suddenly I got an “ah-ha” moment. LOL I made a test run by forming my patties with my little 3″ sauce dish. It worked out perfectly, at least in my opinion. If you don’t have a jar lid or these little sauce dish you can just roll it in a ball and then press it flat to form the patties. You can also keep them round and make pork meatballs. Just stick them on a soaked skewer so it’s easier to grill.

Anything grilled goes well with pickled veggies, salad or relish. I choose to accompany my grilled pork patties with garden fresh cucumber relish. These wonderful crisp organic cucumbers were growing in my backyard so it was a great opportunity for me to use them. Here’s my take on Grilled Pork Patties with Cucumber Relish ប្រហឹតសាច់ជ្រូកនឹងជ្រុកត្រសក់.

Organic Garden Fresh Cucumbers

Ingredients
1.5 lbs ground pork
1 head of garlic (about 12 cloves), finely chopped I use my garlic presser which saved lots of time
2 tablespoons ground black pepper
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon salt
2.5 tablespoons baking powder This is what gives it that nice and bouncy texture. It also helps keep the meat in shape and not too sticky when you form it.
1/8 cup water
1 tablespoon caramel sugar (optional)

Cucumber Relish
2 medium cucumber, halves seed removed and sliced diagonally
3-4 shallots, sliced
5 red chillies (optional)
1 tablespoon unsalted roasted peanut, roughly chopped
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons fish sauce
2 tablespoons vinegar (rice or distilled)
2 tablespoons warm-hot water

Method:
In a mixing bowl combine meat, garlic, black pepper, sugar, and salt. Mix the ingredients thoroughly.

Next, mix the baking powder with water and whisk until you get a nice foam. Add it to the pork and fold it in with the mixture. Incorporate caramel sugar if using. This gives the patty a nice golden brown color when grilling. You can make the caramel by bringing 1 tablespoon sugar and ½ tablespoon water to a boil and then simmer until the sugar brown.

Allow everything to mingle in the fridge for about 1-2 hours. This will make it easier to form the patties.

When it’s ready, use the lid of a jar, a small sauce dish, a cookie cutter, or your palms to form a patty or meatballs. Grill about 15 minutes on each side.  My recipe here makes 17 patties (3″ inches). These patties freeze well. If you plan to do so, line the patties with wax/parchment paper so it doesn’t stick and freeze them individually (single layer). Once frozen, you can transfer them into a zip lock bag and grill them at a later time. There is no need to thaw them.

To make the cucumber relish, combine slice cucumbers and shallots. Mix together sugar, fish sauce, vinegar and water. Stir until the sugar is dissolve then add it to cucumber and shallots. Allow to pickle for about 15 minutes. Just before serving top with chilies and peanuts.

Grilled Stuffed Tomatoes

When I was making my Stuffed Tomatoes Soup I wanted to try an experiment. What if I try grilling the stuffed tomatoes instead? Would it pop? Would it leak? Would it collapse? A quick Google search on “stuffed tomatoes” yield a lot of results but mainly about baked or grilled and not much in a soup form. Hopefully my Stuffed Tomatoes Soup can be an addition to that search too Anyhow, the results that I came across for bake or grilled tomatoes had some sort of American or Italian touch to it. The ingredients would call for bread crumbs, cheese, olives and etc. Just things that I don’t usually stock in my Asian cabinet. I just gave up with the search and start putting my imagination to play.

The result? Oh my! It was pretty G-O-O-D in my opinion. It met my Asian Taste expectation. Again because I used slightly unripe tomatoes it hold it’s shape during the grilling process. Although the juices began to flow out a bit from the stuffing and at one time I thought it was going to explode, but it didn’t, thank goodness LOL Also I had to finish it off in the oven setting it to broil because I wanted to brown the top filling a bit.

Here is my recipe for making what I called Grilled Stuff Tomatoes – Asian Style.

The fillings for my Grilled Stuffed Tomatoes remains almost the same as what I did with my Stuffed Tomatoes Soup. The only difference is that I omit the addition of chopped tomatoes flesh and instead added a bed of fresh basil leaves at the bottom of the hollowed out tomatoes in an attempt to flavor the fillings as it grilled and reserve some to garnish as pictured.

Steps to note:

1. Omit adding chopped tomatoes flesh into the filling.

2. Use a couple basil leaves to line the inside of the tomatoes as this will add a nice taste an aroma to the pork fillings when it is grilled.

3. Start on the grill for about 10-15 minutes and then transfer to the oven setting it to broil so it finish cooking the top. Allow it to cool a bit before serving as they might be a bit soft too handle right away. I am using a mini home conventional oven so the temperature setting is a little bit off. Just keep an eye on it when you brown the top fillings as it doesn’t take long.

Garnish with some basil leaves and serve with hot steamed rice. YUM!

Grilled Lemongrass Chicken

The weather is still hot to enjoy a soupy dish so even my steamed rice are prepare hours ahead so that it’s not too hot when it’s time to eat. Oh, I don’t use a rice cooker because the one my Mother gave me is too big and I didn’t bother trying to look for a 1-2 serving rice cooker so I just settle with my gas stove and a small heavy pot.

These days I like to cook dry dishes such as this delicious “out of this world” Cambodian Style Lemongrass Chicken in Khmer called  សាច់ម៉ាន់អាំងប្រឡាក់គ្រឿង (Sach Mon Arng Prolak Kroeung.) It’s very quick  & easy to make and cook because it’s grilled outside. This mean that less heat and time is used in the kitchen. I am using the same Kroeung that I’ve used when making Cambodian Spicy & Sour Beef Soup and  Cambodian Stir-Fry Lemongrass Chicken. Used here is a small 1-2 lbs game hen which you can substitute with chicken breast, thighs, leg quaters or even just wings. Marinating time will depends on the cut of chicken used but the longer (overnight) the better.

Ingredients
1 game hen chicken (about 1-2 lbs)
3 tablespoons lemongrass paste (available for purchase)
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1 tablespoon fish sauce
1 tablespoon oyster sauce

Method:
Combine marinade and mix well. Pour and rub over the chicken. If using chicken with skin, use your fingers to loosen up the skin and add some of the lemongrass rub in between.  Cover and allow to marinade about 1-2 hours but best overnight turning once in awhile .

Chicken Marinating

Pull out and let stand at room temperature about 20 minutes to remove the chill.  Grill it as usual be sure to flip and allow to cook on both side. Enjoy with hot steamed or leftover rice.