[CH] Thai-style stir-fry

Margo Thompson (Margo.Thompson@uvm.edu)
Thu, 23 May 2002 08:58:46 -0400

The May/June issue of Cook's Illustrated has a set of very tasty 
Thai-style vegetable stir-fries. Sure, they aren't the Colonel's 
recipes, but I can find all the ingredients here in 
ethnically-challenged Vermont. And they are awfully good. They all 
start with the same base for the sauce:

3 T fish sauce
1 T lime juice plus 1 t grated lime zest
1 T light brown sugar
1/8 t red pepper flakes (yeah, right: substitute a minced Thai chiles 
to your taste)

The variation we tried was a peanut sauce with broccoli and red pepper:

Add to the base:
3/4 C coconut milk
1/4 C water (I forgot this one time, didn't really matter)
3 T smooth peanut butter

This gets poured on the sauted vegetables, which have been done with 
some garlic and ginger (maybe more chiles here, too), in the pan and 
heated through. Serve with rice.

This was an excellent side to grilled skirt steak. It was less 
successful with scallops added--little bay scallops got lost, larger 
ones might have worked better.

We're going to try the red curry variation next (Add to base: 1 C 
coconut milk, 2 t red curry paste--probably more). This goes with 
cauliflower and snow peas, sauted with garlic and ginger, garnished 
with minced basil. I think shrimp would be a good addition, we'll see!
-- 
Margo Thompson
Asst. Professor, Art History

Art Department
Williams Hall
University of Vermont
72 University Place
Burlington, VT  05405-0168
(802) 656-0667