Thai Cuisine Recipe

This is a two layer dessert, a jelly bottom layer and a top creamy layer that comes from mashed pumpkin. It's the combination of the two textures that make this a nice dessert. The flavouring for the green one is Bi-Tuoy (the bubblegum flavouring made from Pandan leaves). You can also buy pandan essence in shops if you can't get the leaves.

Ingredients For Lower Layer
20 gms Bi Tuoy (Pandan) Leaves
300 ml Water
100 gms Sugar
5 gms Agar Agar Jelly Powder

Ingredients for Pumpkin Layer
230 ml Coconut Milk
100 gms Pumpkin
20 gms Sugar
A Pinch of Salt
5 gms Agar Agar Jelly

Preparation
1. Lower Layer: Blend the bituoy leaves with water, bring the mix to the boil and simmer for a minute. Strain into a second pan you keep the green liquid and throw away the leaf pulp.
2. Add the sugar and agar to the hot green liquid and stir until dissolved. Pour into a tray and leave to cool and set with the tray at a slant, it makes for a prettier effect.
3. Pumpkin Layer: Cut the pumpkin into large cubes and boil in water until soft. Drain and mash.
4. Mix the mashed cooked pumpkin, coconut milk, sugar, agar, and salt and heat while stirring till the sugar has dissolved and the mix is smooth.
5. Leave to cool a little and pour over the bituoy layer, but be careful, agar sets very quickly, you want it to be cool enough to pour on the bituoy layer, but not to let it set. If you are more use to using gelatin as the setting agent agar can be a surprise - it sets above room temperature.

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Another way to eat friend fish, shitake mushrooms, especially dried ones, add a delicious flavour to the fish, the vinegar adds a little bite and the soy a little saltiness.

Ingredients
500 gms Fish Suitable for Frying
2 Tablespoons Flour
Oil For Frying
6-10 Shitake Mushroom ( soak overnight if dried )
1 Grated Ginger
3 Tablespoons Light Soy Sauce
1 Teaspoon Vinegar
1 Tablespoon Corn Flour
Shredded Chinese Cabbage (For the base)

Preparation
1. Clean the fish, gut and scrape the scales off. Your fishmonger will usually do this for you.
2. Cut diagonal score marks over the fish, to increase the surface that touches the oil and make more crunch.
3. Dry it with a piece of kitchen paper, cover with the flour, then shallow fry until the fish has a crunchy skin and is cooked through.
4. Slice the mushrooms, add to a pan with soy sauce, vinegar, grated ginger and heat until boiling.
5. Mix the corn flour, with a few tablespoons of water, mix into the pan with the soy mixture and stir until it thickens.
6. Shred the raw cabbage, lay it in the base, put the fish on top and pour the source over the top.

These biscuits have a plain base, the sweetness comes from the sweet flower shapes and a little crunch and sweetness comes from the sugared pumpkin seed, or you can also use sugared almonds or sesame seeds if you can't get the pumpkin seeds.

Ingredients Pai
240 gms Wheat Flour ( Cake flour )
1 Egg Tolk
100 gms Salty Butter
100 ml Water

Preparation
1. Mix flour and butter, and rub between your fingers to form a fine crumb.
2. Add egg and water slowly and massage until mixed to a soft dough.
3. Roll flat and very thin, and cut out 2cm diameter circles.
4. Cook in a pre-heated oven at 160 degrees celsius and bake for 8 minutes.

Ingredients for Ton Aigg
6 Egg Yolks
240 gms Wheat flour
100 gms Sugar
220 ml Coconut Milk

Preparation
1. Heat a dry frying pan to make it hot.
2. Put the flour in and toast it by stirring it for a few minutes (don't let it brown, just toast it a little). Set aside.
3. Boil the coconut milk and add sugar boil until some of the liquid has boiled off and it's it's a slightly thick syrup. Leave to cool (it needs to be cooled enough before adding the egg yolks, warm is OK)..
4. Stir in the eggs yolks into the syrup one by one, stirring them in as you do.
5. Add the flour to this, stir it in and put on a medium heat.
6. Keep stirring, this will thicken to a firm paste. Keep stirring and cooking and stirring and cooking to cook through the paste. Leave to cool.
7. Form small balls of this paste in your hands, this forms the centre of your flour.
8. Make the leave pattern with a toothpick in each ball.

Ingredients for Nam Mong Gud
100 gms Pumpkin Seed (Almonds or Sesame seeds)
50 gms Sugar
50 ml Rose Water (Or water and vanilla essence)

Preparation
1. Toast the pumpkin seeds in a dry pan.
2. Mix the water and sugar and heat until the sugar goes crystalized (at the fudge stage).
3. Mix in the pumpkin seeds and leave to cool.

Assembly
Take a base, place the seeds as leaves around the base, then place a ball of the yellow paste in the middle.

Spring is coming, well at least in the Northern hemisphere! As with previous years, I'll be doing lighter food and drinks for the coming summer like this one. If you can get fresh guava, this is one of the most delicious ways to use it. It is a juice, really a smoothy, made from the pulp of the guava fruit.
Use larger older guava for this recipe, it will give a sweet/sour taste to the drink.

Ingredients
120 gms Guava Fruit
5 Tablespoons Sugar Syrup (50-50 sugar & water solution)
236 ml water ( boil )

Preparation
1. Peel the guava, take only the outer flesh minus the seeds in the middle.
2. Mix the guava, syrup and water and blend in a food processor.
3. Pour over crushed ice.
4. Optionally a tiny pinch of salt over the top fills out the flavours.