Snow day here in PA today. That big winter storm that's hitting much of the Midwest and East Coast is giving us a fair amount of snow and, unfortunately, sleet. The sleet really ruins it for me. I get excited when I hear we might get huge amounts of snow, but the sleet cuts down the overall snowfall totals and makes it hard to enjoy, not to mention shovel. It's also bitter cold and windy outside, so kind of a disappointment. It would be fun to romp in with the kiddos and dog, but I don't think that's going to happen!
Sorry for the lull here, but I've actually been called into to sub for the last 5 workdays and have been thrown off my routine. And believe me, that's a good thing - it got me out of the house and put a little extra money in our pockets. But on to the regularly scheduled program......the Pad Thai I was talking about on Sunday.........
Mmmm...one of my favorite dishes is Pad Thai. There is one Thai restaurant in the area, but we have not tried it. It looks like a hole in the wall from the street, but it could be nicer inside. Even if it isn't, sometimes a hole in the wall turns out some great food!
Restaurant or no restaurant, it's nice to know how to cook your favorite ethnic dishes at home. I used to think that Pad Thai was a peanut-based sauce. While it is often served with chopped peanuts as a garnish, it does not have any peanut butter in the sauce. It's a sweet and sour sauce, most of the flavor coming from the tamarind paste or concentrate.
At first I thought I had a complete disaster on my hands. First, I didn't have time to soak the rice noodles as the recipe indicates, so I cooked them according to the package directions. The package called for cooking them for 6-8 minutes and even though I only cooked them for 5, they were still a bit mushy. Next time, I will soak the noodles as directed! The next thing that worried me was the sauce - it just didn't seem that interesting at all after I mixed the ingredients together.
Fortunately, I worried for nothing. Yes, the noodles were a but mushy, but they were edible. The sauce, once combined with the all of the rest of the ingredients became very close to what I think of when I think of Pad Thai. I did change the recipe up by using snow peas and tempeh instead of broccoli and shrimp, but this is a recipe that allows a little substitution and the snow peas and tempeh worked very nicely. I ran out of time, so I skipped the eggs, but I would like to use these next time.
While researching more on Pad Thai (but after the meal), I found this great tutorial over on Chez Pim for making your own Pad Thai. I don't think I'll ever take the time to prepare just a serving or two at a time as she suggests, but the tutorial is full of some really good information.
So, I need to refine my Pad Thai skills and try again, but not bad for a first time.
Today we'll be huddled inside (DH is off from work because of the snow too), cleaning, doing laundry and baking. And a little bit of a Valentine's Day celebration...a bit of lump crab and some champagne.........
Okay, how'd you do that with your post titles? I like the way that looks!
ReplyDeleteNow I have to go play around a bit...
Erika - Hi. :)
ReplyDeleteThanks. I tried something like this before and ended up changing it back, so we'll see.......
To do this, you go to the "posts" part in your template (or at least in my template) and look for "post h3", or your post header (not date header). In my old Blogger template, it was under "post-title". Then you need to modify and/or add the following:
background-color:#ffffcc;
text-align:center;
border:1px solid #999966;
Of course using whatever colors you choose, you can do a dotted border, whatever. Pretty easy!
I think I want the text bigger though.....will have to play around some more. ;)
Thanks Alysha! I wanted something like this for my recipes. It worked perfectly.
ReplyDeleteYou can watch how Pad Thai or lots of other Thai dishes are cooked at
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thaifoodtonight.com/thaifoodtonight/recipes.htm