Pad Thai

ad Thai is Thailand's ubiquitous street food that needs little introduction. I believe if you really want to get a real taste of the food and culture of a place you should try its street food. The street food of a place defines the food and culture of a place and is usually the best the culture has to offer. Thai cuisine is definitely my favorite after Italian (and of course Indian). Pad Thai has all the qualities I like and more. It contains noodles, lots of veggies, crunchy roasted peanuts and is simmered in a tangy, sweet and spicy tamarind-soy based sauce. It is my second favorite Thai entrée after red thai curry which I order every time I visit any Thai restaurant. It is one of the national dishes of Thailand and is perhaps the most beloved of all Thai dishes and also the favorite of vegetarians like me. One put off for me being a veggie is the fish sauce/shrimp paste used in the preparation so lately I have making the dish at home without the fish/shrimp and you get the clean tasty dish custom made per your liking not to mention it is a breeze to make.

The term 'Pad Thai' literally translates to 'fried thai', but it really refers to (usually) flat rice noodles fried with thai spices and seasonings.

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Vegetable Manchurian

Indo-Chinese cuisine is something I just absolutely adore as is by almost everyone in my family. Chinese food used to be on the top of my list when eating out. Chinese food which we get here in the US is very different from what we get back home in India. Also being a vegetarian we had better options there. Here the more stress is on pork and sea food so the choices are very limited.
These are really easy to make at home, taste awesome and are always a big hit with guests. Vegetable manchurian is one of the most recognized dishes in the cuisine. These are fried vegetable balls in a multi sauce gravy often paired with chinese style fried rice. These are great for a potluck parties and will be gone in seconds!! It can be made dry or with gravy (see notes). Also different kinds of vegetables can be used like red bell pepper, cauliflower and even broccoli. The only thing that used to be time consuming for me in this recipe was prepping the veggies, grating and chopping carrots and cabbage :( so one day while buying groceries a packet of coleslaw (it is mix of grated cabbage and carrots usually used for making coleslaw salad) caught my attention and bingo life is much easier now. But if you don't have access to this you can always grate and chop your own vegetables. If you don't like deep frying, manchurians can also be baked in the oven, hmm.. I will come on this in some other post. For today enjoy these deep fried beauties and you will forget about the number on the scale for... well.. some time ;)

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