Friday, August 5, 2011

"we're RICH!"

How do you measure wealth? I joked the other day "you have to lock your car in summer because otherwise people will put bags of free zuccini in there". The wife tells me the other day "we're rich!" not because of powerball, but because a guy at her office gave her 4 cucumbers, and since the other lady in the office was like "I have a mountain of them at home too", we got a second bunch. What do you do with 8 cucumbers? I don't pickle, but I do have superb recipes. I made my version of Thai Cucumber salad.

When I first moved to Chicago in 1988 there was a wonderful Thai restaurant across the street. They always gave you a little dish of their cucumber salad with whatever you ordered. It was beautiful and tasty, and I happened to see the recipe in a cook book I bought in 1991. This recipe is superb too. I have NO idea what fish sauce is and do not plan to learn, so I use BBQ sauce, or ketchup of chili sauce. You can also use cilantro instead of oregano, but I never seem to have any. I have another cucumber recipe coming to this blog soon...as you might imagine......

combine in small bowl: 3 tbs lime juice, one or 2 tablespoons of garlic minced, a few shakes dried oregano, one tbs sesame oil, 3 tbs BBQ sauce, or chili sauce or ketchup, 2 tbs sugr, many shakes of dried pepper flakes----stir and set aside at least half an hour--do not add to cucumber mixture until you are about to serve

combine in nice serving bowl: 2 small cucumbers, sliced thin, 1/2 cup red onion sliced fine, 1/2 of a bell pepper--yellow, orange or red, sliced into matchsticks----mix in bowl, and when ready to serve, pour the liquid dressing on top, stir around, top with sesame seeds


9 comments:

  1. You're right - you DON'T want to know what fish sauce is!

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  2. fermented fish guts in a jar? I am veg, and there is no way no HOW I am gonna try that stuff

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  3. That salad looks amazing!! I love cucumbers...you ARE rich!

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  4. This sound be awesome. If I liked cucumbers even a little bit. :)

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  5. Yum yum yom, Daddy Warbucks. You ARE rich!

    You should not fear the fish sauce. I buy mine at the grocery store in the oriental foods section.

    It's a little stinky, but ZOINKS! The flavor!

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  6. no no, I am a vegan, and there is no way i am touching any animal anything :)

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  7. Fong's has vegan pizza...couple options...so if you're ever in town...

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  8. It does sound good! My mom used to pickle...those were delicious too.

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