Thai Salmon Salad with Yam Dressing

I think many people agree when I say that moving out from an apartment can be so nerve-wrecking. Today it’s been (again) so incredibly beautiful day that it would have felt like a waste to spend it indoors. That is because here up North you can never know if the summer lasts for three months, three weeks or three days. That’s why every day of warmth and sun should be embraced like it was the last one.

Another reason to get out of the apartment today was of course to say good-byes for now to all the friends. As I don’t know when will we meet again, even though I know that day is not so far away. I felt slightly sad anyway, those people have been very important during the months here, where me an S don’t practically know more than a handful of people. So now, after a day in the sun with friends our apartment is still a total mess, which means  tomorrow we can only hope it will be cold and rainy! Because tomorrow for me means scrubbing, rubbing, wiping, washing, vacuuming, arranging, and finally, packing.

To the point: Sun usually makes me less hungry, which is great, because I sometimes feel my stomach is bottomless. So tonight our dinner was salad. I love salads and I would like to have more of them, but for some reason S is not completely agreeing in this. I assume for a man a salad for dinner is not quite enough to feel satisfied. And because it doesn’t make much sense to prepare different food for each of us, we rarely have salads. This time the inspiration for the salad came from my dear friend who one day gave me a coconut. So of course I had to prepare something out of it! I have never opened a coconut, but luckily the South American of the house knows how to do the thing. And so beautifully it opened, like an egg, by just using a knife. I’m impressed!

I’m also so happy we decided to use the coconut in exactly this dish, because I think we found a new favorite again! Underlining the word we, as S loved it too. I might have told he’s a big fan of Thai food, after I introduced him to the wonders of this intriguing cuisine. This salad was a nice change for our weekly red/green/yellow/massaman/panang curry tradition.

The recipe I took from the newest edition of a Finnish magazine Olivia, and as it’s not online (at least yet), here it comes for you to take and save in your archives! The original recipe calls for fresh mint, but as our market had run out of it, I substituted it with a same amount of fresh coriander.

Thai Salmon Salad with Yam Dressing (serves 3, or 2 very hungry ones)

400g fresh salmon fillet

0,5 teaspoon salt

1 shallot onion

1dl grated coconut

1 English cucumber

100g long green beans

big bunch of lettuce of your choice (NOT iceberg), roughly torn

1dl fresh mint, chopped

For the dressing:

1-3 small, very hot chillies, thinly sliced

3 kaffir lime leaves (frozen or fresh, I used frozen), cut into thin strips

1 teaspoon fresh chili paste, like sambal oelek or alike (use more if your chillies are not hot)

5 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice

4 tablespoons Thai fish sauce

4 tablespoons coconut cream

2 tablespoons palm sugar

Whisk together the ingredients of the dressing and refrigerate.

Open the coconut. Now I did not do this, like I told, so I cannot really tell how to do it. But I googled and found many tutorials which show the proper way to open your coconut, so you might wanna take a look in case you’re not already a pro in this :-) Grate the coconut.

Thinly slice the shallot and cut the cucumber into 0,5cm strips. Boil the beans in a saucepan for 3 minutes, drain, let cool and cut in 2-3 pieces.

Spread the lettuce on the serving plate and top with cucumbers, green beans, shallots, grated coconut and chopped mint. 

Cut the salmon fillet into strips (about 2cm x 4cm) and sprinkle with salt. Heat up a teflon coated skillet over a medium-high heat and cook the salmon pieces quickly, about half to one minute on each side without oil or butter.

Pour the dressing on the salad base and place the salmon pieces on top. Garnish with some fresh coriander.

Crazy About Pad Thai

It’s pretty weird I still haven’t posted any Thai food recipe, even that is definitely (alongside of Italian) the kind of food we cook most at home. Especially Thai curries are our favorites, because they’re flavorous, they are extremely quick and simple to do, and they have a real kick in them. I have never been to Thailand myself, but learned to love their food here in Finland, in Thai restaurants and in friends’ homes.

When me and my boyfriend started to date in 2009, it was one of the first times we went out in bars together and ended up eating whatever we could find in my fridge late at night. That day I had prepared me some red curry and so we devoured the leftovers with a good appetite - at least I did. For my significant one that was rather a strange experience, simply because he had never tasted Thai food before. However, something changed that night and since then he’s been a huge fan. It’s actually him, who requires us to have at least one Thai dinner in a week.

One of my favorites of Thai cuisine is pad thai. Along times I’ve tried to find a proper recipe for this dish by googling, but there’s always something that could be done better. This is why I have always done my own version of it. Actually it’s about a time for me to write the recipe down, as I always forget how I prepared it last time, and have to start all over again. In fact, I start losing the memory of preparing this delicious noodle dish already, but I’ll try to be as precise as possible with the amounts of ingredients.

And PS. I totally FORGOT the egg from my previous pad thai, that’s why you can’t see it in the pics ;)

The Best Pad Thai in Western World (serves 3-4)

200g flat dry rice noodles

150g firm tofu, cubed

1 tablespoon canola oil

200g shrimps (I use frozen ones but peel and devein yours, if raw)

150g bean sprouts, washed and drained

2 cloves garlic, very finely minced

2 eggs

50ml salted peanuts, coarsely chopped

4 spring onions, finely chopped

handful of fresh coriander, coarsely chopped

lime wedges, to garnish

For the sauce:

6 tablespoons Thai fish sauce

50ml fresh lime juice

3 tablespoons ketjap manis

1 tablespoon palm sugar

1 tablespoon light soy sauce

2 heaping teaspoons tamarind paste

2 teaspoons chili paste or one fresh red chili, finely chopped

Bring water to a boil in a large sauce pan. Break the noodle nests slightly smaller an boil according to the package instructions. Cooking time for rice noodles is usually very short, around 1-3 minutes depending on thickness. It’s better to leave the noodles a bit al dente and elastic, as they cook slightly more when added into the wok. Rinse ready noodles with cold water, drain and set aside.

Mix all the sauce ingredients well together, until the sugar dissolves. Break the eggs into a bowl and beat lightly.

Heat up a wok pan and fry tofu cubes over a medium heat without oil until they’re slightly golden on each side. When ready, add 1 tablespoon of canola oil, the shrimps (if you use raw ones, fry them for 1 minute before adding the next ingredients), garlic, bean spouts and drained noodles. Stir fry for 1 minute.

Make some room in your wok and pour the beaten eggs in the pan. Scramble until almost cooked, then mix with the rest of the ingredients on the pan. 

Lastly, add in the pad thai sauce, 3 chopped spring onions and half of the crushed peanuts. Stir fry for a minute or two more, until everything is cooked and well incorporated.

Garnish with rest of the spring onion, peanuts and fresh coriander. Serve with lemon wedges and shriracha. 

Udon Noodles with Tofu, Mushrooms and Spinach

My love for Asian food grows day after day. One day I visited an Asian supermarket in Helsinki and bought me a packet of fresh udon noodles. I had never cooked them before and was curious about their pale white, thick and soft appearance. This simple wok dish was so, so delicious (I mean, I cannot underline its deliciousness enough…there just aren’t words for that) that I cannot believe how easy it was to prepare and how little effort it requires from you. You can also use dry noodles but if you can get the fresh ones, I’d prefer those.

I’m about to write another post about how to properly fry and marinate tofu for Asian dishes, to get the best out of it, so stay tuned. Meanwhile, do yourself a favor and try this simple recipe here. You will return to it over and over again.

This portion was enough for two hungry people (or one hungry and one very hungry). And a word of warning: even you would not be that hungry, you just can’t stop eating this.

Udon Noodles with Tofu, Mushrooms and Spinach

600g fresh udon noodles (or 250g dried udon noodles)

200g firm tofu, cubed

150g shiitake mushrooms, whole

100g white button mushrooms, sliced

150g baby spinach

1 tablespoon canola oil

1 tablespoon fresh ginger, peeled and finely chopped

3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

3 tablespoons soy sauce

2 tablespoons ketjap manis (sweet Indonesian soy sauce)

2 teaspoons fresh chili paste

2 teaspoons sesame oil

finely chopped scallions to garnish

Bring water to a boil in a large saucepan. Boil the noodles according to the package directions. Drain.

Fry the tofu cubes on a dry frying pan (don’t use oil!) on a medium heat until they are golden on each side. Set aside.

Heat the canola oil in a wok or a large skillet. Add chopped garlic and ginger, and fry on a medium heat for 30 seconds. Add the shiitakes and button mushrooms and continue frying for 5 minutes more.

Add the baby spinach one handful at the time into the wok until it all cooks down. Add the noodles, tofu, soy sauce, ketjap manis, sesame oil and chili paste and toss well to incorporate all ingredients.

Serve with scallions and sriracha sauce, if you like it hot (like I do).

Mandu, a Korean Dumpling

Even I usually like to keep things simple while cooking at home, sometimes it’s great to start a real food project that takes requires a bit more time and effort. One example could be sushi. I love doing sushi, and doing sushi together with someone is even better. My pasta machine is still waiting to be used on top of the kitchen cupboard. Some raviolis, yum!

Dumplings are kind of the Asian version of raviolis. I guess different Far Eastern countries have their own ways of doing dumplings, but this time I decided to make mine Korean style. I got the idea of preparing them after watching a Korean horror film about dumplings that provided the eater an infinite youth. These ones didn’t have this magic power though, but instead, they were truly delicious.

I found the recipe from Anna’s Korean Kitchen Diary and modified the measurements a bit. Below you can find a recipe of a great dipping sauce for these. You can prepare your dumplings fried or boiled/steamed. I decided to fry mine.

Korean Dumplings

250g ground turkey (leave this out and add more tofu if you want a vegetarian version)

150g firm tofu, crumbled

1 pack (30-40) dumpling wraps

1 egg

1/4 cabbage

1 big carrot or 2 small ones, grated

1 small zucchini, grated

1/2 onion, finely chopped

3 scallions, finely sliced

2 cloves garlic, finely chopped

1 tablespoon sesame oil

1 tablespoon sesame seeds

1 tablespoon soy sauce

salt and black pepper to taste

canola oil for frying

First prepare the filling. Slice the cabbage very finely into 2cm strips. Steam lightly in a boiling water, squeeze out the excess water and sautée in a frying pan in a little bit of canola oil and a pinch of salt until soft and dry of any water.

Add a pinch of salt in the grated zucchini, let stand for a few minutes and squeeze out the excess water. When preparing the filling it’s very important that all the ingredients are dry. Fry the zucchinis and the grated carrots in a small splash of canola oil.

Fry the ground turkey until dry of liquids. Squeeze any excess water out of the tofu.

In a big bowl, mix together the fried cabbage, carrots, zucchini and turkey, finely chopped onions, garlic, scallions, crumbled tofu and egg. Spice up with sesame oil, sesame seeds, soy sauce, salt and black pepper.

Filling the dumplings is easy and nicest when done together with someone. Place the dumpling wrap on the palm of your hand and spoon a heaping tablespoon of the filling on the middle of it. Don’t fill too much, otherwise your dumplings won’t stay closed when you cook them.

Still holding the wrap in your hand, wipe the outer edges of the wrap with lukewarm water. Press the sides together firmly, so that your dumpling forms a shape of a half moon. Repeat until you have used all the wraps.

Cover the bottom of a frying pan with canola oil and heat up. Add a few dumplings at the time on the pan and fry on medium heat from both sides, until golden and crispy. Serve with dipping sauce.

Dipping sauce for Dumplings

4 tablespoons soy sauce

2 tablespoons vinegar

2 teaspoons red onion, chopped

1 green chili, sliced

Mix all the ingredients together and serve aside of dumplings.