summer girls v summer rolls

In the summer of 1999 | A plague was released upon my junior/high-school population: LFO’s summer anthem Summer Girls. Which for me, is quite possibly the single WORST (worst worst) summer anthem ever in the history of bad summer anthems.  Fast forward to the summer of 2002, when I started my summer tradition of making egregious quantities of  Summer Rolls and forcing my friends to come over and eat them. Hence the best summer food? Summer Rolls.  Worst summer song? Summer Girls. So, what are yours?

Not Chinese food, but… | I took myself on a fieldtrip to Chinatown this weekend in search of the most wonderful.cheap.colorful grocery store in all the neighborhood. I settled on my top-two: a Thai store called Bankok Center Grocery and a wonderful well-stocked market called Sun Vin. This weekend I was in search of rice paper wraps for salad rolls and Sambal (aka: one of the many incarnations of ‘cock sauce’.)

Sambal is a common ingredient in most South Asian cooking.  It has many different incarnations, some have ground shrimp or coconut others are made with green chilies or have squid ink.  Since moving to Brooklyn, I have seen Sambal (aka: cock sauce) in many places.  But there is a specific brand/type/price point that I have to insist upon (and it does not involve a fancy glass jar, a well attached label, or more than $2).

On Saturday | After wandering the isles for about 45 minutes, I hit the register @ Sun Vin with a bushel of purple ‘holy’ Basil, a package of rice paper wrappers and a bottle of Cock Sauce for a grand total of $3.21.  This left me with a buck-75 for a Thai Boba Tea from a cart on the way out of town. (It should be mentioned that when in Portland, I shopped @ Fubonn Shopping Center.  If you can, pay it a visit, you shall not be disappointed.)

Summer Rolls

In them:
Leaves of lettuce or cabbage
Leaves of cilantro and basil
Silken Tofu (straw sized strips)
cucumber, jickma and carrots julienne
Avocado

I dress all the veggies (except the lettuce) with:
1 glug of Mirin
a bit of grated ginger
1 teaspoon agave
half a lime worth of juice and zest
a pinch of salt

Re-constitute your rice wrappers:

Place two sheets in a shallow pie pan or  deep plate. Then pour water from my kettle over them.  It as they soften I roll the water around and poor it off.  Then let them cool slightly.  Use your fingers to ‘squeegee’ off the excess moisture.  I like using two because I can fit more yumies in it.  This is not really how everyone does it. But it works for me.  I find that I scald my fingers alot less when I do it like this.

Peanut Sauce

1-1.5 cup peanut butter (natural, unsalted)
1/2 cup coconut milk
The juice of one lime
a dash of soy sauce
a dash of fish sauce
1 tablespoon honey or agave
1 tablespoon Sambal Sauce (with garlic if you can get it)
a pinch of minced fresh ginger
Warm water

Place everything (except the peanut butter and lime) in a pan on low heat.  When warm enough add the peanut butter with a whisk.  The peanut butter should look like it is melting in.  Add additional water and additional salt to taste. Add the lime juice after the pan has been removed from the heat.   I like mine served warm, but it is also wonderful chilled and served along with Mae Ploy or with homemade nước mắm pha (which I will be posting a recipe for very very soon).

(ps: skip the pan, throw everything in a blender and call it good.  It wont tastes as well incorporated, but it is easy as hell.)

nummy num num

a