This is for Q. It’s a quick-to-make and yummy meal with great reheat potential.
Ingredients:
- A goodly amount of green beans
- A chicken breast (or 2 if you want to go meat-heavy), may substitute tofu, shrimp, squid, or white mushrooms
- Optional: white mushrooms, halved
- Some garlic [I use vodka garlic; see note below] – about 1tbsp
- Some ginger [I use vodka ginger] – about 1tbsp
- A can of Prik Khing curry paste (chili and garlic flavor)
- Sesame oil
- 2tbsp vegetable oil
- Fish sauce (I like Red Boat #42)
- Optional: raw red bell pepper cut into thin slices as garnish
- Optional: cilantro as garnish
Rinse and pick the green beans; break off the ends and snap them in half.
Cut the chicken/shimp/tofu to desired-size chunks (for chicken I cut strips about 1 1/2″ long and 1/2″ wide)
Chop the garlic and ginger together
Put the green beans in the microwave for about 6-8 minutes, depending on how powerful your microwave is. You want the beans to be softened slightly but not dehydrated. Alternatively, you can steam the beans, though microwaving them preserves their flavor better and keeps whatever little nutrients are in the beans.
While the beans are microwaving, put vegetable oil in wok and bring up the heat. Add the garlic and ginger and stir until they begin to sizzle and smell. Do not brown the garlic/ginger. [I have also sometimes added chopped red indian chili peppers for people who really like it hot; danger: oil frying red peppers can make them quite overpowering!]
Add the chicken and stir it in with the ginger/garlic oil. Stir it around to cook the chicken (when the chicken turns white)
Open the can of Prik Khing and add to the wok; stir to coat the chicken. If you want to add mushrooms, this is a good time to toss them in, too.
Take the steaming hot beans out of the microwave and add them to the wok; toss everything together.
Add 1-2 tbsp of sesame oil, and 2 tbsp of fish sauce; stir it all up.
Serve garnished with optional shredded red pepper, cilantro, or toasted sesame seeds.
I have been known to make large batches of this stuff and eat it for breakfast, cold or hot it matters not and it holds up well in the fridge. If you’re planning on working hard all day and coming home exhausted, you can make a batch of this in the morning and reheat it in the evening.
In case you are not familiar with the technique of making vodka garlic/ginger: keep 2 nalgene bottles in your fridge full of cheap vodka. Whenever you have more garlic than you use in a dish, peel the garlic cloves and toss them in the bottle of vodka. Peel some ginger, slice it into chunks, and toss them in the other bottle of vodka. Now, whenever you need fresh-tasting garlic or ginger, but don’t feel like peeling it, you can just fish it out of the vodka and use it. I’ve kept ginger this way for up to a year (I make a point of running the supply down and dumping the vodka and washing the bottle) and garlic for years, as well. The garlic vodka is a great thing to add to popcorn butter, or pasta water, or anything else that needs a little whiff of garlic. I often make buttered pasta, and add a tablespoon of garlic vodka to the bowl before I stir in the cheese. I consider maintenance of vodka garlic/ginger/red peppers(or habaneros) to be an essential kitchen technique. There, now I have ruined the secret.
500ml nalgene bottle of garlic and vodka
The wok I use I bought for $0.25 at the Johns Hopkins University Fair in 1974. It’s been to Pennsic on the back of my motorcycle, and it’s been to camping events and fine dinners. It’s probably the most-used quarter dollar purchase of my life. I wonder what kind of steel it is… Hey, if I made a mandrel for the lathe I could make a damascus wok… No.
The seed entry for a round of “pairs of words you shouldn’t put together”.
Carbonfibre surfboard.
Monofilm paraglider.
And so on.
This sounds wonderful, definitely going to try it. On the garlic vodka, great idea, every year I am positively over-run with garlic and do all sorts of desperate things to preserve it, so this sounds perfect! From now on I too will have this in my refrigerator.
sonofrojblake@#1:
The seed entry for a round of “pairs of words you shouldn’t put together”.
There is a guy who made a damascus frying pan. I think it was mostly one of those “I have a new air hammer let me see how flat I can make this billet” and then “now what do I make out of this?”
PS – from the “foolhardy dangerous” category: I carried a katana and the wok slung on my back, on a motorcycle. Fortunately, I did not fall. I was 19, that’s my excuse.
kestrel@#2:
On the garlic vodka, great idea, every year I am positively over-run with garlic and do all sorts of desperate things to preserve it, so this sounds perfect!
I used to soak my extra garlic in an oil bottle until someone told me that was basically an incipient Botulinum Farm(tm). Vodka is perfect, though. The garlic and ginger get a bit soft and lose some of their edge but they remain remarkably crisp and pungent.
I made a bottle of vodka habaneros for a friend, once, and made the mistake of wiping my eye… Habanero vodka burns like acid. Well, mild acid. Concentrated nitric is worse than habanero, and I won’t go any farther than that.
Nalgene polypropylene lab bottles are perfect for the garlic and – incredibly – do not retain the scent or taste after a washing. One year I bought a dozen lab bottles and made up garlic stashes for friends for christmas. It’s seriously nice to be able to spear a piece of garlic out and chop it up without getting it on your fingers.
kautex clear polypropylene leakproof bottles at Berlin Packaging, inc.
I often have garlic bits left over so I’m definitely going to make the garlic vodka. I have heaps of canning jars that should work equally well.
As for the curry, it sounds delicious.
Marcus Ranum@#4 (sorry if this shows twice, testing the cite attribute for block quotes)
My uncle likes super spicy things so every year I make a couple bottles of hot vinegar to put on his greens. Just take quart mason jar and fill it about half full with coarsely chopped habanero, seeds and all, and then fill it to the top with some distilled white vinegar (I have always wondered, why is it called “white” it looks clear to me.) After that a brief application of standard “acidic food” canning techniques and give it a couple months to get spicy.
Your talk of habanero vodka makes me realize that alcohol is probably a better solvent for capsaicin than water / acetic acid… Maybe my next batch for him should be 1/3 vodka or Everclear…
Also, that curry looks awesome, and I am totally going to start using garlic and ginger vodka.
This…has never happened to me. That said, garlic vodka? Ginger vodka? My flavour skillz are about to level up!
Okay, I will make this dish tomorrow. Just reading it makes my mouth water!
Also I will try the Vodka-Ginger, sounds like fun. Even though I can only second Badlands observation that I never seem to have spare garlic after cooking.
I buy those big braided garlic rope things at the farmers’ market. I suppose you could use all of that in one meal, if the meal was garlic soup with roasted garlic nuggets and a large fake turkey made out of crushed garlic, stuffed with garlic, and basted with garlic butter.
Joking aside, there was this one vietnamese place I went to, which had an item on the menu that sounded good: “garlic with chicken.” That was not a typo! It was huge chunks of raw garlic with shredded chicken and I smelled of garlic for a week. I didn’t mind but then-wife made me sleep on the couch.
I don’t understand the need to preserve garlic… I grow my own, and I find that each years harvest keeps just fine until the next, braided and hanging up in the kitchen.
Update fresh from the kitchen: All tennants of avalus appartment are in agreement: Very yummy!
Thanks for sharing Marcus! :)
Maybe you should have shared the meal with her. You would have both reeked and only been objectionable to other people, not each other.
avalus@#11:
Update fresh from the kitchen: All tennants of avalus appartment are in agreement: Very yummy!
Excellent!
I always wonder, when I post a recipe, if anyone will ever make it. The feedback is welcome.
Marcus, it was perfect timing. We had a load of green beans from the local market and I actually wanted to make green beans with a mustard-cheese-white wine sauce. But you provided something new and I had to try. I also made ginger vodka.
Also-also I can second that this tastes really good reheated as a midnightsnack :D.