[thechat] Recipe: Tom Yam Gai (Thai Hot n' Sour soup)

[Norman Beresford]

Hi Madhu

Organic stock cubes so no MSG (and supposedly no GM materials either).  The
recipe I use is very similar to yours, although it doesn't use the Galangal,
Nam Prik Pao, Onions or Mushrooms, and the lemon juice is replaced with
lime.  And as I said you boil the raw chicken breast in the stock until it's
cooked and then shredded to be added back in later.

You got me wondering about how different our tastes are likely to be.  I
know that our 'Indian' food is supposed to be very different to authenticate
Indian cooking, but I wonder if we have that different a palate to others
cultures.  Infact thinking about it, somehow our isles are home to deep
fried mars bars so something must have gone wrong somewhere :)

Nigel Slater is part of our new wave of television cooks.  Basically TV
cooks in this country can be split into two categories.  The first is the
old style cook, personified by Deliah Smith.  They tend to be very specific
about amounts, stages etc.  The second is the new wave, unfortunately
personified by Jamie Oliver.  They tend to be less concerned about weights
and measurements etc, rather it's about understanding that cooking is a
individual thing and that people should cook to their own tastes.  It's
interesting contrasting the two, Deliah's cook books tend to start with long
lists of equipment, one of Nigel's Slater's latest pretty much just says one
good knife and two pots.

I use the word "unfortunately" with Jamie Oliver because throughout his rise
to fame (and fortune) he's come across as a horrible mockney (fake Cockney)
tw at t.  However a lot of people (myself included) have revised their opinions
of him after his latest venture where he took a number of basically
unemployable teenagers with a vague interest in cooking and after training
them has opened a restaurant (which by all accounts is very good).  It made
for compelling viewing and by all accounts the finished product is very good
(it's funny how many reviews of it start "I hated Jamie Oliver but after
watching his latest series I have revised my opinion").

Hmmm a bit rambly that, must be the snow affecting my brain

Norman