Food is Food

I generally don't review cooking kits since I'd rather cook something from a recipe instead, but there are exceptions. Try as I might, I cannot make my own tamales from scratch taste quite as exquisite as the ones from Global Grub. I'm pretty sure it has to do with the mix of chiles in package.

Which brings me to the lastest cooking kit from Global Grub, Pad Thai. It’s all about the ingredients. There are a lot of recipes for Pad Thai out there and more often than not they use ingredients that just don’t belong in it such as ketchup, rice wine vinegar or honey. For more authentic versions, check out the recipes in Pok Pok by Andy Ricker or Thai Street Food by David Thompson (which also includes the fascinating history of the dish).Or even easier, you can use the latest Pad Thai kit from Global Grub. Having tried the kit I can vouch for it. Along with rice stick noodles, the kit contains tamarind, fish sauce and preserved radish which you might not have on hand but make all the difference in this simple but satisfying dish. It tastes just like what you get in a restaurant not in a cheap kit or from making it without the right ingredients. The balance is right, but so is the texture and the toppings.  I asked Carley Sheehy the founder of Global Grub how this kit came to be.

Give the kit a try, and let me know what you think!

Disclaimer: My thanks to Global Grub for providing the kit for me to review. I used my own tofu, egg, garlic, shallots, bean sprouts, green onions, lime, roasted peanuts and shrimp to make the dish and was not compensated monetarily to write this or any other post on Cooking with Amy. 

A few weekends ago I went to a Hatch chile roast.Hatch chiles are a very prized New Mexican variety. They are available fresh from August through September and once roasted, they can be kept in the freezer for up to 2 years. They are very high in vitamin C—one medium chile has as much as 6 oranges. 

There are 5 or 6 different chiles that are marketed with the name “Hatch” and they are each named for the valley they are grown in. The most common Hatch chile is the NuMex 6-4 Heritage, which was bred for flavor, heat level and size at New Mexico State University. They are fleshy, long and narrow. Not generally eaten raw, roasting really brings out their flavor—they are smoky but also have citrus, herbal and vegetal flavors but with distinct heat. You can get mild, medium, hot or extra hot Hatch chiles.

A year ago I was sent some hot chiles from The Hatch Chile Store and it has taken me a year to use them. They are really, really hot so a little goes a long way. You might think I had learned my lesson and would get medium heat chiles this time but I did not. In fact the chiles I got from Mollie Stone’s Market supplied by Melissa’s were fresh off the grill and I made yet another mistake, not peeling them with gloves. Ouch! I didn’t feel the sting and burn until hours later. Fortunately it does go away, eventually. 

You can still attend a 2015 Hatch chile roast at a Bay Area Mollie Stone's Market in September on the 12th in Sausalito, 13th in Burlingame, 19th in San Mateo or 20th in Palo Alto. Preorder them if you like. If you prefer having them peeled for you, you can order them from The Hatch Chile Store. They arrive frozen in a flat package and are easy to remove, one at a time. 

So what do you do with Hatch chiles? You can use them in dishes that feature them as a primary flavor such as chile verde or in chile rellenos, but there are countless other ways to enjoy them too. Here are just a few ways to use them:

* Stirred into polenta or grits 

* In scrambled eggs, frittata or quiche

* Mixed into macaroni and cheese

* As a topping for burgers or cheese burgers

* In a quesadilla 

* In chili con carne or vegetarian chili 

* Added to corn chowder

* In enchilada sauce or filling

* Added to cornbread or corn muffins 

* To spice up spinach artichoke dip