The Pregnant Kitchen

As a prelude to describing tonight’s meal, which J liked, I need to let everyone know about the ghost of pad thai past that has been haunting me for a year. When I was still commuting to Boulder from Baltimore during the 2008-2009 academic year, I was living alone in the basement apartment of our house and renting out the rest of the house. Feeling adventurous and alone, I tried to make pad thai, one of my favorite dishes of all time. The result: so bad I couldn’t finish it. The rest went into the rubbish bin.

What did I do wrong? First of all, I cooked the rice noodles like Italian noodles and this overcooked them into a mush. When I went to add the noodles to the sauce, all I had were rice paddies. The peanut sauce tasted awful. It gave me the impression of chunky peanut butter turned moldy. Finally, my timing was off. I added things in the wrong order, left them frying up too long, and destroyed every delicate aroma that should come from nicely done pad thai.

This time was better. While I remain disappointed and a bit down, J liked the meal. I took my recipe from Alton Brown’s website, and made a few adjustments. Here is what Alton has for ingredients:

• 1-ounce tamarind paste
• 3/4 cup boiling water
• 2 tablespoons fish sauce
• 2 tablespoons palm sugar
• 1 tablespoon rice wine vinegar
• 4 ounces rice stick noodles
• 6 ounces Marinated Tofu, recipe follows
• 1 to 2 tablespoons peanut oil
• 1 cup chopped scallions, divided
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic
• 2 whole eggs, beaten
• 2 teaspoons salted cabbage
• 1 tablespoon dried shrimp
• 3 ounces bean sprouts, divided
• 1/2 cup roasted salted peanuts, chopped, divided
• Freshly ground dried red chile peppers, to taste
• 1 lime, cut into wedges

J didn’t want the bean sprouts, because they are contraindicated for pregnant women, and the shrimp was too expensive at the store. So we opted for tofu only. In addition, we didn’t have peanuts, but we did have roasted peanut butter. We also didn’t have tamarind, which is a shame. The sweet and tangy flavor would have improved the meal significantly. Finally, we didn’t have cabbage, so we used finely chopped Italian kale. I didn’t have time to marinate the tofu, but it was a good thing: our sauce was certainly salty enough without salty tofu. J’s suggestion, which I think would be fantastic, is to marinate the tofu ahead of time with lime and ginger.

I avoided the rice paddies by soaking the noodles in very hot water (it was boiling, then taken off of the stove for 5 minutes) for 6 minutes. They were just a little too soft, but still ok.

I then simultaneously fried up the tofu in one cast-iron pan and the garlic-and-kale in the other. (I have no wok, which really would have improved matters.) Once done, I took out the tofu and the kale, and started sautéing the scallions, added 3 eggs, stirred it around, added the drained noodles, the sauce (which was 1/8 cup brown rice vinegar, 2 tablespoons of fish sauce, a teaspoon of peanut butter, one crushed red dried pepper, and teaspoon of the Thai Kitchen satay sauce), and the kale, in this order.

From the pan, I served it on a warmed plate with the tofu placed on top. J’s commented that there wasn’t enough sauce and she was right. I doubled the recipe and in so doing, probably violated a huge commandment of thai cooking, which stresses freshness. This meal only works because the ingredients are all cooked well and of high quality. Small batches can be made in 5 minutes each. I, however, was still cooking like an Italian with meatballs, going for quantity. The time investment in making a second batch is limited only to the amount of raw materials, and the (insignificant) time needed to soak the noodles. The result: too many noodles for too little sauce. That said, the sauce was hot enough, but not sweet enough (no tamarind!). The fresh lime we used on our plated food helped that problem, to some degree.

All in all, it’s edible, and we have no qualms about eating it tomorrow. Next time, I feel confident that my pad thai will be a bit closer to what I want. It’s been a learning experience…