We grow some not so common green things, I thought I'd write about them and what we use them for.
If I know them I'll give the English name, and if possible describe the food. If I get lazy I might not.
Click on any photo and it should get not only larger, but you'll see more than you do now.
The first photo is the worst. Below is a common plant that I'm sure you've used. You are probably more familiar with it's root which we call ginger.
Ginger (king) also has tasty leaves which can be used to flavor soups where you aren't actually eating the vegetable. That way one can have fresh ginger all winter. Getting a plant started is as difficult as saving a small section of ginger that has another section growing out of it, and placing it in dirt.
The next one below looks almost exactly like ginger. The leaves and roots all seem similar but the taste is totally different, and it is of course used in a much different way.
Galanga or Kah as it's known in Lao is a strong flavor. The one in the photo is Kah Noi or Kah Pah, which are names for the same thing. (Kah small or Kah from the jungle)
I think the most familiar use of Kah is in the famous white Thai soup known as gaeng kah gai or Chicken kah curry. The soup is white from the coconut milk. A freind thought for years that the curry was named for Chicken legs because kah with a different accent is the word for leg and they mostly use the leg of chickens to make the soup.
Ahem. Break for blurry flower photo.
Above is an eggplant flower. No idea if one can eat, never tried. The eggplants are those small green ones about the size of an egg Good to add a mushy texture to a jao.
Moving along.
Above is mac tua which is actually just a very long green bean. When I say long I mean a foot or two. Eaten always raw as a side green.
Below another variation of a vegetable we are already familiar with but used in a different way.
Called "san-a-lee" if you listen carefully you can hear the "cel-er-y" that it comes from. From the French colonization I assume. The plant only has leaves, no stalks as we are used to. Perhaps this is how celery used to be but it wouldn't ship well? In any case the taste is much more flavorful than stalk celery. Celery on steroids. Can't imagine yam moon sen without it.
The herb below I've seen sold live along with basil and mint in the garden departments of big box stores.
Bai ee tou also known as lemon basil is the crucial ingredient to gaeng jute the thin soup preceding dinner. Typicaly my wife feeds all of us with one pork chop by de boning, using the meat for one or two dishes, and tossing the bone in a boiling small pot of water, when it boils she turns it down to a simmer for five minutes, then turns it off, throws in twenty leaves of bai ee tou, and some stock powder (Knorr). Sublime on a hot summer day.
Below I'd think you know.
Hom kao we say mint, some leaves a little browned from being bitten maybe. This is the kind I like to use in cooking. The flavor is mint but not minty, not like candy. I use it tossed in with meats or in spring rolls. If you click on the photo, and look on the right, you'll see the kind of mint I find gone wild, which unfortunately doesn't taste as good to me in foods.
Below another plant that you've seen the fruit of many times but maybe not eaten the leaves sliced very thin across the leaf.
Mc'noa lat or lat lime, we say key lime. Not so easy to grow. Started from a seed, they need care.
And bellow another tree which in English we call a type of lime but I don't even think it's a citrus.
See how one leaf grows out the end of the one before it? Note the sharp thorns? Not only are they sharp but they hurt more than they should, perhaps a poison on them or tiny hairs. The common English name begins with a racist term from South Africa so I'm just not going to use it. I think the Lao is preferable, bai kii hoot, rolls off the tongue.
Many westerners are familiar with bai kii hoot from the spicy Thai shrimp soup called Tom Yum Koong. Often you'll see a couple leaves floating.
Lastly lemon grass.
Notice the pot? All of these plants go inside during the winter, all of these plants are propagated for free, either through seeds from a friend or by buying the plant as a food and using some to grow.
Recommended? I don't see it there now, does that mean for a short while this was up there with meta? Should have cussed more. Sune Saap means bon apetit and also enjoy your meal even though I'm not able to join in your offer of food right now.
Sune Saap