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I usually cringe when people talk about fusion food, but recently I had a Thai (mis?)interpretation of Bánh Xèo (usually called Vietnamese Pancake or Vietnamese Crêpe in English) at a temple fair in Bangkok. It was served by two ladies who simply called it “khanom buang yuan” (vietnamese pancake). What’s funny is that it was absolutely nothing like it’s Vietnamese cousin, but was really tasty all the same. I liked it so much I went home and made it the next day.

The only thing I changed from their version was to serve the pancake folded once (like in Vietnam) and I added turmeric powder to the dough (Jett’s idea). It’s filled with cooked bean sprouts, fried tofu, pickled radish and chopped peanuts. And topped with ajaat — slightly pickled cucumber salad. It’s like Southern Thailand meets Southern Vietnam!

Bánh Xèo, misinterpreted
Makes two crêpes

• 1/3 cup rice flour
• 1/4 cup water
• 1 egg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon turmeric powder
• 1/4 cup tofu, cut into strips and fried
• 2 cups bean sprouts, boiled until soft(ish - don’t kill them)
• 1 tablespoon diced chinese pickled radish
• some vegetable oil
• 1 tablespoon chopped roasted peanuts
• 1 cup ajaat

1. Mix the rice flour, water, egg, salt and turmeric in a bowl until smooth. Be careful with the turmeric, it stains really really well.
2. Fry the tofu strips until crispy, about 2-3 minutes on high. Set aside.
3. Boil the bean sprouts until soft, but not dead. About 30 seconds.
4. Chop the Chinese pickled radish (chai bo) into little pieces. If you don’t have chopped peanuts, go ahead and do that too (if you have a mortar and pestle, it’s way easier to use that.
5. Use a large bottomed pan (crepe pan is good) and bring it up to medium high to high heat. Coat the bottom of the pan with a bit of oil. When hot, add 1/2 of the batter and lift the pan — tilt it to coat the bottom. Set it back down and let it cook for about 1 minute, or until the bottom is lightly browned. Flip and add 1/2 of the filling ingredients. Fold in 1/2 and toss on a plate.
6. Repeat once more with the rest of the ingredients.
7. Top with the cucumber salad and chopped peanuts.

If you leave out the pickled radish, make sure to add some salt, as the radish is where most of the salt comes from in this dish. I’m not kidding about the turmeric, if you like your counter tops or don’t want yellow hands for a week - be careful. You can substitute the fried tofu with whatever you want — don’t be afraid to get creative, these market ladies sure weren’t!

Update: I went to another temple fair two nights ago and saw 3(!) vendors with this dish. It’s taking over Bangkok by storm! - April 4, 2008

Here’s the recipe I use for hummus — I’ve made it a few times now and it’s pretty good. And really easy. I can’t find the original site where I got the recipe from, otherwise I’d credit it.

Hummus
Makes 4 cups

• 1 1/2 cups dried chickpeas, soaked overnight
• 1 teaspoon sea salt, divided
• 2 teaspoons garlic cloves, peeled
• 3/4 cup tahini (roasted sesame seed paste)
• 1/2 cup fresh lemon juice, and more to taste (I used lime because I’m in the land of lime)
• paprika (garnish)
• olive oil (garnish)
• some leftover boiled chickpeas (garnish - optional)

1. Soak the chickpeas overnight in water. Make sure you cover them with a lot of water because they’ll triple in size.
2. Rinse the soaked chickpeas well and drain. Put them in a saucepan and cover with plenty of fresh water and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Bring to a boil. Skim off the scum that forms at the beginning, then cover and cook over medium heat for about 1 1/2-2 hours until the chickpeas are very soft. You’ll probably need to keep adding water and skimming the scum off the surface. Allow to cool.
3. When the chickpeas are done, puree the garlic and the rest of the salt in a food processor. Add the tahini and lemon juice and puree until blended. Add 1/2 cup of the chickpea water and process until completely smooth.
4. Fish out the chickpeas and add them to the food processor, but keep the chickpea water. You may want to keep a few aside as garnish for after. Process until well-blended. Thin to desired consistency with the chickpea water. Adjust the seasoning with salt and lemon juice. The hummus can be kept in an airtight container in the fridge, and it’ll last a few days up to a week.
5. Serve sprinkled with paprika and extra virgin olive oil.

Goes great with homemade pita.

I’m sick of Thai bread. It’s white, weightless and they cut the crusts off. I’m not kidding. It just like the bread that Americans give little children. And it’s so full of preservatives that you can eat it 2 weeks later. Yuck. So, I decided to make my own. And no, I don’t have a bread machine.

I went out and bought a book called “The Bread Book” by Sara Lewis. It’s published in the UK where they use all these cute terms like “strong flour” (bread flour) , “treacle” (molasses) and “molasses sugar” (dark brown sugar). The problem is, it calls for all these great flours like “granery flour” and “malthouse flour” which are absolutely impossible to get here in Thailand.

So I’m improvising. I went over to Villa (the expensive farang grocery store) and bought stone ground whole wheat flour, bread flour, flax seeds, oats, dried milk powder, sunflower seeds and black sesame seeds. And I followed the recipe for “Farmhouse White Loaf” but made it a bit more… wholesome. Here’s my adapted recipe. I call it 1/2 and 1/2 bread.

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cup stone-ground wheat flour
• 1 1/3 cups bread flour (don’t use all-purpose)
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon fast-action dried yeast
• 2 teaspoons dried milk powder (makes the crust nicer)
• 2 tablespoons black sesame seeds
• 3 tablespoons roasted sunflower seeds
• 1 tablespoon flax seeds
• 3/4 cup warm water (you may need to add more here)

Method

1. Put the flours in a large bowl. Cut the butter up into pieces and add to the flour. With your hands, mix the butter and flours until there are no more chunks of butter, and the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Add the salt, sugar, yeast, milk powder and nuts. Add the water and mix until you have a dough (you may need to add a bit more than 3/4 cup, I add up to 1 cup if it’s dry)
2. Flip the contents out onto your (clean I hope) table. Make sure it’s dusted with flour too so it doesn’t stick. Kneed for about 5-10 minutes, until the dough is springy and elastic. You want to do a lot of pulling to stretch out the gluten.
3. Ball it up and throw it back in the bowl. Cover with oiled plastic wrap (that’s cling film for you weird Brits) or a damp towel and let it rise until doubled in size. This took me about 45 minutes, but it depends on how warm your kitchen is.
4. Toss the dough back on your table again and kneed it once more, about 5 minuts or so. Roll it into a tube-shape and place inside a buttered bread pan (1lb/500g pan - like the ones used for making banana bread). Cover with your plastic wrap again (or towel) and let rise until it reaches over the top of the pan, about 30 min.
5. Remove the plastic wrap, sprinkle the top with flour and bake in a pre-heated oven at 200°C (400°F) for 25 minutes.
6. Remove from the tin and let cool on a wire rack.

Since this bread has no preservatives (yay) it’ll go hard in a day. So, slice it up once it’s cooled and throw it in a freezer bag in the freezer. What? You didn’t know you can freeze bread? Well, you can. Take it out and let it thaw and it’s as good as fresh. Great for toast too.

Cake

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temp
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 large eggs, room temp
• 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tea baking powder
• 1 tea baking soda
• pinch salt
• 1 cup milk
• 2-3 tea fresh lime juice
• 1 tea lime zest

1. Cream the butter until smooth, and gradually add the sugar. Beat for 2-3 minutes until it’s fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, and beat well between.
2. Combine the dry ingredients — flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt in a bowl. Add slowly to the creamed butter mixture.
3. When mixed, add the lime juice and zest.
4. Fill lined cupcake tins 3/4 way, and bake in a pre-heated oven for 20 minutes at 350°F. Make sure the tops do not get browned.

Frosting

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, very soft
• 8 cups confectioners’ sugar
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 tea fresh lime juice
• 1 drop light green food coloring (if desired)

1. Cream butter until smooth, and then add the milk and lime juice and mix well. Slowly add the sugar until the desired consistancy is reached — you may not need all the sugar. You can add food coloring and/or zest if desired.
2. Make sure the cupcakes are room temp before icing or you’ll make a big mess. Top with sprinkles or whatever you want!

makes 24 cupcakes.

Filling

• 5 cups sliced green apples (about 5 small Granny Smith apples)
• 1/2 c white sugar
• 1 table all-purpose flour
• 1 tea ground cinnamon
• 1/4 c water

Topping

• 1/2 c quick oats
• 1/2 c all-purpose flour
• 1/2 c packed brown sugar
• 1/8 tea baking powder
• 1/8 tea baking soda
• 1/4 c melted butter

1. Slice the apples and put into a 9×4x4 bread pan. You can also use a 9×13″ cake pan, but you need to double the above amounts…
2. Mix the white sugar, tablespoon of flour and cinnamon together, then sprinkle on the apples. Pour water evenly over the top after.
3. Mix the oats, flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and melted butter together. It should be really thick. Crumble with a spoon over the top of the apples, making sure it’s evenly covered.
4. Bake at 350°F (170°C) for 45 min or until dark brown.