One of the best things I took out of the Martha Stewart show experience, was being introduced to Pim Techamuanvivit, author of The Foodie Handbook, and aka @chezpim on twitter.
Noah and I LOVE Pad Thai but since we moved away from our favourite Thai Kitchen in Lakewood, Ohio, we've had to "make do" with the offerings in Columbus. But we have never thought to venture into making it ourselves because we had convinced ourselves that we would not be able to maneuver around ingredients such as fish sauce, and tamarind, and palm sugar.
So when I sat in that audience and witness the "self-help" segment titled, "Pad Thai 101" at the Martha Stewart The Blog Show, which made it all look so do-able, I made a mental note to rope Noah in and try it at home.
So we got all the ingredients at Columbus Asian Market(817 Bethel Road, Columbus, OH), soaked the noodles, picked the ends off the beansprouts (if I could pay someone to do this, I would), prepped the shrimp, and all that good stuff. I had read pages 66 - 71 of The Foodie Handbook a couple of times, but I did make Noah watch the video snippet with me - yes, I can laugh at myself for making him watch it with me but we needed to start from the same reference point! Then we rolled up our sleeves and began our virgin attempt at the dish. The results of which you can witness above. It tasted divine (more fish sauce for us next time) and it was so easy, I cannot imagine why we felt so intimidated by it.
So thank you Pim for a great segment, and a fun and insightful book, and for enabling us to become self-sufficient Pad Thai fans!
Note: The referenced Pad Thai segment can be found here. Click on the video labelled "Pad Thai".
looks super duper yummy! i feel u on the bean sprouts issue. once i was so lazy, i actually put the roots in and my mum was horrified. i'll never do THAT again.
Posted by: gee | March 01, 2010 at 01:16 AM