Thai Pesto

This recipe is a fleshed out version of something I heard on The Splendid Table when a caller was asking about what to do with all of her Thai basil she had growing in the garden. She mentioned that she had made a Thai pesto with it and gave the ingredients that she had used: Thai basil, coconut oil, cashews and some Thai chilies in one batch.  The host got very excited and suggested many uses for the pesto (though nothing else for the basil) and I got very excited and thought "Dinner tonight".

So, here is what I came up with based on the above mentioned ingredients. I use a stone mortar and pestle for making pesto because I think it gives better flavor to the herbs when they are mashed not cut. That said, I am a snob and I'm sure cutting in the food processor works just fine.

4 cups Thai basil (longer, skinnier leaf than genovese or sweet basil. Can be found at Asian groceries)
2 cloves of garlic
2 Tablespoons of raw cashews

Strip the leaves from the stems of the basil and mash or run through the food processor until you've got a smooth paste. (I had to do batches because my mortar, while large, only holds about 2 cups of leaves.)

To this add:
1/3 cup of coconut oil, best if in liquid state.
2 Tablespoons of fish sauce
1 Tablespoon of lime juice
1/4 teaspoon (minimum, I added more like 2 Tablespoons) of sriracha sauce. Don't skip this, it rounds out the flavor, but if you don't love spicy things, stick to the minimum.

Mix well until smooth. Adjust seasonings to your taste. You may need to add a bit of salt or more fish sauce.

Cook your rice noodles in your preferred way. I used the wide noodles like the ones for Pad Thai. If you want meat or tofu, use a bit of the pesto as a marinade to give extra flavor. Thinly slice some raw carrots and red bell peppers and toss all of this together with the pesto. Easy-peasy, tasty dinner in 15 minutes. Even if you're hand mashing everything!

Vietnamese Inspired Eggplant

This is a loose adaptation of a recipe from a friend. She gave it to me when I asked for help with eggplant cause I don't love it but am growing it.  This was the #1way we ate eggplant last summer. I think it works best with the long, skinny Asian types of eggplant that don't really need to be brined first, but I've made it with the fat globe kinds eggplant. A young plant is better.


Slice the eggplant into rounds. If it's the big kind, salt & press out the water for a while first.
Heat some coconut oil in a pan and fry the eggplant rounds til caramelized. Just before removing the eggplant, toss some banana pepper slices in to the pan. Cook till almost soft. Thrown some heavy greens (kale or collards), cut into long slices in. Cook til bright green, a few minutes total. Put all of the veggies over rice or thin rice noodles. Top with nuoc cham sauce. Can be eaten hot or cold as a salad. Is a little addictive.

Body Butter

A while back, when we all had 1, maybe two kiddos we got together and made a bunch of crap for the holidays. One of those things was this body butter, which I loved and thought I'd lost the recipe for. I found it, including my notes and am pasting it below so that if (when) I lose it again, it will be here.

Body Butter Recipe/Formula

1 part wax (beeswax or soy wax)
1 part fixed oil (almond, apricot kernel, macadamia, hemp, whatever)
1 part butter (shea, cocoa, mango, whatever again)
This is great and really moisturizing and you can design and change the recipe based on what you like and what you have on hand.

example:
1oz beeswax
1oz cocoa butter
1oz sweet almond oil


Should be ~1:2 oil to butter and wax. Possibly add a bit of cornstarch to help make a smoother feel, about 2tsp/lb of ingredients

ETA: 7/22/13
I'm not 100% certain of when I intended to post this. I just found it in the drafts. And this recipe seems a bit off. Did we really use that much wax? Anyone remember?