Pad Thai

This is one of my very favorite recipes. The prep of the noodles takes a little time but it's so worth it.

Serves 2-3
1/3 of a 1 pound package of clear rice noodles (very thin ones are easiest to use)
Quartered lime
1 Tablespoon Sriracha Sauce
1 Tablespoon Fish Sauce (Tiparos, from Jay International)
1 Tablespoon Sugar
Just under a pound of cooked meat of any sort (I mostly use tofu or chicken)
Cooked veggies (I use broccoli and carrots)
About a handful of bean sprouts
2 chopped up green onions
2 Eggs
About a handful of chopped peanuts
2-4 cloves of chopped garlic
Oil for frying (I prefer peanut)

Submerge noodles in a bowl of hot tap water. Cover and let sit at least 15 minutes and no more than 20 minutes. Combine Sriracha sauce, fish sauce, and sugar in a cup and have it ready. Put heat on medium. Fry garlic in wok for a few seconds. Add noodles and a little water if they need to be softened up a bit. Add sauce mixture. Move noodles aside and scramble eggs in the wok. Mix scrambled eggs with the noodles. Throw in cooked meat/veggies and cook long enough for them to heat up. Add about half of the sprouts and green onions. Serve on plates and garnish with limes, the rest of the sprouts/green onions, and chopped peanuts.

When it comes to the sauce, all that's important is the 1:1 ratio. So often I will double the amount of sauce to make the dish spicier. But the way it is, Alex can eat it--it's spicy but not too spicy for her. I then add more hot sauce just to mine. There are probably a lot of different hot sauces besides Sriracha that would work with this recipe, too. It's not exactly like Pad Thai at a Thai restaurant but it definitely satisfies my desire for Thai food.

Black Bean Soup

I got this one off of mothering.com, also.

Black Bean Soup

1 C tomato salsa
3 C cooked black beans (or 2 (15oz) cans)
2 C chicken stock
1 tsp. lime juice
2 tbsp. chopped fresh cilantro
sour cream (optional)

Heat salsa in a large saucepan over medium heat, stirring often, for about 5 minutes. Stir in beans and broth. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat and simmer soup, covered, for 15 minutes. Let soup cool slightly, then ladle half of it into a food processor or blender and puree it. Return the pureed soup to the pot. Stir in the lime juice and cilantro and heat the mixture through.

Mandy's take on it: I never bother to puree the soup and rarely use cilantro or lime. This soup is so easy and delicious. It tends to be much better with unsalted beans (not most cheap cans of beans). I sometimes put frozen corn in it, also, and serve it with cornbread. I seriously could eat nothing but this soup and cornbread for a week.