The brown thing in a sea of mudbugs

If anyone knows me they know that i'm a news watcher. I love cnn.com and i like to watch the news while i'm eating my cereal (special K vanilla almond) and my lactose free milk. Yes, i'm envious that everyone else can have the regular milk. The news is usually the bearer of bad news and all things bad in the world. Times are hard, the economy is bad and people are jobless....so jobless that there are weave theifs! Yes, weave theifs. fake hair stealers. LOL. I know times are hard and people can't get their hair done like i did today (it looks nice by the way if you're wondering haha) but people just don't want to pay money for the good horse hair. Go figure.

While i was down south i decided to have dinner with my parents. I might as well make my drive worth it while i'm down south. I've been on this crawfish bender for the past week and a half. I'm getting the feeling that the crawfish season will fare well as the season is still early and the 3 times i've had them they've been pretty good sized. So rajun cajun @ 21.99 for 3.5 lbs, Vito's Deckhouse @ 5.50 a lb and Pearland Seafood at 5.00 a lb. All have been good...but then Pearland seafood did the unthinkable. Im looking at the crawfish platter...looking at the corn..and I'm looking at t his brown thing. I'm like, what's that? it's a POTATO, a brown russet potato cut length wise. i found this rather Odd. In all my crawfish eating days and countless crawfish boils it's not very often if EVER that i've seen a brown potato? I'm assuming this is against cajun rules? it's like having an eggroll and stuffing it with vegetables. it's blasphemy! I googled crawfish pictures and not one picture had a brown potato. none. brown potatoes aren't necessarily cheaper than red ones so makes no sense, maybe they just ran out. Don't get me wrong, i ate the brown potato and it wasnt' the same but i liked it.

I've been thinking about writing a blog for quite some time, mostly on my way home from work when i'm trying to think what to cook and where i want to go to eat. Cooking mirrors my life,...interesting and humorous and sometimes just unpredictable...yet savory, sweet and satifying.

All my friends know my love for entertaining and my willingness to try new things as well as try to cook them. As of lately i've been fasincated with Vietnamese cooking. Being Vietnamese myself, i can never get enough of Vietnamese food. Yesterday it dawned on me that i have a love obsession with Nuoc Mam. I"m sure some of you are asking what Nuoc Mam is or i guess some people can call it Nuoc Cham (dipping sauce). Nuoc Mam is just simply fish sauce. There are two kinds of fish sauce though so some may be confused. The term is used loosely in two ways. Nuoc mam as the seasoning and Nuoc mam as the condiment. The seasoning is used to make the condiment yet they're called the same thing. Usually the condiment's long term is called "Nuoc Mam An lien" which translates to fish sauce ready to eat.

What do you eat Nuoc Mam with you ask? I compare Nuoc Mam to Vietnamese food as ketchup is to westerners. You can eat it with Eggrolls and grilled meats with Vermicelli..the possibilities are endless.

I've been a cheater all these years about having Nuoc mam for my own apt. I usually just buy it at the asian market where they make it it batches. Just recently i realized that they made it bottled. It's never as good as my parents made it at home. So then i just asked them...How do you make it. Upon asking any question to parents they usually say "oh it's sooo easy". Sure enough..it was easy. My friend Gary 's mom told him that There's not really a recipe for it, you just mix and taste. I find that true in so many ways with asian cooking but i found this recipe good enough for my tastes. This is my version of Nuoc Mam.



Nuoc Mam An Lien:

3 cups of water
1 cup of Nuoc Mam (i used lucky brand)
1 cup of sugar
1 table spoon of chili sauce
2 garlic cloves