Herbal Beverages ,mapraw (coconut) - by Saronkorn Seuyouyong

Mapraw (Coconut)
Scientific Name:Cocos nucifera Linn.
Family:PLAMAE
Other names:Maakon Mogoon, Mapraaw (In general) Heddung (Petchboon) Praaw, Mapraaw (The Southern Part ) Yo (Malayu - The Southern Part ) Korsaa (Karen - Mae Hongsorn) Dung (Chong-Chanburi) Pole (Karen - Karnijanuburi) Eiajee (Chinese)

Botanical features:
Trunk A perennial tree for about 20-30 metres high; the trunk which is very tall and thin does not produce any branch.
LeavesThe leaves of a coconut tree are in a compound form, feather - like shape. They are long, narrow and pointed at the end with glossy, deep green colour.
BlossomsA cluster of small - sized flowers growing at the fragrant of husk which covers small blossoms. There are 6 petals of a blossom. Every cluster contains of stamens and pistils, at the end and base, respectively.
FruitA coconut has a round or oblong shape with smooth outer husk. The young coconut is green and turns brown when fully ripe. The middle part is soft fibre. The inner part is hard (the endocarp). The next part is white, soft meat with thin juice.

Usage:
As foodsThe young crown of the coconut tree is for fried food and curry. Young coconut is edible as fresh or being burnt as well as being cooked a hormog (a Thai dish consisteing of steamed fish or chicken in coconut cream and chili sauce). The cluster, with its cut tip, produces syrup for namtaan peep (sugar made from coconut syrup) liquor, and vinegar. Coconut milk is made into magarine and cooking oil. Coconut meat is squeezed into coconut milk or coconut cream for cooking, and sweet dainties and coconut oil.

Food valueCoconut meat contains of about 65% oil with high phosphorus, calcium, carbohydrate, and others. Coconut oil contains variesties of fatty acids which produce rancid smell if left too long.

As medicineAshes of the burnt fresh bark of the coconut palm are used to cure toothache and scabies. Fresh or deied coconut meal is for nourishing body's energy, decreasing urinary discomfort and getting rid of parasitic worms as well as being medicinal drug. Coconut milk, a laxative and medicine for diarrhea, helps solve urinary problem, gallstone and blood vomit. Oil extracted from coconut meat or the hard husk is used to cure the wounds burnt by hot water. Nam Mapraaw (Coconut Juice);

IngredientsMapraaw Namhom (Sweet-smell coconut milk) Syrup

Chao Wang Food And Thai Food Of Each Festival - by Manora

Chao Wang Food:

(Food Prepared for Royal or High-Class Families)
The food which is prepared for Royal family members or of the high-class people is different from that of the ordinary people. The Chao Wang food has its own delicate cooking; for example, Khieo Wan Kai must have only chicken meat without any bones, whereas the ordinary people's Khieo Wan Kai contains with chicken both of meat and bones. The Chao Wang Namprig has beautifully carved vegeytables, side by side, to take with.

Some Bits about Thai Food:

Thai food is a Thai national symbol. It reveals the characteristics of the Thai people: their delicate taste, discipline, rules of conduct, artistic taste and human relationship. Thai food has its unique name with précis meaning of feature, flavor or the methods of cooking, Tong Yip and Foi Thong are examples of Thai sweets in this case. To understand causes and effects of Thai food cooking is to achieve.

To preserve the Thai nationality, the learners of how to cook Thai food should both keep Thai national values of the past and also accept any new ones.
Thai Food of Each Festival:
Thai food is cooked in agreement with Thai festivals organized according to Thai religious customs.

The fifth Month (April):

The old Thai New Year is celebrated in this month of April (between April 13 and April 15). To relieve the hot weather in the summer month, the dainty Khao Chae, (-a luncheon dish which includes rice served in scented water with jasmine and rose petals, and with seven or eight side dishes-), is used to serve monks, relatives and friends in the merit-making occasion. Kaaraamae (a Thai caramel) is made as well as Khao Niew Dang (Sweetened red glutinous rice) to give among friends and relatives.

The Sixth, Seventh, Eighth Months:

The Eighth Month (July) is in the rainy season and the Buddhist Lent. Fruits are in abundance so they are preserved in many techniques of cooking: stirring, or cooking as well as soaking in thick syrup. Durian Guan, Kluai Guan, Kluai Taak, Sabparod Guan are examples. Fully ripe chillies are sundried for the needed time. Fully ripe and sour tamarind is pitted, sprinkled with salt, pasted and preserved for the coming days. Fishes which are also plentiful, are sundried or grilled, for the next days.

In these months, Thai people do their merit-making at the temple. They offer foods to the monks in the form called "Salaag Puut", that is, the monks are offered foods by drawing slots. The baskets offered to the monks, contain with both fresh and dried foods. The people, offering foods to the monks, are very exited to see who is going to get their basket by drawing lots.
The Eighth Month is also the time for young Thai males to enter the monkhood. Folks helps bringing foods and sweets to join the occasion. The foods are of various kinds with ingredients of vegetables, fishes, coconut or sugar. One example of these is Yam Kamoei cooked with any food stuff found at hand but delicious with its sauce made with crunched, red chillies, garlic, vinegar, fish soy, lime and sugar.

Main dishes are often many kinds of curries and lon (a kind of sauce served with raw vegetables). For the funeral, Plara Lon(a sauce made with fishes which are fermented by salted and roasted rice) and foods with noodle-ingredients are avoided because of Thai superstition of death prolongation.

The Ninth Month (August):

The Ninth Month is the most favorable month for wedding ceremony, new house merit making, and age meritorious performing. Favorite Thai sweets, symbolized fortunes and honors, Khanom Chaan (sweetened, light color pudding with many layers) and Khaaw Niew Kaew (sweetened, glassy glutinous rice) are favorably cooked.

The Tenth Month (September):

The Tenth Month (September) is the month for Sart Thai Festival.
Krajaa Sart (sweetened, forested, and popped rice mixed with peanuts and sesames ) and Khaaw Yaa Koo(a cake made of sugar boiled with water received from crunched young rice grains) are popular sweets.

The Eleventh, Twelfth Monts:

The Eleventh Month (October) and the Twelfth Month (November) are months of Krathin Ceremony (the offering of Krathin Cloths to the monks) and Oogpaansaa (the outing of the Buddihist Lent ). Khaaw Tom Paad (glutinous rice wrapped by banana or bamboo leaves cooked by steaming ) are offered to the monks in this festival. Other favorite foods are rice cooked and wrapped in lotus or banana leaves accompanied by fried food such as Paad Prig Khing, dried curries, Namprig Makaam Paad, Namprig Makaam Piak and Namprig Taa Dang including salted food as salted meat and salted eggs, along with vegetables plucked along the way.

The Fist Lunar Month (Dyan Aaai or January) of the old days was full of shrimps in the canal. Tha main ingredients of food in this month, then, were shrimps.

Top Ten Favourite Thai Food - by Paisan M.

Everybody is well known about Thai food because many Thai restaurants has established around the world. The unique flavour of Thai food is blended of fresh herbs and aromatic spices. Thai food is cooked with basic ingredients such as garlic, chilies, pepper, lime juice, lemon grass and coriander leave. The main food in Thailand is rice. Although rice is the main food of Thais, but we aren't eat rice alone. We must have some dishes (soup, curries or fried vegetable) to eat with rice.

In July 1999, the Office of the National Culture Commission in Ministry of Culture announced the top ten Thai dishes best liked by foreigners. The Office had conducted a survey of Thai restaurants all over the world to find out ten favourite Thai dishes of foreigners. In the survey 1,500 Thai restaurant in America, Europe, Asia, Australia and Africa were asked to fill in a questionnaire. However, only 500 restaurants which have Thai chefs and offer the authentic Thai food were qualified for being taken into consideration. The results were the top ten Thai dishes which are listed below in order of their percentages of popularity:

1. Tom Yam Kung (spicy shrimp soup) 99%
2. Kaeng Keow Wan Kai (green curry with chicken) 82%
3. Pad Thai (Thai fried noodles) 70%
4. Pad Kaphrao (stir fried basil with chicken) 52%
5. Kaeng Phet Pet Yang (roast duck curry) 50%
6. Tom Kha Kai (chicken in coconut soup) 47%
7. Yam Nua Yang (spicy roast beef salad) 45%
8. Pork Satay (roast pork coated with turmeric) 43%
9. Kai Phat Met Mamuang Himmaphan (fried chicken with cashew nut) 42%
10. Phanaeng Kai (chicken in coconut cream) 39%

What has Thai Food got to offer for Vegetarians? - by Tony Ailton

For good reasons, Thai cuisine is one of the most popular in the world. Although popularly described as a single cuisine, Thai food is actually best characterized as a combination of four regional cuisines coming from Northern, Northeastern, Central and Southern Thailand.

A glance at the menues of Thai restaurants in western countries suggests that there is almost no place for vegetarian food in Thai cuisine. However, this is not the truth. Most Thai dishes consist of rice with vegetables, meat and sauce on top. Meat and fish or sea food are viewed as just one portion of a meal and not as the primary ingredient of the meal. Much of the flavour of Thai food comes from the sauces and vegetables, so you can frequently substitute bean curd or other ingredients that you do eat for the specified meat.

Below, you will find a vegetarian meal from Central Thailand.
Vegetarian Thai Stew
Ingredients:
2 sweet potatoes2 carrots
2 onions
3 cakes of tofu (bean curd)
250 grams of ricestraw mushrooms
15-20 small cherry tomatoes
150 grams of green beans
1 tbsp of light soy sauce
1 tbsp of dark soy sauce
3 cups of vegetable stock
2 tbsp of arrowroot
starchsalt and pepper
vegetable oil.



Wash and cut the tomatoes into pieces and then fry them in the oil. Cut the carrots into 1-inch pieces and the onions into quarters. Wash the mushrooms and cut them into halves. Cut the tofu into flat pieces, about 1/2-inch thick. Marinate the tofu in dark soy sauce for about 20 minutes. Fry the marinated tofu until it's brown and firm. Add the vegetables, soy sauce, salt and pepper. Mix the starch with water and add it to the stew. Boil the stew for a few seconds and serve it in a warm bowl.

Homestyle Thai Cooking - by Alison Anton

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I'm no Thai chef, but I sure have made my share of Thai green and red curry in this life! To me, there's nothing like the taste of these curries, with their rich exotic flavors of coconut, lemongrass, ginger and chilis.

Many of the ingredients that give Thai food its distinct flavors can be purchased here in the West, and not just in the Asian markets either. True, the really good stuff you'll be able to find only at the Asian stores or online, but decent substitutes for those of us who do not want to drive all over town can be found at natural foods stores and even some conventional stores around the US.

If you can't get (or if you just don't want to get) the fresh ingredients for Thai food at home, sometimes all it takes is to purchase a good jar of curry paste, which contains many of the exotic flavors, like galangal, kaffir lime leaves, lemongrass and chilis, that give a Thai dish its authentic taste (see recommendation below).

To make it easy for a fast and flavorful lunch or dinner, I created a simple Thai Formula that can be used for a number of coconut and curry based dishes. Once you remember the basics of the Thai Formula, you can't really go wrong. Along with brown jasmine rice with a stick of ginger in the rice cooker, your meal is ready in 30 minutes. And the flavors only get better through time - your left-overs tomorrow will be richer and creamier than your dinner today.

Here's a few of the mandatory pantry ingredients needed for authentic Thai cooking at home:
Thai Fish Sauce - This distinctive sauce is a must-have for Thai at home - it adds just the right flavor to take your so-so curry and make it authentic. Have you ever wondered, "why doesn't my coconut curry taste like the ones I get in the restaurants?" This is why. Fish sauce has concentrated flavors so only 1-3 tablespoons are needed for most dishes. It can be found at most natural foods stores, specialty stores and of course Asian markets.

Thai Curry Paste - Good Thai curry paste should give the dish a rich, pungent flavor without taking over. Not-so-good curry paste will be over stimulating (i.e. your mouth and lips will burn) but the curry ends up lacking depth and overall flavor. Kasma Loha-unchit, Thai chef and cooking instructor from the Bay Area, recommends Mae Ploy brand curry pastes that come in plastic tubs rather than jars or cans. Red, green and yellow curry pastes are the most popular.
Coconut Milk - Coconut milk is a blend of the meat from the coconut with the coconut water (or sometimes plain water). It imparts a very rich, sweet succulently exotic flavor and a creamy texture to Thai and Indonesian food. Choakoh is the milk of choice of many Thai chefs and Cook's Illustrated. Find coconut milk on sale and stock up, you'll need it if you want to start experimenting with Thai cooking.

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RECIPES:Thai Coconut FormulaThai Green Vegetable CurryFavorite Thai Peanut SauceHot and Sour Lemongrass Soup

200+ Delicious Thai Food Recipes - by Suthep

Over 200 of the most famous and mouth-watering Thai Food Recipes.

Delicious Thai Cuisine offers an in-depth look at the unique culture origins and influences behind Thai Cuisine.

Thai foods are food you can enjoy cooking as much as eating. Wonderful tastes can be created in your own kitchen with a minimum of fuss.

Delicious Thai Cuisine is as prepared in private home, street stalls and even palace.

Delicious Thai Cuisine includes everything from curry pastes, sauces, snacks and appetizers, soups, salad and vegetables, main courses (chicken, meat, and seafood), curries, rice & noodles, and desserts.

Download this wonderful e-Book for free! click here:

http://hot-giveaways.blogspot.com/2007/02/200-delicious-thai-food-recipes.html