Category Archives: – Featured Food Discoveries

A Chinese pan-fried flatbread and “Chinese hamburger”

Posted on May 21, 2017 by David Dettmann

As the cuisine of China’s interior becomes popular in US cities (i.e. among the popular Xi’an-themed restaurants in NYC and Philadelphia–see here for my past post on that topic), items like “Chinese hamburger” are slowly becoming commonplace on menus at … Continue reading →

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Delicious greens: water spinach

Posted on May 10, 2017 by David Dettmann

Water spinach is one of our favorite vegetables. It is a popular vegetable to stir fry in Southern China and Southeast Asia. When quickly fried at high heat, its leaves wilt and the stems stay crunchy. Its flavor is like … Continue reading →

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A childhood comfort food memory via Kashgar flatbread and a savory mutton stew

Posted on March 26, 2017 by David Dettmann

Have you ever had that unexpected situation when you taste something that transports you back to your childhood–even though you happen to be thousands of miles from where you grew up? The subject of today’s post is exactly that, and … Continue reading →

Posted in - Featured Food Discoveries, Central Asia/Uyghur food | Tagged , , , , | 9 Comments

Besan flour and Burmese chickpea tofu

Posted on February 19, 2017 by David Dettmann

Yesterday I had an exciting new food experience with a starch jelly common in Myanmar. There it is commonly referred to as “tofu” တိုဖူး, though it isn’t made from soy or processed in the ways in which beans are fermented … Continue reading →

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Edible Southeast Asian tree and bush leaves

Posted on January 5, 2017 by David Dettmann

Happy New Year greetings! Although I wasn’t able to post as much as I would have liked to in 2016, I was able to continue my careful exploration of interesting finds at our MANY Asian markets in Philadelphia (I now … Continue reading →

Posted in - Featured Food Discoveries, - Featured Markets, Cambodian food, Indian food, Thai/Lao food | 3 Comments

Sour times: the instant noodle-fueled rise of “old crock” sour vegetables

Posted on November 27, 2016 by David Dettmann

In a 2014 post I tried to argue that the Kang Shifu 康師傅 (aka Chef Kang, or Master Kong) “happy chef” and his style of the popular beef stew noodles have influenced not only other instant noodle brands in Taiwan … Continue reading →

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Kluwak seeds and a savory black beef stew from East Java

Posted on October 23, 2016 by David Dettmann

The black flesh of fermented kluwak seeds (aka keluwek or black nut) adds a very unusual and thick earthy base to meat stews in regional cuisines of Indonesia and Malaysia. It is particularly well known as a key ingredient in … Continue reading →

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(A few) Asian grocery options for Germantown and Manayunk

Posted on September 18, 2016 by David Dettmann

Regular readers of this blog may be surprised to find that for the past 3 years, I have been living about as far away from any Asian market as can possibly be in Philadelphia. Perhaps that has helped force me … Continue reading →

Posted in - Featured Food Discoveries, - Featured Markets, Japanese food, Korean food, Thai/Lao food | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Selamat pagi, Yogyakarta: a surprisingly rich and savory chicken rice porridge for breakfast

Posted on August 11, 2016 by David Dettmann

I’ll start by saying that I’m not one for sweet breakfasts. As regular readers will know (ex. 1, ex. 2, ex. 3), I prefer savory foods leftover from the night before to American breakfast cereal or glazed donuts. A recent … Continue reading →

Posted in - Featured Food Discoveries, - Recipes, - Unique food traditions, Chinese food, Malay/Indonesian food, Thai/Lao food | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Salam leaf, an essential flavor in Indonesian cooking

Posted on August 6, 2016 by David Dettmann

What you are seeing above is NOT a bay leaf. I say this because it seems like a majority of all recipe sites and blogs online, as well as cookbooks translate daun salam as “bay leaf” in English. In fact, … Continue reading →

Posted in - Featured Food Discoveries, Malay/Indonesian food | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments