Eggs in Tomato Sauce, Myanmar Style

Eggs in Tomato Sauce, Myanmar Style

This is one of my favorite Myanmar dishes to make. First, because it’s fun to peel so many boiled eggs at once! Second, because it doesn’t involve processing/cleaning any meat (this can take a lot of time if you shop at wet markets in Myanmar). And best of all, the dish keeps really well in the fridge for several days—it’s a great make-ahead meal, and the flavors improve over time, much like with a pot of soup. …

Myanmar Pumpkin Curry

Myanmar Pumpkin Curry

With thanks to my friend Daw Phyu, who always passes the most delicious food to me across the fence between our homes. Thank you for cooking with me and helping me to learn this recipe. I will always love your food.

A note about ingredients for making this curry: 

Lots of Myanmar curries have a seafood component. This dish, as taught to me by my friend Daw Phyu, often includes a handful of fresh shrimp and a teaspoon of fish paste.…

Pickled Tea Leaf Rice

Well, here we are, three years after I started this blog, and I am finally getting around to posting the recipe for which it is named. Better late than never, right? Pickled tea leaves are a favorite of mine, and I think there is nothing like them in the world. I am a bit at a loss to describe them adequately. They have the flavor of green tea, with the flavor of fermentation; they are slightly bitter, slightly salty, and they leave a bit of a tangy aftertaste on the tongue for a few moments.…

Yellow Bean Stew

Yellow Bean Stew

Myanmar is not short on flavorful vegetarian dishes—this stew is another example of that! I love this dish because it can easily be made in bulk and lasts a few meals and it is really inexpensive. Also, if I have any leftover meat curry from a previous meal, I can easily add it in to give the whole meal extra protein and flavor (and use up leftovers in the process–always a win).

I struggled to name this recipe; in Burmese, part of its name contains a pejorative term for an ethnic group in Myanmar.…

Traditional Burmese Sour Soup

Traditional Burmese sour soup: it is served in most restaurants, alongside platefuls of rice and little dishes with different curries. You can pour spoonfuls of it onto your rice and mix it with a curry, or you can just drink it right out of the bowl. Usually the restaurant staff will keep refilling your bowl of sour soup unless you ask them to stop; I rarely ask them to stop—such is my love for sour soup. (Ironically, you don’t receive bottomless water when you eat out in this part of the world, you have to order a bottle of it.…

Coconut Milk Noodles

Coconut Milk Noodles

(Ohng No Khao Swe)

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“Coconut milk noodles” – that is the direct translation from the Myanmar name for this dish. A lot of dishes here have simple and sometimes vague names—“Chinese Muslim fried rice”, “wide fried noodles”, “soaked, long and fried”—names which do not always explain the flavor, contents, or texture of the dish. I struggled to give this recipe a proper title in English, afraid that a direct translation of the name would leads you to believe that the noodles themselves are made from coconut milk (which does sound pretty great, actually).…

Easy Dulce de Leche

Dulce de leche translates from Spanish to mean, literally, “sweet of milk.” It is creamy, thick, and is, in essence, caramel. Dulce de leche is made with sugar and milk, but can easily be made by heating sweetened condensed milk for a number of hours.

A couple summers ago, when I first made dulce de leche, I submerged a can of sweetened condensed milk in a pan of water, brought it to a simmer, and then continued cooking the can on low (while maintaining the water level) for another 3 hours.…

Beansprouts and Tofu, lightly fried

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I am typically not a huge fan of either bean sprouts or tofu. However, this particular arrangement of the two has become a new favorite in our house. Some days, I don’t get to the market early enough to get the best meat, and some days, I just don’t feel like cooking meat; these sorts of days often come on the heels of meat purchases that proved to be tough and unpalatable. (My last attempt at beef curry involved what must have been a very old water buffalo.…