Global Cuisine

I knew them so well, I am sure I could have called them by their first name or (at the very least) in our family’s preferred style – ‘Uncle’ Chiang and ‘Auntie’ Madame Chiang, but I had much too much respect for those monstrously large and patronizing portraits that hung in the Grauman’s Chinese Theater to call them anything but Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and Madame Chiang Kai-shek. And, I always greeted them with reverence each Friday night when we went to the Chinese Theater and to the movies! I guess I was seven, and I had never seen portraits so grand and large. I wonder what happened to them. When were they un-ceremoniously dethroned and where are they now? Probably, resting on their sides against the wall of some antique warehouse in downtown Los Angeles smelling of incense and camphor…

Besides movies at the Chinese Theater, (Remember Dragon Seed with that lovely Chinese actress, Katherine Hepburn?) there were exotic dinners with my parents in Chinatown restaurants and visits afterwards to the small gift shops nearby where I fondled the porcelain dishes with green dragons, vowing one day to have plates just like them at home when I served Chinese food which I would surely learn to create.

The other day I received a flyer advertising a romantic Caribbean get-away. It showed a scantily clad, deliriously happy couple lounging on the beach, cocktails in hand. I ripped it in half and tossed in the recycle bin. When you're married to someone whose Twitter handle is @Dermdoc, lying on the beach isn't in your future. Consider this: Last summer when our local Target ran out of sunscreen, they called us.

So the only thing worth going to the Caribbean for would be the food. Caribbean food is a fusion of many cuisines including African, Ameri-Indian, French, and Spanish making, making it deliciously unique. Given its temperate climate, the Caribbean produces an astounding array of exotic fruits such as passionfruit, guava, cherimoyas, and coconuts which feature prominently in both sweet and savory dishes. And their beloved jerk seasoned meats and fresh fish, are often accompanied by two of my favorite foods: plantains and black beans.

Caribbean black beans and rice. If you've never had it, I'm sorry; you've been missing out. I had my first taste about 12 years ago in an eclectic Caribbean restaurant in Asheville, North Carolina. I was smitten and still am.

Peas are one of my favorite vegetables to grow. Just plant them near something they can attach to and watch them emerge from the earth, their tendrils climbing and clinging, eventually bearing bulbous pods filled with green pearls. I grow two varieties: classic shell peas and sugar snap peas, which I use mainly for stir-frying. But I love them raw too. They make a nice addition to a salad. Every now and then I'll pluck one from the bush and nibble on it while I'm out and about in the garden. Snap peas are crispy, sweet, and completely edible, pod and all. For me peas are the harbingers of spring going into summer.

This stir-fry recipe features sugar snap peas paired with tender pork, all enrobed in a Thai-style sauce that is sweet, spicy, and savory. Chicken or beef would also work wonderfully well in place of pork. To round out the dish, Jasmine rice simmered in coconut water makes a nice match. The sweetness of the coconut counterbalances the heat of the chile pepper. It's also lower in fat than coconut milk but just as flavorful. This simple and healthy stir-fry comes together in literally minutes, making it ideal for a quick meal for one hearty eater or two dainty ones.

Stuffed and sated without the ability to eat even one more bite – or so I thought – we headed to Hwang Hu Sam Gye Tang restaurant to experience Samgyetang, a hot bowl of bubbling chicken soup made with one very important ingredient: ginseng.

Ushered upstairs to the second floor of this elegant and glistening airy restaurant, we were seated next to a vast window overlooking a rainy busy side street below. We passed walls that were lined with photographs of celebrity and everyday patrons, leaving the menu to appear even that much more sparse. Hwang Hu Sam Gye Tang doesn’t offer too many things other than chicken and ginseng soup, a fact I’d later forget about once the scorching hot liquid touched my tongue.

The chef and host suggested that they bring our food to the table before cooking purely for photographic purposes. “Please, do not go through any trouble” I said to our guide, watching my translated words make their way to the chef. The chef wouldn’t have it any other way, his face said everything I needed to know. Once a boiling hot soup is brought to our table I would see none of the ingredients; steam and bubbles would make sure of that. I acquiesced and like a good guest I let them set out bowls of food to photograph.