Tom Yum Goong, Saveur [Recipe/Pictures]

LTH,

Every once in a while a Saveur recipe catches my eye,* in this instance Tom Yum Goong from June 2007. A quick spin through Thai Grocery for lime leaves, lemon grass etc filled in the essentials, including a nibble portion of Thai Grocery's deliciously addictive juicy, fatty, crispy fried pork ribs from the array of prepared food items in the rear of the store.

Thai Grocery Pork Ribs


Truthfully Saveur's Tom Yum was not up to my standard home recipe from The Original Thai Cookbook by Jennifer Brennan, which uses shrimp shells for stock, or many of the Thai restaurants about town, quite possibly due to the small liberties I took with the recipe. There was a murky earthiness which both my wife and I both found displeasing. A retry is definitely in order.

Due to poor reading comprehension on my part I added aromatics to cold water, as opposed to boiling water.


I shelled the shrimp, which I'm sure resulted in loss of depth of flavor.


I called an audible on the addition of sliced white mushrooms, which may have contributed to the earthy flavor.


I certainly intended on giving the recipe a retry, though have a feeling I will be going back to Brennan's recipe or giving David Thompson's dtom yam gung from Thai Food a go.



Enjoy,
Gary

*Thai sweet garlic chili dip, Thai Grilled Chicken, Fried Pork-Wrapped Garlic , to name a few

Thai Grocery Inc
5014 N Broadway St,
Chicago, IL 60640
773- 561-5345

Very pretty pictures.

I'm betting that the mushrooms were the source of the earthiness. Just last week I made *my* tom kha kai going through the frozen remnants of my last expedition to Thai Grocery...but, went to the wrong store searching for straw mushrooms(*Potash*...um...Jewel carries 'em...why not you? Of course Potash also stocks the Thai coconut milk with the milk substitutes...wtf?). I know I can get cheaper and better coconut milk up on Argyle, but this was a spur-of-the-moment endeavor.

Anyway, I too opted for button mushrooms which the s/o proclaimed "very earthy" and not to his taste...tho' he did allow that he might've just been expecting straw mushrooms.

anyway

your pics have got me in a soupmaking mood...too bad I've yet to replenish my aromatics