Monday, May 31, 2010

Delightful Pork Skewers At Bangkok Market In The Hawthorne EcoVillage

Photo and blog post by John Hoff

Bangkok Market--a grocery and deli located in the EcoVillage, near Lyndale and 31st--has delightful hot and ready-to-eat Hmong dishes, including a tilapia which is out of this world.

Recently, I dropped by and found the pork skewers so tempting I just had to have one. After eating it, I told my friend Megan Goodmundson how good it was, and we made a special side trip that very minute to go try one. Megan attempted to get the recipe from Tony, the owner of Bangkok Market, but he just laughed and said, "We throw a bunch of stuff together." Not only was the recipe a secret, but it was not written down...a practice I've read is typical of Hmong recipes, which are passed down verbally within families.

But I'm fairly sure the pork skewers in question use saffron, which turns the pork fat a delicious yellow, and for some reason the fat in particular seems to soak up the saffron flavor. Beyond that, I have no clue.

Well, garlic. A little garlic, not a lot.

Undeterred by the secrecy of the recipe, Megan purchased some pork shoulder meat, and decided to create her own Hmong-like pork skewers. In preparation for Memorial Day Weekend, we also made a trip to So-Low to buy (among other things) African snail meat, but that's a different post to follow. For now, the only place to get these fantastic, savory pork skewers is the Bangkok Market.


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1 comment:

General Disarray said...

omg, i eat these every other day!! i love the spicy ginger fish sauce dip... out of this world. and the ribs are super good too..