Vietnamese Salad Rolls (Woo HOO on ME!)
OK. They may not look like much to you, but these are my very first Vietnamese Salad Rolls, one of my favorite eats in the whole world.
And I am giving myself a BIG WOOO HOO for doing them.
You all think I am much braver and more experimental than I really am. I have loved these for probably 15 years, but on my own I could never figure out how to make them, and I really didn’t want to try. I told myself I couldn’t get all the ingredients, anyway.
“Oh yes!” said my French friend, mistress of the kitchen, nothing she couldn’t do, and she invited us for dinner and the first course was Vietnamese Salad Rolls, made in her own kitchen. “They have the rice wrappers at all the Phillipino stores in Kuwait.”
Who knew? My French friend knew ALL these little secrets.
She carefully explained how to make them, but my mind shut down when she said “There is one part that is a little tricky – the rice wrapper has to soak for ONE SECOND in a pan of hot water, but only one second!” To me, that sounded very scary and daunting.
Then she gave me two packages of the wrappers.
I took them out now and then and read the instructions and put them back in the cupboard. I even shipped them from Kuwait to Doha with me. I read detailed instructions on the internet. I printed some out.
Yesterday, I found more wrappers at the MegaMart and bought two packages and now, with plenty of back up and with an unanticipated energy and hopefulness, I thought “why not give it a try tonight?”
The secret to making these is to have everything ready in advance – a bowl of cooked shrimp, sliced in half down the spine (so both halves look like a shrimp), a bowl of basil leaves, a bowl of mint leaves, a bowl of chopped parsley, a bowl of thinly sliced lettuce, a bowl of julienned carrots, a package of the rice wrappers, the cooked vermicelli in a strainer (it stays flexible because these go together fairly fast) and a flat round pan of hot water to soften the rice wrappers.
Once you have the ingredients assembled, the assembly – which for some reason was the part that daunted me – goes fairly easily and rapidly. If you soak the thin, brittle wrapper for exactly one and a half seconds, and lay it on a cutting board, it becomes very flexible and exactly the right texture. I started 3 inches from the top with the shrimp, then lay the rest of the ingredients in a row vertically, but almost on top of each other. Then I pulled the bottom up over the ingredients and tucked it in – not too tightly, but very snugly, folded in the sides, then wrapped the top over the already-rolled up section, and wow – a salad roll!
Vietnamese Salad Rolls
INGREDIENTS
• 2 ounces rice vermicelli
• 8 rice wrappers (8.5 inch diameter)
• 8 large cooked shrimp – peeled, deveined and cut in half
• 1 1/3 tablespoons chopped fresh Thai basil
• 3 tablespoons chopped fresh mint leaves
• 3 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
• 2 leaves lettuce, chopped
•
• 4 teaspoons fish sauce
• 1/4 cup water
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoons white sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic chili sauce
• 3 tablespoons hoisin sauce
• 1 teaspoon finely chopped peanuts
DIRECTIONS
1. Bring a medium saucepan of water to boil. Boil rice vermicelli 3 to 5 minutes, or until al dente, and drain.
2. Fill a large bowl with warm water. Dip one wrapper into the hot water for 1 second to soften. Lay wrapper flat. In a row across the center, place 2 shrimp halves, a handful of vermicelli, basil, mint, cilantro and lettuce, leaving about 2 inches uncovered on each side. Fold uncovered sides inward, then tightly roll the wrapper, beginning at the end with the lettuce. Repeat with remaining ingredients.
3. In a small bowl, mix the fish sauce, water, lime juice, garlic, sugar and chili sauce.
4. In another small bowl, mix the hoisin sauce and peanuts.
5. Serve rolled spring rolls with the fish sauce and hoisin sauce mixtures.
FOOTNOTE
• The fish sauce, rice vermicelli, chili garlic sauce, hoisin sauce and rice wrappers can be found at Asian food markets.
These are so fresh-tasting and light, perfect for a hot summer evening, perfect for a special Ramadan breaking-the-fast appetizer. Once the rolls are made, seal them on a plate under a couple layers of saran-type wrap to keep the wrappers from drying out. You can make them a couple hours in advance and wrap them good and store them in the refrigerator; they keep well for a couple hours. Don’t make more than you can eat the same day; they don’t keep well overnight.
The recipe above uses a different sauce than we use. The Vietnamese in France use this sauce, which is more of a vinaigrette, but the Vietnamese in Seattle and in St. Petersburg, Florida, use a peanut sauce:
1/2 cup peanut butter
2 Tbs Thai sweet chili sauce (sometimes called chili pepper sauce for chicken) it is that thick, sticky sweet orange-y red sauce with pepper flakes in it)
2 Tbs soy sauce
2 Tbs rice vinegar
1 Tbs sugar
1 Tsp finely chopped ginger
1 Tbs tahina
Cook one minute in microwave and stir until all the peanut butter is dissolved. Then add liquid – can be water or orange juice or pomegranate juice or chicken broth or sake (!) to thin to a thick salad dressing consistency.
AdventureMan was so amazed and delighted when he came home and saw I had been able to make these all by myself! I am so amazed and delighted that I can do it! Wooo HOOOOOOO! We didn’t eat them as an appetizer; we like them so much, we ate them as the main course, with some finger-food veggies – snow peas and carrots – as side dishes.
Stat Bump
There are a lot of factors in blogging that I don’t control. I have no control over the policies of the countries I live in. I have no control over who might like my posts and tell their friends. And I have no control over what posts might tickle interest among blog readers.
Kuwait has a lively, active blogging community, even in the face of competition from FaceBook and Twitter. Many bloggers have gone inactive, working in new areas, and have come back to blogging. Leaving Kuwait, moving to Doha, I lost about 300 – 500 regular viewers per day. I know, I know, some of you found the sunrise-over-the-Gulf daily photos SO so boring, but there were Kuwaitis all over the world who checked in just to see what Kuwait looked like each day, and having been in their position (I still check Seattle every day, and Pensacola) I know how they feel.
Some posts I consider “filler.” Maybe I can’t think of anything to say, so I share a piece of news that interests me. Or I ask a question. Posts I just tapped off and posted without giving it a lot of thought then take off, and over the months and years maintain a steady popularity. The posts I like the best are posts where my readers have stepped in, commented and we’ve all learned more about something.
At Halloween, I had my all time high stat bump – on an article I had written two years earlier. Last night, I watched the numbers climb irrationally on a news article on the Perseids – and oh, by the way, even though last night was the peak, they are still out there, and if you can find a quiet, light free spot, you are in for a thrill. I remember one year, AdventureMan and I headed for Clearwater Beach, and it was like Spring Break except it was dark, what a hoot! Everyone had blankets or beach loungers, laying out flat, looking up at the sky – with all their clothes on! It was night!
This is what I could see this morning:
Ah well, coming up are Friday and Saturday, the two worst-stat days of the week. Some days I don’t even bother blogging on Saturday!
Have you ever had an irrational stat bump? Did anyone in Kuwait or Doha go out last night to watch the Perseids? Any luck?
Qatari Divorcees and Widows More Likely to Marry
This caught my eye for a couple reasons – one of which is that Qatar has the second largest divorce rate after Kuwait. Second, while it is mentioned in the article, it is not mentioned at the end that the women have other options in Kuwait and Qatar, are more able to care for themselves financially, and are not bound to stay in unhappy marriages for reasons of financial dependency.
It is delightful to think that one unhappy marriage while young will not doom a still-young woman to a life of celibacy. 🙂
More Qataris tying the knot with divorcees and widows
Web posted at: 8/11/2009 2:41:41
Source ::: The Peninsula / By MOHAMED SAEED
DOHA: Qatar has the second largest divorce rate in the Gulf region after Kuwait, but a welcome development has been that now an increasing number of citizens prefer to marry divorcees and young widows.
Qatar being a conservative society, marrying divorcees and widows has been a taboo of sorts.So, since the largest number of divorcees is in the age group of 20 to 29 years, their remarriage is a healthy sign.
In 1986, for example, divorcees under 20 years of age accounted for 15 percent of the total. Their proportion has been declining and was down to 6.4 percent in 2007.
Studies conducted by the Permanent Population Committee (PPC) show the number of marriages breaking up in the country has risen from just 308 in 1986 to nearly a 1,000 in 2007.
And although the population of locals has also gone up in this period, the rates of marriage and divorce have risen at a larger rate than the population increase.
It is also interesting to note that nearly 85 percent of weddings ending into divorce are first marriages. In other words, a husband taking a second, third or even fourth wife has never been the cause for a wedlock to end.
With women having increasing access to education and employment, the number of married Qatari females asking for divorce (‘khula’ in Arabic) has been on the rise. The share of such divorces in the total is on an average between 16 and 23 percent.
The studies note that financial independence of educated women has much to do with the rise in the phenomenon.
And as for male citizens marrying young divorcees and widows, the number of such marital knots had increased to nearly 300 in 2007 as compared to barely 29 in 1986.
Among the Arab countries, Egypt and Syria have the lowest divorce rates, suggest the studies.
They point to erosion of social values, modern living, fading influence of families, as the major factors behind the rising incidence of divorce in Qatar.
John Lockerbie, Catnaps and Islamic / Arabic Design
One of the reasons I love going to museums over and over again is because I can only absorb so much at one time. Every time I see an exhibit, I learn something new. The next time I go to the Doha Islamic Museum I am going to go by myself, get the headsets, and get an overview. It will be my seventh trip to the museum. I am ready to go a little deeper.
You know you have read a good book – even if you didn’t like it when you read it – when your mind keeps going back there, time after time, mulling over questions, thinking of alternative endings, thinking even about what you didn’t like – a book that troubles you enough to make you THINK is a good book.
John Lockerbie’s website, Catnaps does the same thing for me. As I drive around Kuwait and Doha, I see things and get the great “aha” because I have read articles he writes about Islamic / Arabic houses, their origins, how the earliest houses were constructed, problems with modern constructions. I can’t absorb it all at once, so I visit again and again. I look for window shadings, and I look for air conditioning. Because of his website, I am more aware when I take in the architecture.
Here, for example, is a relatively new building, but look what they did for air conditioning. I was in the building next door; the offices are air conditioned but the hall is hot and breathless.
As I went to the site today to get the reference, I got lost once again in the boat section. Now, I do know my shuw’i from my booms! I’m still working on the others. The very cool thing is John Lockerbie is always learning new stuff, too, and often updates what he has written, so there is always something new to learn on this site.
Don’t try to take it in all at once. Go often to visit and peruse. There is so much there that will enrich your stay in the Gulf if you understand a little more about what you are seeing.
Mr. Lockerbie used one of my photos to show a shaded garden. I haven’t the heart to tell him that the very next week they came and took off the tops of all my trees so the lawn would grow, but now my garden has harsh sunlight like the rest of Doha. The trees grow really fast – several feet per year – so it won’t be long before I have some shade once again.
Prickly Pear Becomes Cash Crop
The first time I ever saw these prickly pears was in Tunisia, where they were a by-product of huge prickly pear fences that kept roaming sheep, goats, even cattle out of the living areas. The prickly pear fences were everywhere. Some people made jam out of the fruit, but now, the fruit is bringing in big bucks to Moroccans.
To read the entire story, please click BBC News Africa
By Sylvia Smith
BBC News, Sbouya, Morocco
It is just after dawn in the hills above the Moroccan hamlet of Sbouya and a group of women are walking through the thousands of cactus plants dotted about on the hillside, picking ripe fruits whenever they spot the tell-tale red hue.
But these woman are not simply scraping a living out of the soil.
The cactus, previously eaten as a fruit or used for animal feed, is creating a minor economic miracle in the region thanks to new health and cosmetic products being extracted from the ubiquitous plant.
This prickly pocket of the semi-arid south of the country around the town of Sidi Ifni is known as Morocco’s cactus capital.
It is blessed with the right climate for the 45,000 hectares (111,000 acres) of land that is being used to produce prodigious numbers of succulent Barbary figs.
Every local family has its own plot and, with backing from the Ministry of Agriculture, the scheme to transform small scale production into a significant industry industry is under way.
Some 12m dirhams ($1.5m) have been pledged to build a state-of-the-art factory that will help local farmers process the ripe fruits.
The move is expected to help workers keep pace with the requirements of the French cosmetics industry which is using the cactus in increasing numbers of products.
Lucrative
Izana Marzouqi, a 55-year-old member of the Aknari cooperative, says people from the region grew up with the cactus and did not realise its true benefit.
“Demand for cactus products has grown and that it is because the plant is said to help with high blood pressure and cancer. The co-operative I belong to earns a lot of money selling oil from the seeds to make anti-ageing face cream.”
I know I have seen these growing in Kuwait – are they growing in Qatar, too?
Kuwaiti Youth Read Books
Wooo HOOOO on you, Kuwait! 😀
Kuwait”s youth bucking the trend, more open to reading books
Nadia AlـNassar
Staff Writer
Al Watan
A solid core of knowledge comes from reading. No matter what book a person reads, numerous benefits come from it; unlike watching TV, reading exercises the brain through an active mental process. Kuwait is often cited as one of the top reading Gulf countries in terms of print news, but is said to be amongst the lowest in terms of books. However, there is a visible trend emerging in the youth, with the number of teenagers reading in Kuwait over the past few years gradually increasing
Talking to a manager of one of Kuwait”s prominent bookstores about the readers who visit the bookstore, he noted that about 50 percent of the customers are now between the ages of 13 and 17 years old. He said that the majority of them choose bestsellers and books that were made into television shows or films.
Most of the readers choose to read English books, while there are some who read English books that are translated to Arabic, said the bookstore manager, bringing up the fact that there has been an increase in the percentage of teenage customers witnessed over the past year.
When students were asked why they think the youth of Kuwait is reading more, their responses were diverse, as well as interesting.
Saud said, “I think that our parents are much more educated than the parents of previous generations, therefore our parents comprehend the significance of reading more than the previous generation of parents.
“Our parents are trying to promote reading by getting us into the habit of reading at a young age.”
Mariam had a different view; “I think that the students are reading more nowadays because Hollywood is creating more movies based on teenage novels, such as Harry Potter, which makes teens compare the book and the movie.”
Many of the students brought up the fact that teens enjoy discussing books together, which influences their friends who do not read to do so and be able to join in the discussion.
Haifa, a 17ـyear old, said that there are more English books than Arabic books available to read in the book market, and more students now are better in English, therefore they have more options to read.
“I personally have always been a reader, and I have noticed that teenagers in Kuwait are reading much more because reading is becoming more worldwide and is being more publicized on the Internet, but yet I do not think that they are reading enough,” stated Jasmine, a high school student.
Faisal, a sophomore in high school, said he is reading over the summer to stay ahead in the courses that he finds challenging, whereas Jasmine reads for a different purpose.
“I read because reading takes you to a different place; it”s like traveling, and I am always willing to explore new places.”
Whether it is to enhance their information about the world or to entertain themselves, numerous students in Kuwait have realized the importance of reading and have taken it into their daily lives.
One of the most popular genres that teenage girls are reading in Kuwait is romantic fantasy, such as the Twilight series. Teenage boys on the other hand are interested in different genres.
“I”m very picky with the books I read; I usually read thrillers, fantasies and series such as Harry Potter and Charlie Bone, said 14ـyearـold Saud.
Sara mentioned that teenagers in Kuwait are also interested in reading psychological books, such as A Million Little Pieces, one of the more adult books making its way into the small but growing new generation of Kuwaiti readers.
Last updated on Tuesday 4/8/2009
Kuwait – American Woman Abducted and Raped
I received this notification this morning from the American Women’s League of Kuwait, guidance from the US Embassy:
We received a report that the spouse of an American citizen was kidnapped and sexually assaulted by three men in Mahboula. The victim was forced in a vehicle, taken to a secluded location, sexually assaulted, and left in the desert. The authorities are working to solve this heinous crime.
As a reminder to all, it is very important to keep an eye on who may be observing your activities while in Kuwait. Surveillance is not something that is just done by terrorists – almost every criminal who commits a crime conducts some sort of surveillance on their target either seconds, minutes, or hours before trying to commit a crime or assault a person.
Keep the following in mind:
Surveillance – think about who may be watching you. If it feels wrong, it probably is. Alert the local security personnel or store management of anything you feel is suspicious – DO NOT KEEP THIS INFORMATION TO YOURSELF AND TRUST YOUR INSTINCTS.
If you think you are being followed, make every effort to stay in a very public place until you can either make contact with the local security personnel or have some sort of an escort. Do not proceed to your vehicle or restroom, thus giving the person following you an opportunity to get you alone so they can rob or assault you.
Exiting/returning to your vehicle – this is the time when all people are vulnerable because your mind is focused on getting out of the car, watching traffic, trying to control children, or placing packages in/out of the car. Especially when returning to your vehicle, a good practice is to look around the exterior of your vehicle for people or suspicious items. Once in the vehicle, lock your doors and make sure your windows are up at all times.
Travel in groups whenever possible. Tell others where/when you are going and when you plan to return.
If being picked up wait inside a public place as opposed to alone and outside.
Carry a cell phone with pre-programmed emergency numbers, Post One, Police, Home, etc.
Last, think about fighting your attacker, especially if the attacker wants to take you to another location. Do not let that happen and draw attention to yourself and situation.
Sandstorm Due in 72 Hours
I’m not surprised – my niece, Little Diamond, is coming for a visit. Her arrival seems to invite sandstorms! We are just praying for her safe arrival BEFORE the sandstorm hits. For my friends in Iraq – this must seem endless. For my friends in Kuwait – I hope you get to dodge the bullet this time!
Sandstorm in 72 hours: Met
Web posted at: 7/14/2009 2:57:38
Source ::: The Peninsula
DOHA: A sandstorm is likely to hit Qatar in the next 72 hours, the meteorological office at the Civil Aviation Authority has announced.
During the sandstorm, the expected visibility will be around 2 to 5km and one kilometre or less in certain areas. Sea waves are expected to rise upto between 5 and 8 feet and even upto 10 feet in some areas.
The expected sandstorm will be blowing in from Iraq, and will reach the northern, eastern and central parts of the Arabian Peninsula, up to Iran.
The Saudi Meteorology and Environment Department, meanwhile, said the sandstorm would bring winds of medium to high velocity carrying with them around 2 billion tonnes of dust.
The below-average rainfall and inadequate water in the Euphrates and Tigris rivers in Iraq have contributed to the raging sandstorm.
The storm is so strong that it has stranded Admiral Mike Mullen, the US military’s senior commander, in the restive city of Kirkuk, north of Baghdad, according to reports.
The weather department has advised people to exercise caution during the sandstorm, especially during the night and while driving.
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