Try this nutritious dinner recipe. All the ingredients should be available in a large supermarket or an Asian specialty store.

Ingredients

• 12 oz. tofu
• 1/3 cup finely chopped vegetables (carrot, onion, baby corn and mushroom )
• 1-2 cloves garlic, chopped
• ¼ lb of ground pork
• 2 tablespoons fish sauce
• 2 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons oyster sauce
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• corn starch
• 2 cups water

Instructions

1. Remove the tofu from its package and slice into 2-inch flat pieces.
2. Fry the tofu in vegetable oil on low heat until brown and remove. Put on the plate.
3. Brown the ground pork on high heat. Add garlic, onion, carrot, baby corn and mushroom.
4. Stir all the ingredients until a little bit done and mixed well.
5. Add soy sauce, fish sauce, oyster sauce, and sugar, stir, and then add 2 cups of water and let it boil.
6. Slowly add corn starch. Lower the heat to a simmer and stir well for a minute.
7. Pour the simmering stock on top the fried tofu. Serve with steamed rice.

Contributed by Chantawan Hongsamat, au pair in Illinois 2004

Ingredients

• 1/2 package of wonton (egg wrapper)
• 1 cup ground pork
• 1 tablespoon minced white onions
• 1 teaspoon garlic salt
• 1/2 teaspoon fish sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon minced cilantro
• 1 egg
• ground pepper
• 2 cups vegetable oil (for frying)

Instructions

1. Mix pork, onion, garlic salt, cilantro, fish sauce, egg, dash of pepper. This is the filling for the wonton skin.
2. Place 1/2 teaspoon of mixture in center of wonton skin. Fold 1/2 of skin over mixture to make a shape similar to 1/2 of a circle and wet them with a dab of water on you finger.
3. Deep-fry 3 to 5 minutes.
4. Serve hot with the sweet and sour sauce (palm sauce).

You can served them with French fries, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, salad or rice.

Submitted by Joy, Haverford, Pa

A Folk Tale from Thailand
The Birth of The Rose

The Thais do not believe in one god, but in a group of gods and goddesses who inhabit the earth. The gods and goddesses enjoy eternal happiness in their palaces among the clouds and are just as human as the earthly inhabitants, experiencing passion, love and anger just like ordinary people, except they do not feel the need for food, nor do they want clothes and riches like ordinary human beings. Moreover, the gods are endowed with divine powers, such as the ability to travel through the air, land on earth, and take the shape of whatever they desire. Some of the gods have divine powerful weapons and even magical powers.

A human being can be reborn as a god in an afterlife, enjoying much greater happiness than an earthly man can. In order to be reborn as a god, the human must be completely virtuous, perform many kind acts, give offerings to the priests and be good to all others. Evil men can be reborn in darkness after death or be born as lowly animals with many discomforts, for the Thais believe that life never dies. It passes on from body to body. It can be the body of other human beings, of animals and so on, depending on the person’s own acts on this earth. Acts are rewards or punishments in themselves and determine the future life. The highest reward for good and virtuous acts in this life, if one has to be reborn, is for a person to be born as a god in heaven. Therefore, there can be as many gods as people on earth. There are different ranks of gods, according to the quantity of virtuous acts that a person had performed.

At one time, the gods had a ruler named Suthep. He was surrounded by all the beautiful goddesses who danced around him. Now Suthep was still unmarried. He had no eyes for beautiful goddesses.

One day, something extraordinary happened to him. While all the beautiful goddesses danced gracefully in front of him, he noticed one who was the most attractive of them all. He fell in love immediately. He could neither sleep nor eat, constantly thinking of this beautiful goddesses whose name was Madhana. However, he could not think how to win her love.

At last, Suthep confided his secret infatuation to his charioteer who was very loyal to him. The charioteer responded that he would help his kind master. He tried to approach the goddess to talk to her, but she gave him no chance of making her acquaintance. She would not have anything to do with any man. Declaring himself defeated, he confessed his powerlessness to Suthep. However, he suddenly remembered a magician named Mayavin, who had the power to cast spells on all people, making them do his bidding. Mayavin was summoned to Suthep’s presence. The magician said that before he could start his magic on Madhana, he had to find out what had happened between Suthep and the goddess in their past lives to make the lady so uninterested in a powerful god like Suthep.

Mayavin closed his eyes and proceeded to penetrate into the secrets of their past lives with his magic trance. He then saw what happened in the past and told the king that his desire to marry Madhana could never be realized. He had been her enemy in her past life and had already loved her once. Suthep had once been a king and had fallen in love with Madhana, the daughter of his enemy. He had attacked the family’s kingdom and killed the royal family. Because of these past actions, Suthep would have no chance whatsoever to have her consent to marry him. However, Suthep insisted that Madhana be called to him. Whatever should happen next was up to him.

Mayavin then performed a magic chant and soon the goddess Madhana drifted into Suthep’s palace in a dreamy, lifeless trance. She was ordered by Mayavin to stop in front of the king. For some reason, Mayavin took pity on Suthep and told the king that he could cast a spell on the goddess to make her love him, but this spell would not last long. As soon as the spell was over, she would return to her own self again and despise him.

Suthep said he would not make her love him against her will and asked Mayavin to bring her back immediately to her conscious self. This Mayavin did, and then left the couple alone. Madhana awoke from her trance, alarmed to find herself in front of Suthep. She demanded an explanation.

“I love you and want to marry you!” he exclaimed.

“No, that cannot be,” replied the goddess. “There are other goddesses more beautiful than myself. Why not choose one of them?”

Suthep was angry with this response and finally said, “If you want to run away from me, you may go, but you must go down to earth. You cannot live here anymore in heaven. However, when you wish to return to heaven again, just tell me. I’ll go down to fetch you myself.”

The goddess replied, “Let it be so, but let me born on earth as a flower. Then I shall be very happy.”

“You may take the form of a very beautiful flower,” Suthep answered, “so that every passerby will desire to pluck you and kiss you.”

So the beautiful Madhana was dismissed from heaven and was born on earth as a lovely flower, henceforth known to men as a rose, the color of which was gorgeous to behold, with a fragrance that spread far and wide.

Submitted by Woralak Krutchaiyan, a Thai au pair living in Massachusetts, 2004

A Folk Tale from Switzerland
The Robbers and the Farm Animals

Once upon a time there was a miller’s servant who had served his master faithfully and diligently for many years. He had grown old in the mill, and the heavy work that he had to do there finally surpassed his strength. So one day he said to his master: “I can no longer serve you; I am too weak. I am therefore asking you for my dismissal and my wages.”

The miller said: “The time of wandering servants has passed. You are free to leave if you wish, but you will receive no wages.”

Now the old servant would sooner give up his wages than to continue to be tormented in the mill, so he took leave from his master. Before leaving home he went to the animals that until now he had fed and tended, in order to bid them farewell.

While taking leave from the horse, it said to him: “Where are you going?”

“I have to leave,” he said. “I cannot take it here any longer.” And when he set forth, the horse followed along after him.

He then went to the ox, stroked him once again, and said: “God be with you, old fellow!”

“Where are you going?” spoke the ox. ”

Oh, I must leave. I cannot take it here any longer,” said the miller’s servant and sadly went on his way to take leave from the dog. The ox followed along behind, just as the horse had done. And the other animals to whom he said farewell — the dog, the cat, and the goose — all did the same thing.

He made his way out into the country, where he first noticed that the faithful animals were following him. He spoke to them in a friendly manner, asking them to turn around and return home. “I have nothing more for myself,” he said, “and I can no longer care for you.” But the animals told him that they would not abandon him, and they contentedly followed along behind.

After several days they came to a great forest. Here the horse and the ox found good grass, which the goose and the rooster enjoyed as well. However, the other animals — the cat and the dog — had to suffer hunger, as did the old miller’s servant; but they did not grumble and complain.

Finally, after having gone very deep into the forest, they suddenly saw a large, beautiful house before them. It was locked up securely. Only an empty stall was open, and from here they could go through the barn into the house itself. Because no one could be seen in the house, the servant decided to stay there with his animals, and he assigned each one to a place. He put the horse up front in the stall. He led the ox to the other side. The rooster was given a place on the roof, the dog on the manure pile, the cat on the hearth, and the goose behind the stove. Then he gave each one his feed, which was plentifully stored in the house. He himself ate and drank all he wanted, then fell asleep in a good bed, which was all made up in the bedroom.

During the night, while he was fast asleep, the robber — who owned the forest house — returned. As he stepped into yard, the dog jumped on him furiously, and barked at him. The rooster cried down from the roof: “Cock-a-doodle-doo, cock-a-doodle-doo!” All this terrified the robber, for he had never seen farm animals that live with people, knowing instead only the wild animals of the forest. He fled hurriedly into the stall, but there the horse kicked out from behind, hitting him in the side. He staggered around and around, and only with difficulty could he retreat into the back part of the stall. He scarcely arrived there when the ox turned around and tried to pick him up on his horns. This frightened him anew, and he ran as fast as he could through the barn and into the kitchen, where he wanted to strike a light and see what was there. Feeling around the hearth, he touched the cat, which jumped on him and scratched him with its claws until jumped away head over heels, and tried to hide behind the stove in the main room. The goose jumped up, screaming and beating its wings. The terrified robber fled into the bedroom. There the miller’s servant was snoring mightily like a purring spinning wheel, and the robber thought the entire room was filled with strangers. You had better believe that he was overcome by a terrible fear. He rushed out of the house and ran into the woods, not stopping until until he had found his fellow robbers.

He began talking: “I don’t know what has happened in our house. Some strange people are living there. When I stepped into the yard a large wild man jumped at me, yelling and bellowing so terribly that I thought he would kill me. And another one cheered him on, calling down from the roof: ‘Hit him for me too! Hit him for me too!’ The first one was bad enough; I wasn’t going to wait for more of them to jump me, so I fled into the stall. There a shoemaker threw a last at my side, and I can still feel where it hit. I ran to the back of the stall. A pitchfork maker was standing there who tried to impale me on his pitchfork. I ran into the kitchen, where a hackle maker beat me with his hackle [a sharp-toothed tool for combing flax]. I tried to hide behind the stove, but there was a shovel maker there who beat me with his shovel. Finally I ran into the bedroom, but there were so many others snoring in there that was happy to escape with my life.”

When the robbers heard this, they were so horrified that not a one of them had any desire to enter the house. To the contrary, they believed that the entire region was threatened by these strange people. That same night they departed for another country, and they never returned. The miller’s servant lived in peace in the robbers’ house with his faithful animals. He no longer had to suffer in his old age, for the beautiful garden next to the house produced more fruit, vegetables, and all kinds of food every year than he and his animals could eat.

From Animals in Exile, Folktales of Aarne-Thompson, translated and edited by D.L. Ashliman. His source: Otto Sutermeister. Kinder- und Hausmärchen aus der Schweiz (Aarau: Druck und Verlag von H. R. Sauerlaender, 1873), pp. 91-94.

Ingredients

• 14-16 fillets of anchovies
• 2 large onions
• 6-8 potatoes
• 2-3 dl cream
• liquid from the anchovies
• 2 tablespoons of butter or margarine

Instructions

1. Peel the onions and cut it in thin slices. Peel the potatoes and cut or grate them in thin shreds.
2. Put half of the potatoes in an ovenproof dish. Spread the anchovies and the onions over the potatoes and then put on the rest of the potatoes. Add half of the cream and some liquid from the anchovies.
3. Put the butter on in dabs.
4. Bake in 225 degrees C (450-475 degrees F) until the potatoes are golden brown (45-60 minutes). Thin down with the rest of the cream. Keep baking until the potatoes are soft.

This is a traditional Swedish dish that I love.
It’s eaten mostly during Christmas. “Jansson” is a Swedish surname, but I’m not sure who it’s called after…

Submitted by Linnea , Massachusetts 2004