Day Five- Peanut Thai Soup with Chicken

Day Five of Gypy's Two Week Detox:


Gypsy Slow Down       Today I saw a can of coconut milk in the cabinet today and thought it might be nice to shake this detox up a bit. Witt loves Thai food and since he's been really good sticking with me so far I thought I'd try to recreate a dish he likes. There is a small Thai restaurant in downtown Burlington called Anna Thai's. They have a creamy coconut soup with mushrooms thats delicious. I looked it up but all the recipes I found online called for ingredients I'd have to go to an Asian store to get. So I disregarded them. Turns out they are there for a reason.

My ingredients began with lemon and lime peel, lime and lemon juice, coconut milk, cilantro, green chilies, shitaki mushrooms, clam juice, shredded chicken and garlic. Not even close. I was so discouraged. What was I missing?! I called the expert over and he tasted it and added hot sauce. That gave it the right heat but it still wasn't right. By this point I'd been standing over the stove for at least half an hour and my blood sugar was dropping. Mr. Thai added more cilantro and a lot more green chilies. It helped but I felt like the broth was weak, even with the coconut milk. So was my tolerance. I was about to give up when Witt said something about Thai being hard to cook. Yes, but the best Thai dish I've ever made was Thai chicken with peanut sauce. So I grabbed the jar of peanut butter and added a big spoonful. What did we have to lose at this point? That did it, adding the richness that I hadn't been able to recreate. Then I sliced up some celery and added celery salt to give the soup some crunch and more flavor.

Witt said after eating two bowls he would be happy to get this in a restaurant. I actually thought it was pretty good myself. Maybe we were just really hungry, but if you are feeling adventurous, give it a try. I call this the "I didn't go to the Asian store" soup. But really, the Asian store is there for a reason. And so are those ingredients.