Burma: Rivers of Flavor

Description

Located at the crossroads between China, India, and the nations of Southeast Asia, Burma has long been a land that absorbed outside influences into its everyday life, from the Buddhist religion to foodstuffs like the potato. In the process, the people of the country now known as Myanmar have developed a rich, complex cuisine that makes inventive use of easily available ingredients to create exciting flavour combinations. Salads are one of the best entry points into the glories of this cuisine, with sparkling flavours - crispy fried shallots, a squeeze of fresh lime juice, a dash of garlic oil, a pinch of turmeric, some crunchy roast peanuts - balanced with a light hand. The salad tradition is flexible; Burmese cooks transform all kinds of foods into salads, from chicken and roasted eggplant to spinach and tomato. Mohinga, a delicious blend of rice noodles and fish broth, adds up to comfort food at its best. Wherever you go in Burma, you get a slightly different version because, as Duguid explains, each region layers its own touches into the dish. Tasty sauces, chutneys, and relishes - essential elements of Burmese cuisine - will become mainstays in your kitchen, as will a chicken roasted with potatoes, turmeric, and lemongrass; a seafood noodle stir-fry with shrimp and mussels; Shan khaut swei, an astonishing noodle dish made with pea tendrils and pork; a hearty chicken-rice soup seasoned with ginger and soy sauce; and a breathtakingly simple dessert composed of just sticky rice, coconut, and palm sugar. Interspersed throughout the 125 recipes are intriguing tales from the author's many trips to this fascinating but little-known land. One such captivating essay shows how Burmese women adorn themselves with thanaka, a white paste used to protect and decorate the skin.

Naomi Duguid is a writer, photographer, traveler, and home cook. Her recent cookbook Taste of Persia is the winner of a James Beard Award, an IACP Cookbook Award, and a Taste Canada Award. Her book Burma: Rivers of Flavor is also an IACP Cookbook Award and Taste Canada Award winner. Her six previous award-winning titles, co-authored with Jeffrey Alford, include two now-classic cookbooks that won the James Beard Award for Cookbook of the Year: Flatbreads & Flavors: A Baker's Atlas and Hot Sour Salty Sweet: A Culinary Journey Through Southeast Asia. Naomi leads small-group food-immersive trips to the Republic of Georgia and elsewhere. She is a Trustee of the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery, and is a frequent guest speaker and presenter at food conferences, particularly those focused on grains. She lives in Toronto. Follow her on Instagram and Twitter at @naomiduguid.

"Duguid is part anthropologist, part brilliant cook, and her recipes simply work in American kitchens. Many dishes in Burma will seem entirely fresh to palates already familiar with Thai or Vietnamese food. . . . Duguid has mastered the arc of flavor development. She writes with deep, local, friendly authority." --Cooking Light "Simple, distinctive home cooking." --Food Wine "Duguid's well-written recipes . . . will make readers yearn to get chopping, sizzling, and tasting." --Sacramento Bee "This stunning book is part cookbook, part culinary anthropology, and, throughout, a feast for the eyes." --Celebrated Living "A treasury of Burma's cuisine . . . . Duguid's portrait of Burma's rich food heritage contains vivid glimpses of the people who create it along with cultural insight and a dash of travel advice." --Publishers Weekly, starred review (Burma is one of Publishers Weekly's Top 10 Cookbooks for Fall) "Satisfy your taste for adventure with Naomi Duguid's Burma: Rivers of Flavor. Part cookbook, part travelogue, Duguid introduces the salads, stews and meats of Burma and explores the culinary crossroads between China, India, and Southeast Asia." --Greenwich Time