Dried Apricot and Carrot Salad on Betel Leaves

Ingredients

Preparation

For the carrots: Peel the carrot. Shred the whole carrot. If you use the Messermeister tool, you'll get long threads of carrot pieces. Cut into about 3-inch pieces. Place the carrots in a bowl. Sprinkle with brown sugar. Drizzle with the juice of 2 limes. Toss well. Let the carrots marinate. Set aside.

For the lemongrass-flavored dried apricots: Dice the apricots into small squares. In a small saucepan, heat a teaspoon of peanut oil. Add the apricots. Stir for about a minute. Place the puréed lemongrass in a double-layered  cheesecloth and drizzle the lemongrass juice over the apricots. Turn off the heat. Let cool completely.

For the peanut and tamarind salad dressing: In a bowl, mix together the tamarind concentrate, remaining lime juice, palm sugar, peanut oil, dried shallots, crushed peanuts, red Thai bird chile, black pepper and soy sauce. Add the peanuts. Set aside.

Assembly time: In a large bowl, combine the carrots, apricots and kaffir lime leaf and mint leaves (if used). Drizzle with the peanut and tamarind salad dressing.

Place the betel leaves on a platter. Spoon about 1-1/2 tablespoons of carrot salad on each betel leaf. Garnish with dried shrimp (if you're not a vegetarian).

Serve immediately.

Bon appétit!

Tips

You can substitute golden raisins for the dried apricots if you like. It's just as delicious. It brings natural sweetness to the salad.

Unlike regular limes, kaffir limes have a bumpy exterior. The fruit doesn't have a lot of juice, and what juice there is, is quite bitter. Kaffir lime trees are prized for their fragrant leaves, not their fruits. I used fresh kaffir lime leaves from our garden. If you can't find any, you can use fresh mint leaves. Don't add too much kaffir lime leaf to the salad as it tastes very strong and will overpower the dish. You can use the remain leaf for sweet and sour soups.

Tamarind concentrate has a nice tart flavor. You can also use fresh tamarind pods if you like, but I find this to be labor intensive. I just prefer eating fresh tamarind as is and cook with tamarind concentarte or tamarind powder.

The lemongrass stalk has to be finely chopped, then ground in the mini food processor. To ensure that all the lemongrass turns into a fine moist powder, I pound the finely-chopped lemongrass in a mortar and pestle with about 3 tablespoons of water.

Betel leaves can be found at most Indian stores, or you can also buy them online.

Dried shrimp (tôm khô in Vietnamese) add a unique salty taste to the salad. This ingredient is very common in Vietnamese cuisine. I sometimes add some to fried rice but when cooked, the taste is very different.

I use Ponzu brand soy sauce; it's perfect as a dipping sauce. It's lemony and less salty than regular soy sauce.

Palm sugar can be found in most Asian stores or online. It's sold as a block, shave the sugar and dissolve it in the salad dressing.

I buy dried fried shallots at the Asian store. It's crunchy and very strong in flavor. You can also make your own by frying thinly sliced shallots if you like.

You can find all the ingredients listed in most Asian stores.

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