Green Papaya Salad
For this salad, the papaya must be hard and very under-ripe, the flesh almost white with no trace of orange colour. It is always made by hand, the pawpaw shredded incredibly finely with a sharp chopper, the ingredients pounded together using a mortar and pestle, each order executed separately. If you have a Japanese daikon grater, long, even shreds can be easily achieved.
Serves 4.
Ingredients
300 g/10 oz/2 cups finely grated green papaya
1 handful tender green beans
2 tablespoons dried shrimp
2 tablespoons crushed roasted peanuts
1 clove garlic
2 shallots or small purple onions
2 or 3 fresh bird's eye chillies
1 tablespoon fish sauce
1 tablespoon palm sugar
lime juice to taste
dried chilli flakes (optional)
Directions
Peel papaya and shred the flesh or grate into fine, long strands. Cut beans into short lengths. In a blender process the dried shrimp to a floss. Combine with the crushed peanuts and set aside. Use a mortar and pestle to pound the garlic, shallots and chillies to a paste. Add fish sauce and sugar, then the beans and pound gently so the beans don't lose their shape. Add papaya shreds and pound lightly. Turn out into a bowl, add lime juice and toss. Sprinkle with dried shrimp and peanuts, and if liked, some dried chilli flakes.
Recipe excerpted from Encyclopedia of Asian Food by Charmaine Solomon (Periplus Editions, 1998)