I do! This stuff is incredible.
A friend of mine is big into Southeast Asian cuisine and he says it’s a very strong, and very acquired taste. XD
I haven’t been brave enough to take him up on the offer to try anything with it yet.
Oh, if you eat southeastern Asian food I guarantee you’ve had some.
It smells foul on its own, but you can add it to anything that needs some savory flavor. Just a bit will do it, but the results are magical.
I’d never eat it on its own but I’ll add a few splashes to anything that needs a flavor boost, especially things like stews or curries.
Oh, if you eat southeastern Asian food I guarantee you’ve had some.
My friend does, I haven’t summoned that kind of bravery yet. XD
I am not very culinarily adventurous, sadly.
If you’ve had Worcestershire sauce, that is a form of fermented fish sauce. It’s made with anchovies.
[narrowness of my tastes intensify]
If it’s not bread or deep fried, my mother probably sent me to bed as a child for refusing to even try it at least once. XD
It’s taken me a long time to branch out at all, and even then, only slowly and without much success.
Wow, Thai restaurants are everywhere, at least where I live. I’m surprised you’ve never tried it.
If you go to the actual place, they have a version called pla daek, which is the chunky, historical kind made in a bucket.
Let’s put it this way - I pass by far more restaurants day-to-day than I’ve tried in the entirety of my life XD
Getting me to try anything is like pulling teeth. Perhaps especially if it’s me trying to get myself to try something.
Ah. Yeah, I know someone like that.
My fish sauce days are over anyway. For whatever reason they can make vegetables taste like beef, but not even like a humble shrimp cracker.
Was going to post exactly this. It is soooooo good in Thai food. Don’t smell it though lol
Explanation: Not just a military food! Roman garum was fish sauce left to ferment, and was a condiment they put on everything. Bread, meat, other fish, salad, porridge, wine, fruit, everything. It was considered such an essential foodstuff that, like bread and wine, it was provided to slaves. There were varieties that were cheap as could be, like wine, and like wine, there were varieties that would cost a year’s wages for a common laborer just to get a single container of.
Since it wasn’t, y’know, boiled or anything, just left to ferment, it was a great way to get fish parasites. In fact, it’s widely suspected to be a contributor to the spread of Mediterranean fish parasites to the Atlantic during the Roman era. Y i k e s
It sounds gross af, tbqh. Even the Romans acknowledged that the breath of someone who had just eaten garum was revolting, though, with one Roman love poet (sarcastically?) complimenting a man for continuing to pursue a woman after she had eaten six helpings of garum. But it must have had something going for it to be so widely popular - de gustibus non disputandum est!
Lea and Perrins Worcestershire sauce checking in.
