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Thursday, December 4, 2008

Linda' s Four-Winged Bean Salad

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These are four-winged beans, also called four-angled beans. These beans grow easily here, climbing up fences and giving a handful of beans every 3 days or so from one single plant. Because they grow and fruit easily, veg vendors usually have a plant or two, enough for their consumption with extra to sell. This is one veg I am pretty sure is pesticide free, especially when there's only a kilo or two of it out for sale. Once in a while I grow one plant in my garden but they are so fruitful that after a while nobody wants this on the table.

This is a superb salad my friend Linda often makes. I'm not sure of the origin, it could be nyonya (Malay-Chinese). There's no cooking required as the lime juice sort of pickles the beans which have to be cut super thin, one-cell thin if possible. Yes, thin enough to mount on a microscope slide. I was out of peanut brittle so I used grounded cashew nuts. It worked just as well. You will be taken by the burst of flavors from the bunga kantan, the dried shrimps and the fish sauce, the sting from the bird's eye chilies and the tangy sweetness of the lime juice and the sugar. You will also love the crunch of the uncooked beans. YUM.

p.s. I know veg recipes and posts aren't popular. You have heard of fibre and a painful condition if you don't eat enough veg? Starts with an 'h', 3 syllables. First one to answer correctly gets a carton of prune juice. Virtual of course.

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Linda's Four-Winged Bean Salad
400 g 4 winged beans*
2 heap T dried shrimps, washed well
8 (to your liking) chili padis or hot chilies
1/2 heart of bunga kantan (a ginger flower)
juice from 2 large limes
1/2 to 1 T fish sauce
1/3 t salt
1/2 T fine sugar
2 T peanut brittle, pounded until fine

* instead of beans, Linda sometimes uses pakis (wild fern, fiddleheads) and the result is more than excellent. The pakis need to be blanched briefly in boiling water.

1. Wash the beans very well, drain & pat dry with a clean towel. Top and tail. Slice into very thin slices, as thin as you can. Cut the chilies up, cut the bunga kantan heart very finely.

2. Mix everything together except for the peanut brittle. Taste and season to your liking. Sprinkle the pounded peanut brittle on top.


19 comments:

  1. my fav. veg. and tt recipe looks great. Ask Linda for her meehoon kerabu too..

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  2. *digging medical dictionary*

    H? Not C as in constipation?

    I love winged beans especially stir fry with belacan.

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  3. Oh yes I love theis bean. I do prepare this like u did too but minus the peanut brittle....but add serai sliced super thin...yumm.... fried wth dried shrimp and belacan I like it even better like PP above.

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  4. I like winged beans, very crunchy. It's perfect for a salad. Nice recipe. =)

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  5. Ah, four-angled beans... This brings me some memories. Last time I used to grow these in my garden too but like what you said, became too fruitful that no one wanna eat it. Eventually, it got demoted to pest plants. I like this bean once in awhile and also depending on how well my chillies grow. If the chillies are abundant, the beans are very much welcomed as I would make some belachan and eat the bean as 'ulam' i.e. just dip the raw beans with belachan.

    This recipe looked really simple but may yet be one great appetizer. Helps to lubricate you know where and the taste (from the way your photos looked) seemed so... fresh and tangy.

    So what's the H word? errmm... no smart guess... Hopefully you are not referring to haemorrhoid or something, which is downright gross. I only know the phrase BPS i.e. Buay Pang S*i.

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  6. hi, terry. i sent to u some more pictures of your kitchen yesterday. plesae check it.

    love u :)

    lily

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  7. Thanks for my aunt's recipe. i normally hear her talk about it. great i have actual recipe to follow now.

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  8. hemorrhoids - for sure.

    i thought that was a stress related ailment.

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  9. Hi Terry, great blog!
    Do you also eat winged bean tubers?

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  10. That salad just looks delicious (and unusual!). At first I thought the beans had little spikes on the outside but I see now they don't - I was wondering how you would get around the spikes when eating them!

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  11. One of my favorite veges. Thanks for the recipe.
    R

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  12. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  13. A FEAST: she asked when did u eat her meehoon kerabu?

    pp: haha, u r right in a way, but i want the result of having chronic constipation

    zurin: yes yes this veg is excellent with belacan. yummy

    didally: do try it, no oil & no need to fry

    johnathan: u get a BIG carton of prune juice! yay!

    lily: thnx, beautiful work, am looking 4ward to updating my kitchen after CNY

    nee: :) she's a great cook & i'll miss her when she goes to melbourne

    anon: nonono

    lunch guy: stress as in the physically straining or trying too hard :D

    anon: what is winged tubers? tell me, i'm curious about how it looks

    katie: :D the 'wings' are soft so no worries

    r: welcome dear

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  14. you said; stress as in the physically straining or trying too hard :D


    stress as in the psychological, mind-bending, self-pressurizing/introspective, work too much kind of stress that manifests itself in a physical ailment.

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  15. Looks great and delicious. Must try one day.

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  16. Winged bean is popular veggies in Indonesia for salad as well. In Sumatra, this one is similar to Anyang or the Javanese calls it "Urap". I want the ginger torch and can't buy it in Canada.

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  17. That looks awesome, however i love to eat that just with some chilly sauce.

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