GREEN PAPAYA, SEACOAST TOMATO MUNG BEAN SOUP

     My recipes since my time on the island have all been consistently about the ingredients with a simple technique on the scale of braising at its heights soup. I only have vegetables and fruits to work it, you see, and at their rawness are edible, so doing much more of cooking could be draconian. Essentially their individual flavors are independent from the primary taste enhancer salt; I instead extract their juices in the symphony of cooking them down gently with a “baton.” Olive oil and ginger water are enough. At times unsweetened coconut milk. Herbs from your garden picked last minute the final touch. Anthony Bourdain once said that the world is a sad place without a bowl of beef and clams rendang laksa soup found in Singapore street markets - and that’s what it took to heal a broken heart. NYC in Chelsea opened recently a hawkers hall booming with South East Asian soup stalls importing traditional renditions of everything he loved the world for in noodles and spiced broth. His legacy lives on. Last night I started reading another one of his books, I don’t know but… I wanted him around when I needed a “captain” most. If he were a poet he’d be like John Ashbery, a poet’s poet, because of rugged romanticism and intellectual Bohême to carry on like them hand in the wooden spoon. Look at this soup. I added carrots and wing beans for complexity and more color to brighten me up. Roses are not just red. Look at the herbs. Herbs are not just greens. At the end of the day I am only a cook indebted to my poetry mentors. And in this milieu I live like them, like angels now. 

“The creative process by which the final dishes are arrived at is an absolutely fascinating stream [of thought.]” - A.B.

How to: boil the split mung beans with the wild foraged tomatoes and papayas together in pure water over them until half tender adding the remaining vegetables then, the carrots and wing beans, some chili flakes and olive oil, black pepper, adjusting water level of broth naturally thickened of mung starch, add ginger water, and let them all fall their grace in the pot you soup. Taste for balance. More sweetness when mild add coconut milk. And kiss them with the herbs before you eat.