Which global cuisine to cook?

[bonniebee]

Hi I'm going to host a small dinner party for my extended family and the theme is ethnic cuisine, but I don't know which cuisine to choose. I want to try something different so chinese and italian are out (because of our cultural background we eat those foods all the time). I was thinking possibly malaysian/south east asian, but i'm not sure. Any suggestions? What are your favourite cuisines to cook?

[JungMann]

I really enjoy experimenting with Thai cuisine. I cook a lot of Chinese and Indian, so Thai is an easy permutation. Japanese stews are also a really nice change of pace at this time of year. I keep meaning to try a few Malaysian recipes at home, but they always require ingredients I don't normally have like candlenuts or belacan.

[butzy]

Hey Jungmann, Just use macademia nuts or even cashew nuts instead of candle nuts.
I'm not sure about belacan, maybe you mean Blachan or maybe that's the old spelling... Anyway, I think it is the same as Trassi. You can substitute with any shrimp paste.
My dad didn't like trassi so he just left it out and still prepared amazing food !

[masdiamond]

i agree with katecm, indian is a great go to, the recipes from vij's at home are good. thai is always super yummy too

[katecm]

I'd recommend Indian, quite simple because Madhur Jaffrey's recipes are SO reliable and fool-proof and because there's SO much to Indian food that you don't get at the average mid-level restaurant. Her toothpick shrimp recipe is a good example of that. http://www.myspeakerscorner.com/forum...

[ChiliDude]

I'm with Harters because Mediterranean culinary preps are one of the healthiest in the world. You probably will not need a cookbook of the Mediterranean cookery because the internet has plenty of websites. Your extended family will probably thank you for being concerned about their health.

[butzy]

I like the idea of Malasian.
I would make it Malaysian/Indonesian and go for a rijsttafel. This gives you plenty of opportunities to serve different dishes that everyone can dish up for themselves at the table.
A couple of my favourites:
Gado gado (cold vegetable dish),
rendang (spicy dry curry dish),
ikan boemboe bali (or bumbu) or pepesan (fish),
ajam besengkek (chicken in yellow sauce),
telor in katjang sauce (eggs in peanut sauce),
tempeh
mmm, getting hungry while writing this!

Check out www.asiancook.eu for some good indonesian recipes in english or www.kokkieblanda.nl and use the translation function of google

[wyogal]

I love Indonesian yellow rice: ginger, lemongrass, tumeric, brown basmati or jasmine rice, coconut milk, all in a rice cooker... very easy, very yummy! I goes well with spicy side dishes. I had some leftover last night with us some golden raisins thrown in.

[Harters]

When I want to cook "foreign", I'm always drawn to the eastern Mediterranean

[wattacetti]

In the context of your party theme, perhaps Mexican, Peruvian or Spanish depending on how adventurous the extended family is. Or SW France.

Malaysian/SE Asia has a lot of elements which are also found in Chinese cooking (I understand they aren't the same but there are Chinese communities within those regions).

[bonniebee]

I would say my family is semi adventurous to pretty adventurous. We love calamari, sashimi, and pretty much anything seafood. I'd say we would be willing to try anything within reason.