Color On A Colorless Day

We awoke this morning to such tragic news headlines. Two bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston marathon, killing at least three people and seriously injuring hundreds. . . REALLY? Do we REALLY live in this kind of world? The kind of world where we have to be afraid to go outside of our own homes? The kind of world where we can never truly let our guard down? It makes me cringe and makes my heart ache. Unfortunately, it’s never going to get better or go back to the way it was years ago. All states could ban guns, weapons, you name it… it wont ever change what our society has become. There isn’t any turning back. Ever. Incredibly scary!

There isn’t a week that goes by where we don’t have family or close friends telling us to come back to the states. To be completely frank, we know that there is no true safe place in the world. No place that a person can ever escape harms way. However, days like today make our dinner conversations surround topics such as, how we feel safer with our neighbors to the North threatening nuclear war than the US where you have to worry about little Timmy shanking his kindergarten teachers and classroom classmates. Who knows, maybe those neighbors to the North will have us eating our words in a few hours, days, weeks, months, or even years. But in this moment, this is how we feel.

In honor of such a colorless day, I decided we needed something for dinner that had life and color to it. I knew just what to use for inspiration! My Cambodian cookbook that I purchased in Phnom Penh from an NGO, called Friends that I fell in love with while there.

The recipe, Green Mango Slaw. If you find yourself in the same boat as us, without access to green mango, no worries! The recipe still will work out just fine with a regular not too ripe mangoes.

Green Mango Slaw
Recipe slightly adapted from Phnom Penh Friends restaurant.
Serves four
Ingredients:
2 Mangoes, not too ripe, peeled and shredded
1 Bag of brocoli slaw, use the kind with carrots and red cabbage
1 Medium cucumber, peeled, seeded, and thinly sliced
1/2 Medium red onion, thinly sliced
2 Tbsp fresh basil, thinly chopped
1 Tbsp black sesame seeds
1 Tbsp white sesame seeds
Ingredients for dressing:
1 Cup Thai sweet chili sauce
1 Tbsp fish sauce
1 Tbsp sesame oil
1 Tbsp lime juice
Directions:
Pour all of the dressing ingredients in a  jar with lid and shake well. Set aside.
In a large bowl, combine all the slaw ingredients except sesame seeds. Toss slaw with the dressing, divide between four plates and sprinkle with the seeds.
You can eat this dish completely on its own, or serve with a nice piece of chicken or fish. We opted for a side of Mahi-Mahi fish. Perfect pairing to the slaw.
Hope a little color has been added back into your colorless day too.

Backpackbees

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