Lemongrass BBQ Skewers
A quintessential party favorite for the Khmer community, lemongrass BBQ skewers immediately make me think of being a kid and helping my aunties skewer giant buckets of marinated beef onto bamboo skewers. Squatting on a stool, we would spend what felt like hours prepping for big family parties - most notably my grandmother's birthday which we would celebrate at my Uncle's in Huntington Beach.
Recipe Courtesy of: Aunt Soy
Growing up in a large family, collective cooking was a norm. Every Cambodian family has an outdoor kitchen to cook out of - made possible by the warm climate of the country and much preferred to cooking indoors as it kept the aromas outside of your home. Equipped with one or more propane stoves and commercial sized pots and pans, the set up is always made to accommodate feeding a village. Even to this day, all of my aunties and uncles congregate in my parents' backyard to cook for our family parties. One person washing, one or two doing the chopping, while another is sauteéing over a commercial sized wok. All hands are on deck. This collective cooking that is inherent to our culture is a practice I've now carried into my adult life and into my gatherings with friends.
Recently, I made these skewers for my friend, Veronica's birthday as part of a Filipino kamayan feast. On top of banana leaves laid out on her long kitchen island, we piled on the rice, pansit (a Filipino rice noodle dish), pinakbet (a vegetable dish made of kabocha squash, long beans, and okra stewed in a coconut milk sauce), bo ssam (slow roasted pork butt) in a gojuchang sauce, thai style spam sliders, salt + pepper shrimp, chicken adobo, lumpia, my lemongrass BBQ skewers, and an abundance of tropical fruits. The kamayan dinner took days of planning and cooking, and we were all absolutely exhausted after. But it was such a beautiful act of love and community to have co-created it amongst our AAPI collective of friends. It was a beautiful display of our multitude of flavors and heritages.
My friend Grace, recently taught me that there's a Korean phrase, sohn mat, which translates to "hand taste" or uhm ma sohn mat "mom's hand or touch" a common complimentary phrase used to describe the delicious taste of food. It's a perfect way to describe our kamayan feast. You could taste the loving hands that labored to make that food and what a circular way to have those tastes received through the kamayan practice of eating with one's hands.
Ingredients
1 lb of beef (flank steak or sirloin), cut into 1/8” thick strips and tenderized
-- can also be made with chicken thigh (cut into bite-sized pieces and no need to tenderize)
4 lemongrass stalks
10 kaffir lime leaves
2 large dried chilis
5 dried Anaheim peppers
2 whole heads of garlic, minced
4 tbsp of sugar
2 tbsp MSG
4 tbsp of fish sauce
1 tbsp of turmeric powder
3 tbsp of red curry paste
2 tbsp of canola / vegetable oil
Bamboo skewers
Instructions
Cut meat into 1/8” thick slices and tenderize the meat.
Roast chili peppers in a sauté pan over medium heat for 3 minutes, stirring frequently to prevent burning
Soak chili peppers in warm water for 10 minutes
Drain chili peppers and grind in a food processor.
Thinly slice lemongrass, lime leaves.
Grind chili peppers, lemongrass, garlic, and lime leaves in a mortal and pestle separately. Then add together into a mixing bowl.
Add turmeric powder and red curry paste and mix well. Paste can be made a few days a head of time. This lemongrass chili paste is good in the fridge for 3 days. In the freezer - for months.
Add lemongrass chili paste into a large bowl with your meat. Add fish sauce, MSG, oil, and sugar. Massage and mix with your hands until all the meat is well coated.
Skewer meat onto bamboo skewers, trying not to expose much of the stick in between the meat (prevents burning)
Turn your BBQ grill to a medium-high heat. Grill skewers from 3-4 minutes each side / until meat is 160 degrees or higher on the inside.
Vegetarian option:
Substitute beef or chicken for tofu cubes.
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