Southeast Asian cuisine has risen in popularity over the past few decades and this has led many people to discover the unique flavors of Cambodian cooking. This cookbook is geared to food lovers who would like to expand their cooking repertoire and to young Cambodian Americans who would like to learn the dishes they may have grown up eating and now miss. Demaz seeks to make Cambodian cuisine accessible to the average cook who may not have the time to roast and grind spices from scratch due to the realities of modern society. Over the past thirty years, Demaz has tested various pastes and sauce bases available in Asian grocery stores and now increasingly in mainstream supermarkets. In some cases, these ready made concoctions provide an excellent point from which to begin. For those who are familiar with the cuisine of Thailand, for example, the spices used in Thai curries are very similar to those used in Cambodian curries (with the exception of less sugar, chili pepper and coconut milk). This makes a Thai curry paste a good starting point. To make the final result an unmistakably authentic Khmer taste, Demaz adds spice combinations and ratios unique to Cambodian cooking.
Demaz Tep Baker was born in Cambodia and came to the United States in 1976, basing herself in the Washington, D.C. area. After a few years in private industry, she joined the federal government. At the same time, she went back to school at nights and obtained her bachelor's and master's degrees. Demaz retired from the government in 2004 but was soon re-hired by another agency where she has been working until the present day. She is an avid tennis player and enjoys reading. Well-known in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area for the delicate subtleties of her Cambodian dinners, Demaz has introduced many to the art of Cambodian cuisine. She also formally teaches Cambodian cooking classes, which she began ten years ago at the Arlington Adult Education Center. For the past three years, her cooking classes have been held at her lovely home in Annandale, Virginia. These classes have evolved into a Cambodian cooking club where people meet, cook and enjoy the fruits of their labor. And in October 2007, they were featured in The Washington Times. Southeast Asian cuisine has risen in popularity over the past few decades and this has led many people to discover the unique flavors of Cambodian cooking. This cookbook is geared to food lovers who would like to expand their cooking repertoire and to young Cambodian Americans who would like to learn the dishes they may have grown up eating and now miss. Demaz seeks to make Cambodian cuisine accessible to the average cook who may not have the time to roast and grind spices from scratch due to the realities of modern society. Over the past thirty years, Demaz has tested various pastes and sauce bases available in Asian grocery stores and now increasingly in mainstream supermarkets. In some cases, these ready made concoctions provide an excellent point from which to begin. For those who are familiar with the cuisine of Thailand, for example, the spices used in Thai curries are very similar to those used in Cambodian curries (with the exception of less sugar, chili pepper and coconut milk). This makes a Thai curry paste a good starting point. To make the final result an unmistakably authentic Khmer taste, Demaz adds spice combinations and ratios unique to Cambodian cooking. Demaz has two children, Justin Baker, who also lives in Annandale, Virginia, and Anne Carney, who lives with her husband and daughter in Cambridge, Massachusetts. A word of thanks to Chenda Ly, and Sedar Ly of Los Angeles for their undaunted and enthusiastic devotion to make themselves available for my numerous phone calls and their willingness to try and taste different recipes in order to have the best available in this book. Also thanks to my daughter, Anne Carney, for her full support and enthusiasm for this project.
