You can find them in the grocery store, usually alongside the other root vegetables like potatoes and ginger. These root vegetables are native to North America (despite their other name, “Jerusalem artichokes”) and are in season October – April. Sunchokes - while visually similar to potatoes and ginger - are actually in the sunflower family. My above description describes the look, taste, and texture of a sunchoke, but don’t be fooled into thinking it is related to any one of those above ingredients. This is how I describe a sunchoke: If a potato mated with an artichoke, you would get baby sunchokes (also known as Jerusalem artichokes)…which look weirdly like ginger. Sunchoke Sauce: A Unique Spin on the Classic Fettuccini Alfredo What are sunchokes? Once you try it, you may never go back to the original! One day I saw a recipe for using cauliflowers so I thought, hell, why not sunchokes?īelow is my interpretation of a healthier alternative to Alfredo using a sunchoke sauce.

It wasn’t until college that I had the painful realization Alfredo sauce isn’t actually the most healthful.Īs a result, I regularly look for healthy alternatives to Alfredo sauce. $3.09 for 14 ounces at Lion Supermarket.This sunchoke sauce is inspired by one of my favorite dishes growing up: Alfredo.Īs I kid I thought Alfredo sauce was “healthy” (hey it’s milk right? Oh the woes of growing up in an Italian American family!). No calories listed on the label, 1170 mg sodium, 3 carbohydrates. The hints of lemongrass and makrut leaf in this super-thick, pleasantly hot, olive green paste are tasty, but the searing salt level is problematic. 15 calories, 420 mg sodium, 3 g carbohydrate. But the flavor is so flat that it will need lots of additional ingredients - including chiles for heat - to make your dish taste even remotely like restaurant-quality Thai curry. If this is the only paste on the shelf, it will do. (1½ stars) Thai Kitchen Green Curry Paste 10 calories, 280 mg sodium, 2 g carbohydrates. It’s not terrible, just sadly unbalanced. Too much cumin dominates this otherwise tasty puree. (2 stars) World Foods Thai Green Curry Paste This thick paste transforms coconut milk into a smooth sauce that’s tangy and well-rounded, but it has a slightly unpleasant sour kick.12 calories, 466 mg sodium, 3 g carbohydrates. (2½ stars) Nang Fah (Tue Kung) Green Curry Paste $4.59 for 2.8 ounces at Raley’s $5.99 for 4.23 ounces at Whole Foods. 20 cal, 248 mg sodium, 1.6 g carbohydrates. (3 stars) Mike’s Organic Curry Love Green Thai Chili Pasteīright green chiles and bits of makrut lime leaf make for a pretty sauce, but it lacks the pungency and complexity of more authentic versions. 20 calories, 390 mg sodium, 4 g carbohydrates. This delicately spiced paste is fresh and balanced, but it’s notably less concentrated, which means you need to use nearly double the amount in most recipes. Nutrition details refer to 1 tablespoon of paste. Here’s the scoop on green curry pastes that promise semi-authentic Thai curry at home - and the jars of tasteless green goo that will have you phoning for take-out. Even if the first ingredient is chile peppers, the sauce may lack heat. While red is typically the hottest Thai curry, it’s important to know that green curry pastes come in a range of heat levels - and it’s impossible to know how much by reading the ingredient list. The worst are like eating a spoonful of salt.

Bad curry pastes are chunky, watery, fibrous and tasteless. The best versions are thick, concentrated blends of fresh ingredients that fill the room with the perfume of makrut lime and lemongrass and deliver a burst of tangy, warm flavors and spice. And while some are chunky, others are velvety smooth. Some pastes are searing hot, others nearly sweet. Most green curry pastes include the same basic ingredients, including green chiles, lemongrass, garlic, galangal, shallots and makrut (or kaffir) lime, but the similarities stop there.

Green curry paste options are vast, and they vary wildly in flavor and heat levels. Option 2: Reach for a jar or packet of ready made paste to stir into coconut milk or broth for soups or curries, or to amp up the flavor of vegetables, fish or chicken. While the best Thai green curry paste is made by pounding fresh herbs, spices, roots and more with a mortar and pestle, the process takes specialty ingredients - and a bit of work. It’s a tough choice: red, yellow or green? When it comes to Thai curry, all of them promise a deliciously aromatic dish and a flavorful sauce redolent with the perfume of herbs and spices.įor this taste test, we went for the green.

Red curry paste safeway