Sauces, Dressings and Pickles

This section is one for you to tackle if you like fresh and vibrant dressings and pickles. By all means, buy any number of ready-made chilli sauces and pastes — there are good brands out there and they will give a decent result. However, if you want an amazing result, try making them yourself, then taste the difference it makes to your food. The recipes are fairly simple and are the building blocks to capturing the flavours of Asia.

I have added Nam Jim and Nuoc Cham dressings in here even though each salad in the book has its own dressing, often a version of one of these two. The reason is that, while they are great to make and dress salads, they also taste great with roast or barbecued fish, meat and poultry; in fact, you can use them as a simple sauce with just about anything.