Cooking from the Heart

Simple, earthy, fiery, and fresh, Hmong food is an exciting but still little-known South Asian cuisine. In traditional Hmong culture, dishes are created and replicated not by exact measurements but by taste and experimentation-for every Hmong recipe, there are as many variations as there are Hmong cooks-and often served to large, communal groups. Sami Scripter and Sheng Yang have gathered more than 100 recipes, illustrated them with color photos of completed dishes, and provided descriptions of unusual ingredients and cooking techniques.