Asian restaurant food questions
#169313 - 04/12/05 02:07 PM
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I am taking a trip to California at the end of May and will be eating out alot. My husband and I usually cook at home. We love Chinese, Japanese, basically any Asian food. When we do eat at one of these restaurants at home, and if I eat something that is higher in fat and have an attack, I don't feel so bad because I am at home. But we will be very busy out in CA and I don't want to have an attack. To get to my point what is "safe" to order at Asian restaurants besides, sushi and the low fat menu. I guess what confuses me are the different "sauces". I have no idea what is in duck sauce or brown sauce or any of the sauces. I know they are dairy free but how high in fat? I've printed out Heather's IBS cheat sheet and the two lists of food from the top of the board. I wish there was a cheat sheet for Asian food! I thought I'd start here with the boards, I am also going to check out some Asian cookbooks at the library. Thanks for any suggestion!
-------------------- IBS-D
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Hmm, I am not totally sure what is/isn't safe 'cause I sort of stay away from restaurants like that where I just don't know what is in all the food. I know that you have to be careful of MSG in Chinese food, but I think you can ask at a lot of restaurants that they not use it in your food. Hopefully someone that is more adventurous than I am and eats out at more restaurants will have more info for ya.
Good luck! Have a great trip. --Steph
-------------------- ~~I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell-I know right now you can't tell~~Matchbox 20
IBS-D,pain.
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Hi. I lived in China for a total of nearly two years and I learned to cook there. I eat all kinds of food now, but still love to cook or go out for Chinese when I can. Here's my hints on how to keep it safe: First - start your meal with rice - lots of plain white rice, not fried. Also, avoid the deep fried options - which unfortunately rules out several of the yummiest choices - no sesame chicken, no crispy beef (no beef in general for most of us) no swee and sour, no general tsao's. It is much more safe if you can stick to the choices that are more sauteed or steamed. Dim Sum (a Hong Kong innovation that involves snack type foods rolled around a restaurant in a cart) often has lots of good steamed choices - steamed buns filled with shrimp or bean paste and sticky rice combinations wrapped in banana leaves. Lots of really yummy dim sum choices. Some other generally safe choices include mugugaipan, mushu chicken or mushu vegetables, chicken lomein, or vegetable lomein, mapo tofu (be careful, this one's spicy) the chicken in the chicken and broccoli is usually safe, but I would keep the broccoli to a minimum in eating it. Also, in general, tell your waiter, and be addament, no MSG and as little oil as possible in cooking.
Good luck - also feel free to ask about specific dishes and I'll do my best on an answer
Min
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I do have a question for you. I ate chicken lo mein this weekend, and I think it went pretty well. I'm not stable, but it didn't seem to add to my insability any. I wasn't sure if it was a good choice, but I did the best I knew, so I was glad to see you mentioned it as a safe choice, and I really enjoyed it.
I guess my question is, what is in that sauce? It just makes me nervous eating things that I don't know what are in them! LOL
-------------------- ~~~Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.~~~
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i go for red fruity sauces and they don't bother me. Brown ones do as they seem to have more MSG. See if you can ask for no MSG. In Japanese places I can eat anything except tempura and red meat. I love yaki soba and yaki udon and teriyaka and negima....mmmm and LOTS of japanese rice ...I'm getting hungry!
-------------------- S.
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I'm a huge fan of asian food and cook it here at home all the time.
in restaurants or when i get take out I often cheat because i'm at home..but when i need to be safe, I also rely on lomein (which generally only has a little sesame oil and soy sauce in it), moo goo gai pan, steamed veggie dumplings (they are fabbbbullllous), mixed chicken or shrimp with veggies, or something along those lines. I often get wonton soup too and eat all of the broth and noodle and leave the pork bit.
--------------------
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Most places are pretty accomodating...say you have food intolerances and need something low in fat, with no MSG and see what they recommend from the menu - they'll know what goes into all of it! I tend to stick to prawn dishes (I don't eat meat anyway) with lots of boiled rice and do fine.
Oh, for people with all this inside knowledge, how safe is Kung Po King Prawn in your opinion? I do fine with it as long as I leave out the onion and we've made it at home (sooo yummy), but I was wondering how technically safe the restaurant version usually is?
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Such great ideas and I will write down the various ideas to take with me.
-------------------- IBS-D
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There are some ingredients that are rather common to sauces on Chinese food, so here's what I know:
The most common ingredients: soy sauce, rice wine, seseme oil, hoisin sauce (which is made of fermented beans), chicken or pork stock, sometimes ketchup (yes, they do have it in China) sugar, rice vinegar, fish sauce (more common in Vietnamese food) plum sauce (made of fermented beans and fermented plum juice) chili sauce, lemon juice
common spices: ginger, garlic, cumin, cilantro, anise, salt, pepper, white pepper, sugar, chili powder, cardimum
corn starch is also often used to thicken sauces.
Hope this is helpful...
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This post is wondeful! I love asian food and I had written it off becasue I thought all of it would be bad for me. I am elated that I can continue to eat my Chicken Lo Mein!
-------------------- Keep Smiling
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