[Sca-cooks] Peanut butter and???

[Elaine Koogler]

lilinah at earthlink.net wrote:
> When my daughter was about three, i used to feed her...
>
> ...peanut butter, lettuce, Bac-Os, tomato, pickle relish, on whole wheat.
>
> I don't recall how i came up with this, but i have to confess, once 
> again, that it was probably inspired by my familiarity with 
> non-American food. I'm sure she would repudiate it completely now 
> that she's 25 :-)
>
> While peanut butter is for sweets in the US (and spread with jam on 
> bread it's sweet), in Africa and South East Asia it is for savories - 
> in Indonesia, in sauce for satay (grilled meat on a skewer), mixed 
> with ground hot red chilis as a sauce for fruit; in Thailand in Pra 
> Ram (meat in coconut-peanut sauce over kangkung (substituted by 
> spinach in the US)) and in Gaeng Masaman (beef or chicken (and often 
> potatoes) in peanut sauce); in parts of Africa in hot spicy soups and 
> stews.
>
> So, again, i think of peanut butter, as i think of cinnamon, as being 
> for savories rather than sweets.
>   
And then, of course, here in the south, we have peanut soup, which is 
usually made with crunchy peanut butter, cream and other seasonings, 
along with bacon.  So-o-o-o good!!

Kiri