Shrimp-tastic

Warm Jasmine Rice Salad with Shrimp and Thai Herbs Finally, FINALLY, we have been able to find dried shrimp to put in this dish. Long, long ago, Marc made this salad as an accompaniment to a tuna thing with shiitake cream sauce. (This was back when we were first dating and had somehow, unintentionally, launched a competition of cooking and trying to impress the pants off each other with our culinary skills. We are simple folk: the way to our hearts is through our stomachs. The battle rages on.) At the time, dried shrimp were nowhere to be found, but the salad was delicious nonetheless and did indeed charm me to pieces. Since then, we've made this several times but still had found nary a dried shrimp; that is, until we "discovered" the Asian market. Love that place- it really seems to have launched a new era in our menus in the last few weeks have been distinctly Asian-themed. Anyway, not only did we finally find the dried version, we also found some good frozen ones as well and Marc was practically skipping with anticipation as we left the store. Strangely enough, the dish was not elevated to new level of delectableness by the addition of this one ingredient but we now have a whole bag of shriveled shrimps in the freezer so we have to make this many, many more times. Twist my rubber arm. This is definitely a salad but is big enough to be a meal unto itself. Marc had to use rubber gloves to chop the Thai chilis and that ingredient was worth the danger pay. Spicy, shrimpy, crunchy -with the fresh cucumber- I have no doubt that this will be a permanent fixture in our repertoire. Incidentally, it would probably make a brilliant potluck item and would charm the pants off any friends and co-workers, assuming that is the goal, of course.