Thai Noodles with Peanut Sauce

I love Thai foods and Thai cooking. Years ago I took a series of cooking classes at PCC Natural Markets, where one of the classes was Thai cooking taught by a lovely woman named Eng Tie Ang. I bought her little cookbook at the end of class, and have used it many times over the years. Her recipes are very straightforward and make it very easy for any home cook to successfully make authentic Thai foods. This cookbook though rather small, has allowed me to easily make many complete family 'Thai-night' meals and The Spicy Fried Ginger Beef recipe is one of my husband's absolute favorites. I adore Thai Peanut Sauce and after learning how easy it is to make, I also learned that the rest of my family is not quite as enamored with it as I am, and though I'm happy to eat most of the entire batch by myself, it is probably not in my best interest. I was overjoyed to discover, that I could make Thai Peanut Sauce, package it in individual servings, and freeze it. It is most traditionally served with satays (and would probably be really good with meatballs, too) but I love it best with spinach and tofu. Yesterday, I came inside to find my daughter making herself noodles with tofu and some stir-fried vegetables for lunch, and she had made more than enough for two. I defrosted some frozen spinach cubes from last summer, a frozen container of Thai Peanut Sauce, and within five minutes I was in Thai noodle heaven.

Making Thai Peanut Sauce (click here) when you don't have any in the freezer is actually super easy. Tofu can be purchased already seasoned and cooked, but I prefer to simply fry cubes of firm tofu (after blotting with paper towels) for this. With some cooked spinach (fresh, or frozen and defrosted), soba, udon or even spaghetti noodles, and cooked tofu (or cooked chicken breast or shrimp), Thai Peanut Sauce makes an interesting, quick and easy weeknight dinner.