Gaw-bi-thoke - classic burmese cabbage cole slaw

Yum


Ok, back in January, Huffington post released an article, casting a long-over due spotlight on Burmese salads. My face brimmed up, as if I am Amy Shumer with a class of Chardonnay.  Yes, the world domination is here – Burmese food goes mainstream now.

Back in Myanmar, our family eat salads as a part of our daily meals along with curries, rice and soup, rather than as a bowl of self-deprived and monotonous leafage as a promise to achieve a better health. In fact, the salad culture is quite popular in Yangon, a bustling city of Myanmar where I grew up in. My fondest memory of Burmese salads was eating with my second eldest aunt at a roadside salad bar, draped in sun-bleached vinyl blue sheets to get shelter from the unforgiving tropical urban heat. (I used the word “bar” specifically because the experience actually felt like I was at a crowded bar at a club, where I have to use sign languages and yell to get some attention. There were usually one or two “salad masters” at the salad bar, with ten people shouting simultaneously on their orders.)