Adding to the cucumber salad recipes on 3Jamigos, I recently came across a copycat of Din Tai Fung’s cucumber appetizer.  Just in case you aren’t familiar with Din Tai Fung.  It is a global restaurant conglomerate from Taiwan that specializes in noodles and dumplings.  There’s one in the Valley Fair mall in San Jose. The running joke in my house is wild horses could not drag me to a mall, I hate shopping.  But put a RamenNagi, a Somi Somi, a Marugame Udon, or a Din Tai Fung there?  I’m all in, Babee.  It’s off to the mall we go.

I love cucumbers as a side dish to a rice bowl like Taiwanese Pork Belly Rice, Lu Rou Fan or  Jia Yi Turkey Rice.  Perfect as a Banchan or appetizer at Korean BBQ.  It’s crispy and refreshing, the ideal way to balance a meal.

Cucumber Madness

Ok, confession time.  My mom taught me how to draw the bitterness out of a cucumber by doing the following.  Cut the end of the cucumber off, take that end piece, and place it back on the end, kinda like putting it back together, and rub the exposed side of the cucumber with the cut end.   Apparently, this draws the bitterness out of the cucumber. Does this make sense?  Don’t know, but my mom told me always to do it so I do.  If nothing else, cut off the ends of the cucumber and throw those out.  I hear that’s where the bitterness is concentrated.  Do you rub the ends of cucumbers?  Enquiring minds want to know. 😉

Here are two other refreshing cucumber recipes from the  3jamigos archives…yep, crazy for cukes.

Cool Hand Cuke (Cucumber Salad from A Common Table)

Cool as a Cucumber Banchan (Simple Asian Cucumber Salad)

And now, try this one…a take on Din Tai Fung’s Cucumber Salad. 凉拌黄瓜真的很好吃!