Scrumptious Thai Vaginas

I started out with the desire to share a recipe for Thai-style pasta, but soon I realized I needed to get a little something of my chest.

Why does everyone refer to vaginas? I can tell by the way that most people bring up vaginas in conversation that they're actually referring to vulvas. Vaginas are something you very rarely see, unless you're a gynecologist or an audience member at an Annie Sprinkle performance (Remember that warning you ignored on the Cant click-though page? Well, it applies here. You might not want to open this link if you're at work. Also, depending on the type of relationship you have with your significant other, you might want to let them know what's going on.) This doesn't stop too many people from using the term "vagina" when talk about the external female genitalia. Even folks who really should know better make the mistake. At UC Santa Cruz, I noticed a young woman wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with a Gray's-Anatomy-style representation of the female pudenda, labia gaping and fringed with pubes. The slogan mentioned something about the power of "my vagina". When I mentioned to the young lady that she wasn't wearing an image of a vagina but of a vulva, she told me to do something rude to myself. I felt a bit disappointed. After all, I wasn't trying to rob her of her cootch-power. I was just doing my best to stamp out ignorance and stupidity. At least this is one area where men and women appear to be equally deficient. A coworker once shared with me that she didn't ride her bicycle all that often because "it hurt her 'gina". Now, unless she rode with the seat in a very original configuration, I'm sure that she was referring to her vulva. Maybe she was riding without a seat? Even Dan Aykroyd, in his classic Saturday Night Live rant against cheerleaders, used "vagina". People talk about sculptures of vaginas, comic things with vaginas on them, vagina this, vagina that. A simple search yields "She wore no panties and her shaved vagina did look appetizing. " The vagina is smooth muscle and mucous membrane that spends most of its time sorta flat and squished. Any representation of a vagina would not be "appetizing" but rather boring and puzzling to most folks.

So, Thai-style pasta…

• 16 ounces large shell pasta (Shells are important. They hold the sauce and nest into tasty, tender pasta chunks.)
1 tablespoon olive oil (virgin, extra virgin, extra extra vagina… it doesn't matter) 1 pound boneless, skinless breast halves (two chicken boobs) (These should be frozen, like the big bag o' chicken flesh you can get at Costco)
• ~2 teaspoons powdered ginger (This is a matter of taste. I don't like ginger to dominate a dish. The original recipe called for 2 tablespoons of peeled, grated fresh ginger, but I couldn't be bothered. The powdered stuff works well here.)
• 2 (large) cloves of garlic, crushed with a garlic press
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon ground red pepper (cayenne) (Again, the original recipe called for crushed red pepper, like the stuff you get here in California with pizza. This is ridiculous, as one seed of the crushed red pepper is practically 1/8 of a teaspoon. Besides, the cayenne pepper adds a more uniform warmth without any nasty surprises.)
• 1 can (14 ounces) light coconut milk (not cream of coconut)
• 2 tablespoons lime juice (Again, the original recipe called for fresh lime juice squeezed from Key limes in the muscular vagina of a Bangkok whore, but juice from one of those funny plastic bottles works too.)
• 4-8 ounces fresh green beans, washed and topped (Needless to say, don't use frozen or canned green beans. That would be sad.)

Preprep:

1. Partially thaw the chicken boobs in a microwave oven. The chick should be pliable but still a bit crunchy. This half-frozen state makes it easier to slice the chicken breast into very thin slices with a very sharp chef's knife. Cut perpendicular to the "grain" of the muscle to make the strips extra tender.
2. Open the can of coconut milk and add the lime juice.
3. Pile the ginger, garlic, salt, and red pepper onto a saucer.
4. If the weather's been cold, you might run some hot water over the can to get all of the coconut milk to liquefy.

Prep:

1. In a large saucepot, cook the pasta. After the pasta's been cooking for 5 minutes, drop the green beans in the pot. Cook until the pasta is done.
2. While the pasta's cooking, in a large (12-inch) skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat. Toss in the chicken and cook, stirring often, just until it doesn't show any pink (unlike most porn these days that seems to show a lot of pink… sometimes you can actually see the damned vagina). Add the ginger, garlic, salt, and red pepper, stirring constantly for about 30 seconds. Stir in the coconut milk and lime juice and heat until boiling.
3. Drain the pasta and beans; return them to the saucepot. Add coconut milk mixture and toss well.

I'm sure you'll find ways to tweak this recipe to your own taste. Some folks add 1/4 cup fresh chopped cilantro just before serving, but I'm not a big fan of cilantro.

Enjoy!

Pakeha

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