Burma Superstar

From the beloved San Francisco restaurant, a mouthwatering collection of recipes, including Fiery Tofu, Garlic Noodles, the legendary Tea Leaf Salad, and many more. Never before have the vivid flavors of Burmese cooking been so achievable for home cooks.

Known for its bustling tables, the sizzle of onions and garlic in the wok, and a wait time so legendary that customers start to line up before the doors even open—Burma Superstar is a Bay Area institution, offering diners a taste of the addictively savory and spiced food of Myanmar. With influences from neighboring India and China, as well as Thailand and Laos, Burmese food is a unique blend of flavors, and Burma Superstar includes such stand-out dishes as the iconic Tea Leaf Salad, Chili Lamb, Pork and Pumpkin Stew, Platha (a buttery layered flatbread), Spicy Eggplant, and Mohinga, a fish noodle soup that is arguably Myanmar’s national dish.

Each of these nearly 90 recipes has been streamlined for home cooks of all experience levels, and without the need for special equipment or long lists of hard-to-find ingredients. Stunningly photographed, and peppered with essays about the country and its food, this inside look at the world of Burma Superstar presents a seductive glimpse of this jewel of Southeast Asia.

Curries and Slow-Cooked Dishes
Egg and Okra Curry 21 / Simple Fish Curry 23 / Tomato Shrimp Curry 24 / Coconut Chicken Curry 26 / Chicken Dal Curry 28 / Burmese Chicken Biryani 30 / Pumpkin Pork Stew 33 / Pumpkin Tofu Stew 35 / Pork Curry with Green Mango Pickle 36 / Beef Curry with Potatoes 37 

Vegetables
Tomato Shrimp Relish with Raw Vegetables 45 / Grilled Okra with Tomato Shrimp Relish 48 / Sour Leaf with Bamboo and Shrimp 51 / Corn with Charred Onions 52 / Chayote with Dried Shrimp 53 / Wok-Tossed Broccoli 54 / Wok-Tossed Pea Shoots 55 / Water Spinach 56 / Cauliflower and Tomato 59 / Bagan Butter Beans 60 / Spicy Eggplant 62 

Stir-Fries and Fast-Cooked Dishes
Fiery Tofu 73 / Garlic Chile Shrimp 74 / Chicken with Mint 75 / Chicken with Basil 78 / Sesame Chicken 79 / Kebat 81 / Restaurant-Style Tofu Kebat 82 / Restaurant-Style Steak Kebat 83 / Home-Style Shrimp Kebat 84 / Home-Style Chicken Kebat 85 / Chili Lamb 86 

Noodles
Superstar Vegetarian Noodles 92 / Rainbow Salad 95 / Nan Gyi Thoke 98 / Shan Noodles 100 / Garlic Noodles 101

Soups
Samusa Soup 106 / Sour Leaf Soup 109 / Coconut Chicken Noodle Soup 112 / Classic Mohinga 115 / Rakhine Mohinga 118 / Chin Corn Soup 121 

Salad
Ginger Salad 128 / Green Mango Salad 130 / Chicken Salad 133 / Green Tomato Salad 134 / Samusa Salad 137 / Shan Tofu Salad 139 / Namhsan Salad 140 / Tea Leaf Salad 154 / Tea Leaf Rice Salad 155 

Drinks
Palm Sugar Syrup 160 / Ginger Juice 161 / Myanmar Tea 162 / Ginger Honey Tea 165 / Hibiscus Punch 166 / The Temescal 168 / Burma Cooler 171 

Snacks and Sweets
Lotus Root Chips 176 / Platha 181 / Yellow Split Pea Crackers 184 / Shan Tofu 185 / Fried Yellow Bean Tofu 187 / Samosas 188 / Yellow Split Pea Falafel 191 / Black Rice Pudding 193 / Semolina Cake 197 / Coconut Agar Jelly 198 

Rice and Basics
Coconut Rice 204 / Brown Coconut Rice 206 / Jasmine Rice 207 / Fried Onions and Onion Oil 208 / Fried Garlic Chips and Garlic Oil 211 / Ngapi Kyaw 212 / Fried Yellow Split Peas 213 / Mustard-Cumin Spice Blend 215 / Garam Masala 216 / Tamarind Salt 217 / Tamarind Water 218 / Tamarind Ginger Dressing 219 / Sweet Chile Sauce 220 / Chile Oil 221 / Green Mango Pickle 222 / Pickled Mustard Greens 223

Pantry, Tools, and Techniques
The Pantry 227 / Tools and Techniques 243“Finally! In this beautiful book, Desmond Tan and Kate Leahy bring one of my favorite Bay Area restaurants, Burma Superstar, to the world. From the Tea Leaf Salad to Chicken Coconut Curry, the book demystifies the ingredients and cooking techniques of Myanmar, opening up the restaurant’s incredible flavors for everyone to enjoy. This is a book to read from cover to cover, and to cook from forever.”
—Amanda Haas, author of The Anti-Inflammation Cookbook: The Delicious Way to Reduce Inflammation and Stay Healthy

"Informative recipes and concise historical background set an educational yet approachable tone, while the occasional misty mountain vistas or bustling Burmese city street scenes (captured by John Lee) provide a reason to slow down and consider Burmese culture as a whole. Already, I'm eyeing the classic mohinga, a noodle soup thickened with toasted ground rice and mashed catfish, seasoned with ginger and lemongrass."
—Alex Testere, Saveur

"The rare restaurant edition you’ll actually want to cook from, starting with the tea-leaf salad."
—"This Season's Best Cookbooks", Bon Appetit

“The eponymous San Francisco restaurant is making quality Burmese food even more accessible than before with this insightful, thorough cookbook. Take mohinga, for example, the breakfast noodle soup you've probably never heard of that's considered Burma's national dish. And in between coconut chicken curry and tea leaf salad, you can read all about Myanmar's struggle for democracy, as well as the people and ingredients that make up this rich culture.”
—"Best New Cookbooks," Tasting Table

"Is Burmese the new Thai food? Plenty of San Franciscans (disciples of the city’s beloved Burma Superstar restaurant) would say yes. The hot spot’s first cookbook illuminates the spicy, savory food of Myanmar, from chili lamb to pork and pumpkin stew to the popular tea leaf salad."
 —Rebecca Shapiro, PureWow

"Burmese food is highly underrated—especially where fighting inflammation is concerned, thanks to the generous use of spices like turmeric and cardamom. In his book, Tan reveals that the meals include ingredients that are beautifully colored and textured, meaning that even salad can be exciting. "
 —Felicia Czochanski, Well + Good 

"Despite what some may consider unfamiliar ingredients and cooking techniques, “Burma Superstar” (the book) is incredibly accessible and, more importantly, fun. Fans of the restaurant will be happy to see a some of its most popular dishes, but the cookbook is more than just a rehashing of the menu. [...] There are short snippets on the history, political and otherwise, of the country, and photographs, all by San Francisco’s John Lee, bring the food into context with the country." 
 —Kate Williams, BerkeleysideDESMOND TAN was born in Burma and came to San Francisco when he
was 12 years old. He has grown Burma Superstar into four thriving, unique
locations (with a fifth on the way). In 2014, he launched Mya Foods, the first Bay
Area company to import Burmese ingredients--most notably laphet, Burma's
famous fermented tea leaves.

KATE LEAHY co-authored A16 Food + Wine, the IACP Cookbook of the Year and recipient of the IACP Julia Child First Book Award; SPQR; The Preservation Kitchen, which Eater.com ranked as one of the most notable books of the year; and Cookie Love.
What is Burmese Food?

If you head down Pansodan Street in Yangon’s historic downtown district, the view of the century-old colonial architecture is often obscured by makeshift stalls serving samosas, hand-mixed noodle salads, and steaming bowls of mohinga, a fish noodle soup that is, for all intents and purposes, Myanmar’s national dish.

This scene of street stalls is repeated all over the city. In the morning and late afternoon, tea shops fill with workers downing their first cup of tea brewed the color of burnt caramel and lightened with condensed and evaporated milks. For lunch at a popular restaurant like Feel, customers point at dishes set out on the counter and then sit down and wait as servers bring small plates to the table in rapid-fire fashion. To escape the afternoon heat, locals pop into shops serving sweetened yogurt drinks or a “heart cooler”—coconut milk served over agar jelly, tapioca pearls, and ice. Before dinner, people line up in front of vendors frying up the Burmese answer to tempura. Like the rest of the country, the city grows quiet at night, with the exception of 19th Street, which turns into an open-air market where you can pick and choose from stalls offering skewers of whole fish, squid, pork intestine, or mushrooms. Pitchers of Myanmar beer tide over groups of customers while the stalls grill selections.

Eating in Yangon means sampling a range of culinary traditions, from regional ethnic foods to dishes adapted from neighboring countries, especially China and India. No matter which heritage hits the table, one thing is certain: it’s easy to find a dish—or several—that you can’t wait to eat again.



GARLIC NOODLES

Some form of this comfort dish is made in nearly every corner of Asia, and it has long been a popular item both in Myanmar and at Burma Superstar. While the noodles, which get their flavor from fried garlic and garlic-infused oil, are respectable on their own, some like to beef up the dish with shredded duck, barbecue pork, sautéed shrimp, or stir-fried mushrooms and broccoli. Anything goes. The trickiest part of making garlic noodles is ensuring the garlic doesn’t burn. In this recipe, the garlic is pulled off the heat and left to cool in the oil. If you want to safeguard the process a bit more, set up a heat-proof bowl with a mesh strainer. When the garlic reaches a deep golden color, pour the garlic through the strainer to stop the cooking. 

SERVES 4
1⁄4 cup canola oil
4 tablespoons minced garlic
3⁄4 cup sliced red onion or shallot, soaked in water and drained
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1⁄2 cup sriracha
1 tablespoon minced ginger
1⁄4 teaspoon sugar
1⁄4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons water
12 ounces fresh wide wonton noodles or dried Chinese wheat noodles
1 (5-inch) cucumber (or half an English cucumber), thinly sliced
3 green onions (white and green parts), thinly sliced

In a small pot, heat the oil over medium heat. Add 3 tablespoons of the garlic, set the heat to low, and fry, swirling the pot frequently, until the garlic is nearly golden in color, no more than 3 minutes. (If the garlic starts to darken too quickly, pull the pot off the heat, swirl the oil, and let the garlic continue to fry off the heat for 30 seconds before returning it to the heat.) Because the garlic can burn quickly, watch the pot the whole time while the garlic fries.

Immediately pour the oil into a heatproof bowl and let it cool. The garlic will continue to cook and turn golden as it sits. If the garlic is already golden brown before you take it off the heat and it looks like it might burn if left in the hot oil, all is not lost. Pour the oil through a fine-mesh strainer into a heatproof bowl to remove the garlic from the oil and stop it from cooking further. Once the oil has cooled a bit, return the garlic to the oil.

Add the onions and soy sauce to garlic.

In a small serving bowl, stir together the sriracha, the remaining 1 tablespoon of garlic, the ginger, sugar, salt, and water.

Bring a pot of water to a boil. Add the noodles and cook, stirring often with chopsticks, until nearly soft all the way through, about 4 minutes or until tender but still slightly chewy. Drain in a colander and rinse briefly under cool running water. Give the colander a shake to remove excess water.

Return the noodles to the pot. Pour in the garlic–soy sauce mixture and add the cucumbers. Give the noodles a good stir with a pair of tongs, then divide among bowls. Top with the green onions. Serve with sriracha sauce.