I must say, selfishly, that it’s been a really good past year for me when it comes to some of my favorite local Asian restaurants and their cookbooks. I’ve been going to International Market since 1981, when I was a freshman at University School of Nashville and discovered a magical steam table full of flavors — flavors I had never even imagined while growing up in a house that served roasted whole chicken three nights a week, spaghetti with Ragu three nights a week and a Krystal 10-bagger for treat night.
I was fortunate to get Patti Myint to sign a copy of her cookbook, which was really more of a cook pamphlet, just a week before she passed away. It meant a lot to have those recipes that I had enjoyed for decades.
Then her son Arnold took many of those same recipes, zhuzhed them up and shared the family and cultural significance behind them in his beautifully designed cookbook Family Thai. Especially with access to the NYT Cooking library and all my favorite kitchen nerds at Serious Eats in my inbox every day, I don’t often pick up, much less read, the hundreds of cookbooks that are slowly collapsing the foundation of my old bungalow.
‘Family Thai,’ the new book from the local chef and Nashville son, is out Oct. 7
But I read Arnold Myint’s book from cover to cover and have badgered him on occasion about where to find this or that ingredient, or which fish sauce is the best. (He told me Tiparos, and he wasn’t lying.)
So I was already feeling pretty happy about how I was working to up my wok game when I heard that Curry Boys were working on a cookbook to be titled Asian Smoke. Already available for pre-order ahead of its March 24 release date, this cookbook is a lot like what Arnold accomplished with his tome — filled with personal anecdotes that reveal the personalities of the founders, an origin story of a cult-favorite restaurant and basically the keys to the castle when it comes to recipes for all your favorite dishes.
Andrew Ho, Andrew Samia and Sean Wen share hilarious stories of how they met, how much they love playing hoops and how the connections between Southeast Asian spices and Texas barbecue were just sitting there waiting to be discovered by a trio of mad scientists. Then they proceed to share just about every secret the restaurant has traded on since 2020.
First, they offer an example of the pantry you need to be able to re-create their cuisine, including both purchased items and items that you’ll need to prepare in your own kitchen like rubs, sauces and marinades. There is also a section on barbecue equipment, woods and techniques that is useful whether you’re trying your hand at Curry Boys food or straight-ahead Hill Country ’cue.
Then they basically give away the recipes to every item on their menu. Those pulled-pork nachos with curry queso and honey sriracha sauce? Yep, they’re in there. The curry cream corn? You can now make it at home. Even that addictive Thai salad dressing appears in a few places.
But just because they give away the secrets doesn’t mean you'll likely visit the restaurant less frequently. Reading the behind-the-scenes details reveals how much work goes into their food. From the hours it takes to smoke meat properly to the prep that goes into building all the additive processes and ingredients to assemble a final dish, it really is remarkable that they manage to pull it off every day while looking like it’s so easy.
Asian Smoke offers exactly what I love in a cookbook. It makes me want to cook. It makes me want to learn. It makes me want to shop and discover new markets and ingredients. And above all, it makes me want to eat! It might be time to take a little trip across the river to the pink house and congratulate them on their new book and treat myself to a couple of dishes I know that I’ll never be able to cook in my kitchen.
