Thread: Oyster Sauce & Fish Sauce

On 2011-09-07, xxtamxx <[email protected]> wrote:

> I was wondering if you could give me advice. I love thai food but my
> husband is allergic to seafood and quite a lot of thai recipes have
> oyster sauce or fish sauce in them. What could i use instead?
> Thanks for any advice

Soak stinky old unwashed gym socks in water, then squeeze out water
and add half cup of salt.

No, really.... I can't think of a single thing that will sub for
seafood. Sorry. OTOH, fish and oyster sauce are basically a little
seafood flavoring and a boatload of salt. Try adding just salt or soy
or hoisin sauce. (not sure what's in hoisin sauce, so beware)

nb

On 9/7/2011 8:04 AM, xxtamxx wrote:
> I was wondering if you could give me advice. I love thai food but my
> husband is allergic to seafood and quite a lot of thai recipes have
> oyster sauce or fish sauce in them. What could i use instead?
> Thanks for any advice
>
>
>
>
The Wikipedia article on Oyster Sauce is worth reading but I think there
is really no substitute for the flavor that fish sauce gives to Thai
food. You might try the strongly flavored "Black Soy Sauce", which is
far from just a salt alternative. This condiment might take some finding
but my favorite Chinese supermarket always has it.

--


James Silverton, Potomac

I'm *not* [email protected]

On Wed, 07 Sep 2011 11:14:05 -0400, James Silverton wrote:

> On 9/7/2011 8:04 AM, xxtamxx wrote:
>> I was wondering if you could give me advice. I love thai food but my
>> husband is allergic to seafood and quite a lot of thai recipes have
>> oyster sauce or fish sauce in them. What could i use instead?
>> Thanks for any advice
>>
>>
>>
>>
> The Wikipedia article on Oyster Sauce is worth reading but I think there
> is really no substitute for the flavor that fish sauce gives to Thai
> food. You might try the strongly flavored "Black Soy Sauce", which is
> far from just a salt alternative. This condiment might take some finding
> but my favorite Chinese supermarket always has it.

for the oyster sauce, i might use mushroom soy (which is pretty close to
dark soy, if not black soy. fish sauce is a little tougher - i think most
often you'll see thin soy (what most people just think of as 'soy sauce')
recommended as a substitute.

<http://www.google.com/search?q=substitute+for+fish+sauce&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-USfficial&client=firefox-a>

<http://www.google.com/search?q=substitute+for+oyster+sauce&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-USfficial&client=firefox-a>

your pal,
blake

xxtamxx wrote:

> I was wondering if you could give me advice. I love thai food but my
> husband is allergic to seafood and quite a lot of thai recipes have
> oyster sauce or fish sauce in them. What could i use instead?
> Thanks for any advice

Dried seaweed (Nori) can be chopped and used as a seasoning. Though i
don't know if that has any implications with your husbands allergic
reaction.
--
JL

xxtamxx wrote:
> I was wondering if you could give me advice. I love thai food but my
> husband is allergic to seafood and quite a lot of thai recipes have
> oyster sauce or fish sauce in them. What could i use instead?
> Thanks for any advice
>

The closest thing is probably MSG (and that's not really very close)

Is he actually allergic to fish, or just shellfish? Or does he not
like anything fishy so he just says he's "allergic"?

How about seaweed? or Marmite?

-Bob

blake murphy wrote:
> On Wed, 07 Sep 2011 11:14:05 -0400, James Silverton wrote:
>
>> On 9/7/2011 8:04 AM, xxtamxx wrote:
>>> I was wondering if you could give me advice. I love thai food but my
>>> husband is allergic to seafood and quite a lot of thai recipes have
>>> oyster sauce or fish sauce in them. What could i use instead?
>>> Thanks for any advice
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>> The Wikipedia article on Oyster Sauce is worth reading but I think there
>> is really no substitute for the flavor that fish sauce gives to Thai
>> food. You might try the strongly flavored "Black Soy Sauce", which is
>> far from just a salt alternative. This condiment might take some finding
>> but my favorite Chinese supermarket always has it.
>
> for the oyster sauce, i might use mushroom soy (which is pretty close to
> dark soy, if not black soy. fish sauce is a little tougher - i think most
> often you'll see thin soy (what most people just think of as 'soy sauce')
> recommended as a substitute.
>
> <http://www.google.com/search?q=substitute+for+fish+sauce&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-USfficial&client=firefox-a>
>
> <http://www.google.com/search?q=substitute+for+oyster+sauce&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-USfficial&client=firefox-a>
>
> your pal,
> blake

I think both of your suggestion of mushroom soy is great. And you
are right about the usual recommended substitute for fish sauce.
Never having tried that, I have no idea how good (or bad) it may
be. I think if I had to go the soy sauce route for some reason,
I'd try to cook dishes that I was not familiar with, so I'd have
no point of comparison.

--
Jean B.

On Wed, 07 Sep 2011 21:36:14 -0400, "Jean B." <[email protected]> wrote:

> I think both of your suggestion of mushroom soy is great. And you
> are right about the usual recommended substitute for fish sauce.
> Never having tried that, I have no idea how good (or bad) it may
> be.

It's *very* salty and doesn't taste mushroomy - at least to me.

--
I love cooking with wine.
Sometimes I even put it in the food.

sf wrote:
> On Wed, 07 Sep 2011 21:36:14 -0400, "Jean B." <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>> I think both of your suggestion of mushroom soy is great. And you
>> are right about the usual recommended substitute for fish sauce.
>> Never having tried that, I have no idea how good (or bad) it may
>> be.
>
> It's *very* salty and doesn't taste mushroomy - at least to me.
>
I have mushroom soy on my shelf for years and only opened it a few
days ago. It smelled mushroomy, but I put so little in the dish,
which also involved oyster sauce, that I couldn't parse what the
mushroom soy tasted like.

--
Jean B.

On 9/7/2011 11:09 PM, Jean B. wrote:
> sf wrote:
>> On Wed, 07 Sep 2011 21:36:14 -0400, "Jean B." <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>> I think both of your suggestion of mushroom soy is great. And you are
>>> right about the usual recommended substitute for fish sauce. Never
>>> having tried that, I have no idea how good (or bad) it may be.
>>
>> It's *very* salty and doesn't taste mushroomy - at least to me.
>>
> I have mushroom soy on my shelf for years and only opened it a few days
> ago. It smelled mushroomy, but I put so little in the dish, which also
> involved oyster sauce, that I couldn't parse what the mushroom soy
> tasted like.
>
A "Vegetarian Oyster Sauce" exists. It is made from mushrooms and may be
the same thing as "Mushroom Soy" but I've never tried it.

--


James Silverton, Potomac

I'm *not* [email protected]

zxcvbob;1658546 Wrote:
> xxtamxx wrote:-
> I was wondering if you could give me advice. I love thai food but my
> husband is allergic to seafood and quite a lot of thai recipes have
> oyster sauce or fish sauce in them. What could i use instead?
> Thanks for any advice
> -
>
> The closest thing is probably MSG (and that's not really very close)
>
> Is he actually allergic to fish, or just shellfish? Or does he not
> like anything fishy so he just says he's "allergic"?
>
> How about seaweed? or Marmite?
>
> -Bob

Thanks everyone for your suggestions much appreciated. i have a chinese
supermarket near me so i will check out the mushroom soy there.

And yes he really is allergic, highly allergic, when we first started
dating i cooked something in oil that had previously been used to cook
calamari and even that tiny trace made him sick, all seafood products
need to be avoided.




--
xxtamxx

On Fri, 9 Sep 2011 01:17:17 +0000, xxtamxx wrote:

> zxcvbob;1658546 Wrote:
>> xxtamxx wrote:-
>> I was wondering if you could give me advice. I love thai food but my
>> husband is allergic to seafood and quite a lot of thai recipes have
>> oyster sauce or fish sauce in them. What could i use instead?
>> Thanks for any advice
>> -
>>
>> The closest thing is probably MSG (and that's not really very close)
>>
>> Is he actually allergic to fish, or just shellfish? Or does he not
>> like anything fishy so he just says he's "allergic"?
>>
>> How about seaweed? or Marmite?
>>
>> -Bob
>
> Thanks everyone for your suggestions much appreciated. i have a chinese
> supermarket near me so i will check out the mushroom soy there.
>
> And yes he really is allergic, highly allergic, when we first started
> dating i cooked something in oil that had previously been used to cook
> calamari and even that tiny trace made him sick, all seafood products
> need to be avoided.

good luck and have fun at the supermarket.

your pal,
blake