Guest post by Nessa Riazi
Bustling with delighted customers unwrapping banana leaves to discover hidden curries and stewed meats, Indonesian restaurant Simpang Asia is a gastronomic awakening; its market next door is another. My sister recently introduced me to this restaurant nestled in Palms that is now my favorite Indonesian restaurant in LA. The best part is that as you wait for your table, you are able to explore and happily distract yourself in the aisles of the eclectic supermarket next door. During my quest to find a new ingredient to experiment with in my daily cooking endeavors, I came across dried basil seeds, or mangluck in Thai.
Binomially they are called Ocimum basilicum, coming from the sweet basil plant. Not having reached the same level of mainstream popularity in the culinary world as chia seeds, or Salvia hispanica L., could basil seeds potentially be the next chia seed? Their unique genus may suggest that more differences exist; however, based solely on physical observations and their reactivity to water, basil and chia seeds seem closely related. How do these seeds compare?
