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Somlor Somlok - Cambodian mixed vegetable soup with fish, mushrooms, dried shrimps, Khmer squash, green bean, bamboo, taro, chee prohaer (Khmer herb), fresh chili , slek nguob (mountain vegetable), chili leaves combining ingredients with native flavor such as rhizome, lemon grass, prahok, garlic which is the outstanding flavor of somlor somlok.  Very tasty and hearty soup full of  vitamin. It is served with steam rice and along with Trey Ngeat (sun dried fish).

Somlor somlok  is  similar to somlor prohaer both have the same base ingredients and vegetables.  And the same cooking process, the only different is, with somlor prohaer, the fish is pounded into small pieces and tumeric root is often added where somlor somlok, the fish cut into chunk. The best part of somlor somlok is the joy of tasting varieties of vegetable, there are AT LEAST 9  different kinds and more.
 
 
Preparation:

A) *Soak dried shrimps in lukewarm water for 15 minutes. Then wash it very well and discard the soil. Pat dry. -In a mortar - pound dried shrimps and garlic, rhizome together. -In a bowl - extract prahok. And save for later use.

B) Cut fish (catfish) into chunk. Wash and pat dry. Lightly fry them. Set it aside for later use.

(hard vegetables) C) Cut green bean, taro,  and Khmer squash.Wash well and drain them. * Bamboo shoot must be boiled once and wash a few times to get rid of the smell.

Somlor Somlok - Cambodian mixed vegetable soup with catfish and mushroom. Recipe will be available soon.

These days Vichara Chhy spends her time studying for her exams at Murdoch University in Western Australia and chatting with friends, like any other student. In fact, though, she is a remarkable young woman and, at only 22, a true citizen of the world already.

By Sandra Wilson 
Source: CampusAsia

Born and brought up in Cambodia, one of the world’s poorest countries, she has already won a Cambodian government scholarship to study in Japan, studied English at the University of California at Berkeley, been selected for a Japanese university exchange program to study for a year at Murdoch University, and won selection to attend international youth congresses in Glasgow in June and in Quebec in August 2008.
Vichara is full of ideals. Most of all, she wants to do something to help the recovery of her country. Cambodia still suffers the lingering effects of the disastrous Khmer Rouge period of the 1970s, in which perhaps one-third of the population died and a great deal of infrastructure was destroyed.

More damage was done even after the overthrow of Pol Pot, during the Vietnamese occupation and the long civil war that followed. Indeed, it is almost impossible to find anyone in Cambodia who is still not affected by those terrible years, and in many ways the country remains in shock.