Fish sauce is an ingredient used often in Asian cuisine like Thai, Vietnamese, etc. You can use it for stir-fries, asian soups, asian noodle dishes, and the like.And you're right, it's not necessarily fishy. In a pinch, you can replace it with soy sauce, but you lose a particular flavor that the fish sauce gives. My experience with fish sauce is that even though the name sounds fishy (pun intended...couldn't help it, sorry

), it's a great ingrediant to have on hand if you like cooking Asian-style dishes.