This has
turned out to be a bi country report
First, Happy
Valentine Day all.
THAILAND
Today, is
moving day. I head to the airport for my
flight to Luang Prabang in a couple of hours.
My morning has been taken up with the mundane - doing laundry and packing.
Although I
sent a reservation request in several days ago, unfortunately I received an
email from the Tamarind Cooking School yesterday evening that they have no
space available for the three days I requested.
I am casting about now for another school, but the pickings are slim. Fortunately,
I have a line on a cooking school in Vientiane, so there will be some class
time in Laos, I just don’t know how much.
Forewarned
is forewarned, so they say. I am already
working on lining up cooking classes in Malaysia since it appears they tend to
get booked well in advance. I also just
bought my plane ticket, Vientiane to Kuala Lumpur for Feb. 24th. That will give me two solid weeks of cooking
there. But, more on that later.
I have a
bunch of photos to share. Rather than
overloading the blog with lots of them I’m going to post an album on Picassa or
one of those sites. I’ll give you the
link to it in a future post here on the blog.
Nothing in
the way of food to report other than I ate breakfast at a new place which had a
McCormack pepper mill with whole peppercorns.
It was about the size King Kong might use. It was at least five times larger than what
we get in the states. The restaurant
owner told me the store that sells them is about a 20 minute walk. If I have time I’ll buy one and be the only
kid on the block with one back home. Obviously,
it doesn't take much to amuse me.
I am packed
with an hour to spare. So, after a 20
minute forced march in the noonday sun I arrived at the store that sells the
giant pepper mill. I was greeted by a
very pleasant shopkeeper who explained that they were out of them at the
moment. Well, anyway, it was good
exercise to make the hike there and back to the hotel. I need the exercise and must confess that I
am probably the only person in the country gaining weight eating solely Thai
food. Maybe the sticky rice sticky to my
waist.
LUANG
PRABANG LAOS
I arrived about
5pm. After checking into the Namsok
Guesthouse I hot footed it to the Tamnak Lao Cooking School. I was able to get the 16th at
their cooking school. From there it was
on to the Tamarind Cooking School. The only date they had available was the 18th. At least I’ll get two days of cooking
experience. While at the Tamarind which
is also a restaurant I told the host that I knew nothing about Laotian food and
asked if he would order dinner for me.
In other words I would eat whatever came to the table.
What a very
pleasant introduction to Lao food this turned out to be. First, there was a tall bottle of Beerlao,
the Laotian national beer. It is
tasty. Then came chicken which had been
minced fine and mixed with herbs. What made
it special was that stalks of lemongrass had been slit for about four or five
inches starting very near the bottom and working backwards. The slit parts were then pounded with a
mallet to fray them. The chicken mixture
was then inserted in the cut portion of the lemongrass and the fibers used to
encase the chicken. It was dipped in an
egg mixture and deep fried. What you
notice first and what makes this a great dish is that the flavor of the lemon
grass, which you do not eat, is infused into the chicken mixture.
There were four on the plate which made an ample portion. They were served with a dipping sauce along
with plain sticky rice which you also dip in the sauce.
Next was a
mixture of fish that had been skinned, deboned, pounded in a mortar, and mixed
with herbs. It was then wrapped in a banana leaf and steamed. The banana
leaf came to the table tied up in a packet. When you untie the
leaf there is a lovely fragrance that greats you. Another super dish. What a way to get
introduced to Lao food!
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