The Market and Cooking Class

One of my favorite things to do is cook. To some that sounds crazy, even politically incorrect. But, I love it. Cooking, to me, is creative, adventurous, challenging, and practical. All characteristics I admire. It serves a need we all have and I am, all modesty aside, really good at it. It follows, then that one of my favorite classes we signed up for was Thai Cooking Class.

The cooking school came and got us in their pickup truck first thing in the morning. Then we stopped at the local outdoor market for a lesson in Thai fruits and vegetables and to do a little grocery shopping on our way to class.

This is a picture of one of the instructors showing us the different kinds of ginger. Did you know that turmeric is actually a variety of ginger, but that we can only get it in powdered form in the States? Neither did I!

We also learned about different kinds of sauces used in Thai cooking, like fish sauce, fish paste, oyster sauce, and soy sauce; the different kinds of oil, peanut, vegetable, or corn. Not olive oil because it burns before it gets hot enough; and the different kinds of rice, white rice, sticky rice, brown rice and red rice. Jack and I already went to that market a lot because it was close to our guesthouse and exploring exotic food is one of the things we like to do where ever we are.
Different kinds of fish paste

All of the produce at the market comes from Thailand and is picked when it’s ripe, not before like at home, which makes everything taste really great. There are little bananas that are really good, and the pineapple is to die for sweet. There were also some new fruits we were introduced to like the dragon fruit, with a thick, red peel, and white with little black seeds inside and tastes kind of like a melon. Another new fruit we discovered are rambutens. They are pink and round, with an outer peel that looks hairy, kind of like a sea urchin. When you break open the peel, it’s a white fruit surrounding a large seed and tastes kind of like banana and melon mixed together. They’re really good.

There is one new fruit that is not so great, called durian. They are really large, like an oversized cantaloupe, with a hard, spiky shell. When one is cut open, the white center smells like rotten onions, and I’m told it tastes like sweet rotten onions. One durian can smell up a whole building. The hotels and guest houses forbid anyone from bringing durian onto their premises because they smell so bad, and will evict you if you do. But, lots of folks really like it, and they are sold all over the place. To learn more about the exotic fruits of Thailand and see their pictures, go to this site: http://www.hotelthailand.com/thailand/fruits.html. There are great pictures and descriptions.

Most of the vegetables are recognizable, although maybe a little different. Corn on the cob is everywhere. There is something that looks like collard greens and taste pretty good when sautéed. Instead of green beans, there are long beans, which look like yard-long green beans. There are tomatoes and potatoes, many varieties of mushrooms, and garlic in little, tiny cloves, and garlic the size that we’re used to. We are finding plenty of food that we like and are able to cook.

Fresh veggies

Thai cooking also uses a lot of herbs, like basil and coriander (which is cilantro to us Texans), and many, many hot peppers. The smaller the pepper, the hotter it is. It also calls for peanuts, a lot of eggs, a little bit of meat, especially pork and chicken, and tofu.

Cat nap at the spice vendor

So, after roaming through the market for a while and picking up some essentials for what we were making, we headed for the kitchen. Everyone got an apron and a hand towel to put in our apron pocket. Before we got to class, we had picked out what we wanted to cook from a list. Jack and I each picked separate items, so we were separated into our own group for the next several hours. The first thing I made was Pad Thai Noodles, one of my personal favorites. Everything Jack made had a lot of peppers in it, which are his personal favorites. Each person in our group had a cutting board and a really sharp clever shaped knife. Before we started cooking, everyone had to wash their hands. Then we all sat down across from each other at a picnic table and had baskets with a tray over the top handed to us. Then the instruction began. If you can imagine a drill sergeant teaching you how to cook, that is what the instructor for the Pad Thai Noodles reminded me of. In a very commanding sort of way, she said:

Take tray off the basket.

Take onion out of the basket and cut up. Put in right corner of tray.

Take garlic out of the basket. Smash on cutting board with side of knife and cut up. Put in right corner of tray with onion.

Take carrot out of basket. Cut up on cutting board and put in right corner with onion and garlic.

Take basket and go to stove.

Turn fire ring on medium.

Put onion, garlic and carrot in wok and stir.

Put chicken in wok and stir.

Put noodles in wok and stir.

I will put one teaspoon peanuts. One spoon, one spoon, one spoon, as she marches in front of us with the peanuts.

So, you get the picture. It was okay, though, and everyone’s Pad Thai Noodles came out really good.

Jack with the drill sergeant

We cooked six different dishes that day, and after cooking each dish, we went back to the picnic table that was miraculously cleared away and ate the final results. We ate all day. We were really full.

Hot and Sour Soup and stir fry

Me making Mossman curry paste

Mosmann curry cooking on the stove

Enjoy!

Flight of the Gibbons

The most fun tour we have taken so far was zip-lining through the rainforest on “The Flight of the Gibbons”. We started out very early in the morning when the tour van picked us up at 6:15. After about an hour's drive, it stopped at a small village perched on the side of the mountain in the middle of the rainforest. Everyone piled out of the van and divided into small groups of four to six people. Jack and I were in the last group, so we watched as the others got ready to go. I was trying not to think about the actual zip-lining part, because I didn’t know what to expect and was really uncertain if I would like it. It was finally our turn and we were buckled into harnesses, had our eyeglasses tied on so they wouldn’t fall off, and put on helmets. Our group got back in the van and went a little further up the mountain, then hiked about 100 meters to the first platform.

One of our two guides gave us a talk about safety, told us what we were going to do, what our equipment was for and how to use it, where the safety line was, showed us where and how to hold on, and where NOT to hold on. Then we started. One guide would hook onto the zip-line and go ahead of us to catch us when we came across. The other guide would make sure we were hooked onto the line correctly, that our equipment was secure, and then helped us off the platform to go across.

The first time I was thinking, “OMG, I’m zip-lining.” After a few seconds, it was, “OMG THIS IS FUN!” It was fast and exhilarating. We spent the next two hours going from platform to platform, getting hooked on and flying across to the next one. I felt very safe the whole time. When you sit down in the harness, it just feels like you’re sitting in a chair. I didn’t feel like I was dangling 100 feet above the ground while flying along at who knows how many miles an hour.



So, why is this tour called “Flight of the Gibbons”? Gibbons are a species of ape that live in the rainforest, all around where we were. They are very shy about showing themselves, but we could hear them the whole morning we were flying around their rainforest. Kind of cool.

I put a new album up of our adventures. Our group was kind of small, so one of the guides got everyone’s camera and took pictures of us the whole time, and he got some good shots.

I added zip-lining to my top-10 list of the most fun things I have ever done. In my life.

Languishing

I have been very remiss lately with the blog. I am working on new posts and will put up more stuff very, very soon.

Just a quick update: Jack and I have rented an apartment in Chiang Mai and have finally gotten all the 'move in' stuff taken care of - cable, internet, buying bath towel, etc. It's just the same moving in over here as over there - and we've just about taken care of everything.

We're headed to Laos next week for a few days, too. It's just a short bus trip away. We've heard different reports from Laos, it has beautiful scenery, but sad people. Will let you know more soon.