Asian Cuisine
An Asian Adventure by Manna from Devon
A Food & Drink feature (February 2011)
Coming up to our cookery school’s 5th birthday, we thought it was the perfect opportunity to expand the range of courses we offer and a chance to expand our cookery and foodie knowledge. Lots of students have asked whether we cook Asian food but sadly we had no real knowledge of it. Consequently we packed our bags and headed off to south-east Asia for a foray into all things foodie in Thailand, Laos and Vietnam escaping from the snow, wind and rain for a little while.
Only 3 weeks to explore and a vast underestimation of the infrastructure meant we didn’t get to see as much as we had hoped but we really got to grips with the places we did end up in – Bangkok and Chang Mai in Thailand, Luang Prabang in Laos and Hoi An in Vietnam. All had amazing food markets with the last 2 stops being world heritage sites and utterly beautiful.
First stop in the local Bangkok food markets was an assault on all our senses and confirmed what we were expecting from Thai ingredients – huge stalls of dried fish, counters of fresh limes, chillies, veggies, huge bundles of lemongrass and butchers selling everything (and I mean everything) each animal had to offer. China Town was even busier with people everywhere in narrow alleyways being overtaken by trolleys full of towering deliveries and motorbikes and scooters taking shortcuts through the customers. Health and safety would have had a field day but all perfectly normal as far as the Bangkok shoppers went.
Next on the itinerary was an overnight train journey to Chang Mai up in the north of Thailand. The whole town is much more relaxed than Bangkok and whilst we were there we did 2 days at some of the best local cookery schools. Tutored trips round the markets gave us the chance to ask some of those niggling questions and to point out some of the more unexpected ingredients – buffalo bile, live frogs and jellied sulphurous eggs have certainly stuck in our memories. More appealing were the fantastically ripe exotic fruits packed with flavour – pineapples and watermelon like you’ve never tasted, bright pink dragon fruit, green and orange papaya.
Our cookery days continued back at the schools where we rustled up fresh papaya salads, pounded curry pastes with 20 chillies (perky!), made hot and sour soups, created chicken in lemongrass, made rice noodles from scratch and finished off with coconut sticky rice and fresh mango.
New Year in Chang Mai was spent at the river where thousands of lanterns were sent off into the night skies for good luck and then a 2 day trip down the Mekong on a slow boat. These only run in the dry season as the waters are so high in the wet season the boats would be bashed to smithereens. We ended our river journey in Luang Prabang, 2nd city of Laos and utterly relaxing. It was like being on a film set with beautiful old French colonial buildings, lines of saffron clad Buddhist monks and old men in berets serving drip-through coffee.
The use of ingredients was starting to change as we headed east – no coconut rich soups and curries, more fresh fish such as catfish and tilapia, 4-5 different types of aubergine from the tiny pea shaped green ones to long thin purple fingers, buffalo meat (tough springs to mind!), lots of zingy limes and more use of mint and coriander so generally a much fresher, less rich feel to the food with sticky rice to bulk the meal out.
Breakfasts consisted of noodle soups – meat and noodles in a stock into which you added your own chillies, limes and herbs so you could flavour your meal just how you wanted. There were loads of baguettes and croissants because of the French colonial influences but they like a much softer doughier bake so Saveurs have nothing to worry about. Coffee was served very dark and strong with condensed milk to sweeten it – very finely ground it was dripped through a net. A really great way to kick start your morning.
The most bizarre thing we found in Laos apart from dried rats (for flavouring stocks) was a very hot chilli dip with great chunks of boiled buffalo skin inside. Not the most appealing thing we found on our travels.
Our next and final stop was Hoi An in Vietnam which we reached via 2 overnight bus journeys – really we’re getting too old to lug rucksacks around and lie in the back of a bus with complete strangers…. Hoi An is another World Heritage site with more quirky French colonial buildings, half way down the country and on the coast. Lots of fresh fish and seafood as well as chicken, pork and tofu and many more fresh noodles compared to Thailand’s and Laos’ rice. We were determined to get to Vietnam after the right-to-the-wire arrival of our visas which came with our passports the day before we left for Heathrow. I have to say it was one of the most inspiring places I have been to - fabulous fresh ingredients, fresh, clean flavoured food and joyful smiling people – memories of laughing and speaking fluently with them but sadly in 2 separate languages will stay for a long time.
Vietnamese breakfasts were rice pancakes from a stall in the market fried until crispy with some prawns or squid, wrapped around bean sprouts and fresh herbs and then dipped into chilli and peanut sauce - delicious. Either that or a bowl of pho – noodle soup with herbs and chilli. Top that with another slowly filtered coffee and watch the day’s business unfold.
Counter intuitively to how we eat at home, we always looked for the messiest stall with debris on the floor as this meant theirs was a busy and popular stall with the locals and consequently would have good food. Let’s face it – it’s impossible to eat tidily with a pair of chopsticks. This guideline didn’t let us down and lead us to some of the best street food we had – marinated fish grilled in banana leaves, noodle soups in intensely flavoured stocks, lemongrass chicken and prawns, fresh spring rolls with duck, and one of our favourites, the ban xhao – the rice pancakes described earlier cooked with chopsticks.
All these we learned to cook along with making our own rice noodles, bashing our own curry pastes and also carving a carrot flower; always a useful skill to have up your sleeve.
Now we’re back home we’re working on the courses for our students - we’ll be translating the ingredients in the markets to the ones we can get easily here as well as using the kitchen utensils we bought. We’ll be passing on our newly learnt skills and techniques and enjoying these bright fresh flavours. However having travelled half way round the world to explore new food, their principals are just the same as we have been following here – buy locally and seasonally and support local businesses. We look forward to seeing you here at the cookery school if you fancy 2011 as your year to learn some new culinary skills – buffalo skin purely optional.
First Published February 2011 By The Dart