6/30/13

Chiang Mai

Laura and I woke up pretty early today. After only about 5 1/2 hours of sleep, I sat up excited and ready to go learn how to cook!

We went downstairs to grab breakfast around 8:00. Our van to our class wasn't supposed to be at our hotel until 8:30 so we had enough time to eat. The breakfast buffet was expensive so we decided to order just French toast. The server said it would only be 5 mins. About 15 mins. later, we got our breakfast and ate quickly. Luckily our van didn't show up until about 8:40.

We got in the van with a few other people. One guy was from San Francisco but was living in Castro Valley (go figure!) and another couple was from London. We picked up a few others from their hotels: an Australian lady, a couple from Spain, and a couple and their daughter from China.

We got to the cooking school and had a seat at a long table. There were lots of woks at the cooking stations and lots of utensils. The couple from England was doing the full day class but the rest of us were doing the half day. We met our instructor for the day: a 23 year old girl named Fon. She was so sweet and energetic and was a fabulous and knowledgeable teacher.

We started by deciding that we would make an appetizer, a stir fry, and a curry. We each got to pick our own dish from each category. I chose a spicy basil stir fry, spring rolls, and green curry.

We then went to the garden on the side of the school. Fon showed us different vegetables and herbs, some of which I had never seen before. She let us smell them and feel them and told us what they were used for. Some even had "healing" powers. My favorite was the ear mushrooms that looked like jellyfish.

We then walked a few minutes to a fabulous market, kind of near a backpacking district. Fon showed us different types of noodles, rice and other vegetables. She gave us time to wander around and check everything out. We then headed back to our school.

We had a "welcome snack" waiting for us. It consisted of an edible leaf, tofu, lime, coconut, peanuts, peppers, shallots and a sweet sauce. You put all the ingredients in the leaf, roll it up and eat it. It was a very interesting mix of flavors.

We then went off to make our stir fry. We put on our aprons and each got a cutting board and sharp knife. We cut up our vegetables and put them on a plate. We then headed to the woks where we put our oil and garlic in first, followed by sauces, veggies, sugar and chicken. We sautéed til it was cook then plated it with our rice. We then got to go eat! It was delicious!!! Maybe one of the best meals in Thailand! :)

We then prepped the inside of the spring rolls. We scooped the insides into the wheat wrapper, rolled them and fried them and served them with dipping sauce. Again, they were a culinary masterpiece! Laura made papaya salad that she shared that was so good!

Last we made our curries. It was a group effort to grind all the spices together for 10 minutes. After making the paste from scratch, we added in the basil and eggplant and coconut milk to make the sauce. We plated it with rice and again it was delish!

After we were done, we got our cookbooks and headed back to the hotel. We met up with Kristine and Santi and went to 7-11 to get snacks for the night train.

At 3:30, we got in our tuk tuk and headed for the train station. I had time to grab a sandwich for dinner. We then boarded our train to head for Bangkok.

Laura and I shared a row across from Kristine and Charlotte. Of course in our section, the fan was broken and it was super hot.

We left at 5:00 and we were kind of bored from the start. After napping, reading, playing games on our phones and just staring out the window, we decided to play cards. I even taught Paula, Kristine, and Laura a card trick that they were "amazed" by. :)

Around 10, after brushing our teeth, we decided to head to bed to, hopefully, make the time pass quickly.

Until next time!