One step at a time…

So its been couple of days since I have been in Chiang Mai and have to say its a shoppers paradise but really not the place I’am in a mood for right now. BUT still its a nice place to hang out, get some great food and just wander around. My quest for the perfect “Mango and Sticky Rice” still continues…I came close though when I made my own… its all about the Mango in the end but my cooking teacher “Yui” might disagree and say its how well the rice is cooked as well. So, finally I took Thai cooking classes and I have to say to that I was actually nervous the first day…Me… “Miss Know It All” had to shut up and listen and learn..no wonder I was a bit nervous.

I did well and it was because Yui was a pretty good teacher and we had a very relaxed atmosphere the first day..it was just me..I got a private lesson. Yui and her husband Kwan run the cooking school from their home and they have a little 2 year old helper “Sid”..who is adorable and very well behaved. After the intial introductions and helping Mom for a few mins he dissappears with Grandma.

The first day I learnt couple of basic Thai cooking dishes…made some Red curry paste from scratch and talked and exchanged information with Yui. She had many questions for me about Indian cooking just as I had many about Thai. I realised after a long day of cooking that its just as daunting as Indian Cooking as one needs to have all the ingredients and once you do the style and method for most of the dishes are pretty similar. So I decided I will practice once I get to SF and will not continue with the classes…but when she told me she has couple more students tomorrow and they are going to make “Mango with Sticky Rice” I could not resist. SO, I went back again and this time there were eight other students. Have to say I was a bit concerned but the class went well and there was a great chemistry in the group and we laughed and joked and ribbed couple of the guys about their nearly burned Pad Thai’s. Jim, an older Aussie gentleman said he might even continue cooking..his wife made sure we were all witnesses to this promise of sorts.

In the end they were all ribbing me as I was anxiously waiting for my dessert. They were amused with my fascination with Mango and left me alone as I relished my dessert…it was close to perfection..come on has to be..I made it!
In my opinion its the perfect fruit….I have so memories associated with the Mango. We always reached Hyderbad from Delhi in time for the Mango season and would get baskets from my Grand Aunt’s farm. We had them for breakfast with Puri’s (puffed deep fried bread). The mango pulp was mixed either with cream or milk and a bit of sugar..then you dipped the hot puri’s in this mixture.Yumm….bummer I missed the season again in India..but am enjoying the tail end of the season here in Thailand.

Some of the Mangoes are jucier and you basically just suck on them.In my dad’s village we used to get these smaller juicy mangoes..loads of them soaked in buckets…we could sit in the yard in our slips or old T shirts (mango stains are impossible to remove) and pretty much sat the whole day counting how many we had gulped down. During the same time or bit earlier in the season the raw mangoes would be bought and my grandma would start the annual pickling process. These raw mangoes were cleaned, cut into pieces and marinated with different pickles which then would be eaten all year along as a side dish. My grandma was famous for couple of these and pretty much everybody would be waiting for their share. My grandma’s yellow mustard Mango pickle, grated mango with sugar pickle from my other Grandma, Lemon pickle from my Aunt’s side of the family and then meat pickles made my mom’s sister.We would carry all these back to Delhi…this was serious business…pickles were measured by their worth in gold. Along with the pickles we would take dried Tamarind and other dried spicies. This tradition still continues…my suitcases sometimes have more spices than clothes. I knew exactly what Yui meant when she said that her Mother-in-law still uses the Tamarind from her village down south even though she has lived in CM for 40 years. You don’t mess with a good thing!

The thai seem to love their mangoes too.They have them in pickled forms as well but I seemed to have missed the raw mango season. Here just like we used to eat them with chilly and salt..they add a little bit of raw sugar to the same mixture. Am told raw mango with spicy shrimp paster is yummm as well. Yui and I were sharing stories as kids how we used to eat them directly from the trees.

Another common fruit is the “Tamarind” which is widely used in Thai cooking as well. In the markets you will find sweet tamarind candy which is not the most exotic looking thing but worth a try as its delicious. Kelly and Adam the clean cut young minnesota couple seemed to have liked it. It so nice to meet some Americans who are throughly enjoying their visit to Thailand and are eager to travel more. I think I need to give Americans from the Midwest a chance as am sure the younger generation if given a chance would love to explore. I seemed to have an idea in my head they are like the “frog in the well” who thinks his world is the best but more and more am willing to give them a chance…I should not be this hard on my adopted country folks…am trying hard not to stereo type.

Oh! i forgot to tell you about my first Thai Boxing experience. It was very interesting to say the least. I had conjured up Jean Claude Van Damme’s kick boxing movies but this was far removed from the Rocky…ish potrays of the sport. The night started with kiddy fights..boys matched according to their weight. Strange music accompained these fights…the instruments included a drum (mridangam style), bells..like the one use use in Buddhist and hindu temples, a also a trumpet like piece..it was a strange set of music and the little boys seemed to have a rythum while kicking. The main fight was disspointing..the visisting canadian boxer was bending some rules..but in the end he lost to the local thai boxer. More interesting was a real knockout fight which broke in the stands. Many ignored the match in the ring. It seemed like there was some betting, gambling going on the side..even on the kiddie matches..I thought they were just enthusiatic Baseball parents but no they betting on the matches. The Thai love to gamble and I saw that first hand. They also seem to have a large lottery business..there is a whole street in Bangkok dedicated to this trade. I did not see this in CM but in the markets you will see guys with boxes of lottery tickets wandering around.

Am ready to see some greenary and hit some trails.I thought I would take in some temple sightseeing today but my ethu failed after a couple…I wanted to go to a temple outside the city limits but got lost and found my way to an internet cafe instead. After another attempt to find the perfect “Mango and Sticky Rice” after some firey curry I will venture out again and be a tourist again (am developing a guilty concience for not taking in some of the toursisty sites). More later….

Tags: Thailand

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 20th, 2004 at 12:04 pm and is filed under Thailand. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.