Days 17/18 - Chiang Mai

Chaing Mai was founded in 1296 as the capital of the first independent Thai state, the Lanna Thai, or the Kingdom of a Million Rice Fields.  Rice is everywhere here, and is a central staple --especially sticky rice -- of Northern Thai food.

On our first day here, we took a "Curry Paste" Cooking class.  Before taking the class, I had always thought that the curries of Thailand were the same as those in India. Apparently, however, Thai curries are very different than Indian curries.  Thai curries - typically green or red - are based on a curry paste made of red or green chillies, sweet basil, dried shrimp, fish sauce, little toes of unpeeled garlic and various other goodies.  Any good Thai makes their own paste, which can keep fresh for one or two weeks, and is the basis for many types of dishes including said curry!

So yesterday, we took our own course in the hopes of being able to bring back some of these new found skills to NY.  I think we may need a larger kitchen to accommodate all the appropriate accoutrement - wok, steamer, rice maker.  But we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.

So the menu of the day included:

• Thord Mun Pla-Krai: Deep fried fish cake patties served with cucumber relish.
  

This was not as tasty as it looked, and despite being promisingly deep-fried and puffy looking, actually seemed to have a bit of a soft and sponge-like texture.  The "relish" was more like cucumber and chili syrup, with several cups of sugar and vinegar going into the mix.

• Hor Mok Ta-Lay: Steamed mild seafood curry mousse 

Tastes exactly as it sounds.  Maybe worse?  I think this is a version of the Otak-Okak fish spam we had in Malaysia - only tasteless, with chunks of chewy squid in it.

• Geng Khiew Waan Khai: Green Curry with chicken, eggplant and sweet basil
  

Chalk curry up as another one of T's specialties.  In addition to all things on the grill, braised meats, chili, cocktail making and laundry, we can add curry to this list!  With green curry paste, chicken stock, fish sauce, palm sugar, basil and kaffir lime, red and green chilies, his came out thick, rich, sweet and spicy.  So delicious, I jettisoned my bowl and had seconds from his!

• Tub Tim Krob: Chilled water chestnut rubies in sweet coconut milk

I am not sure why, but I think desserts are the most foreign elements of a cuisine.  Maybe just Asian cuisine?  In a million years, I never would have thought of making a dessert with water chestnuts. In fact, I am not sure I would have willingly thought to do anything with a water chestnut.  That being said, not only was the chestnut central to our dessert, but we then soaked it in a red syrup, coated it with tapioca and boiled them in water till they floated.  Add this, plus some diced jackfuit (imagine day-old cantaloupe), into a soup of coconut milk and sugar.  Top with crushed ice.  Even more surprising, it was delicious! 

It was a great way to spend the morning, although feeling like you were with food-baby all afternoon as you lay in your bathing suit by the pool was less than comfortable!

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Today, we tried some sustenance of a more spiritual sort by making an early morning of Wat Phra That Doi Suthep.  We arrived at the base of the Doi Suthep mountain around 6:30 in the morning to make merit.  The temple was nice at the top of the mountain - we lit candles, burned our incense and made an offering of our lotus flower.  We honored an old monk, long dead and gone, who had helped build a road up to the temple. 

But what stuck with me were the monks we met.  Unlike the handful we came across in Bangkok (all middle aged, one on a cell phone, one smoking a cigarette), these were mostly boys.  Maybe 11 or 12 - the age of my little brother.  And they looked it too, in that sweet way that has an air of being rarefied because it will all-too-soon be gone.  

 As a young monk, they follow ten precepts, one of which was that they collect all their food from the charity of their community.  Shaved heads, flame robes, walking without shoes as a way of meditation, they would approach you if you asked to make an offering.  Wait with a head bowed over their alms bowl, as you placed a little bundle of food in.  And then they would chant together - the three or four you gave your parcels to - a teaching in unison.  

Most of these boys are from the local village.  Our guide said that most of them likely knew each other; that they would stay at the temple for two or three months; that if they had a friend who was not at the monastery, he may still come and play around the temple.  We saw one mother and son outside the temple, both dressed in white, the boy's head already shaved.  His mother had brought her son to initiation day.

As we watched these boys, the familiar crept in.  Like this mother and son. Was this like my mother taking my brother to sleep away camp with his friend Ben? Was he itching to get going, she a bit nostalgic and proud at once? Would her house be as quiet as ours is when he is away?

Like the two monks emptying their small alms bowls into a larger plastic bag, the packaged foods crinkling and crackling like a mound of candy wrappers being poured into a pillowcase? For these boys, was there the little bit of excitement, of anticipation and chance of trick-or-treat?  Did they groan at the homemade rice?  And brighten at the pre-packaged cream puff I placed in?

I am not sure if this is the magic of travel or not.  Do I need to go so far away to recognize the familiar in the exotic?  Or even more, to appreciate the sweet tenderness of my everyday?