Thai Cooking

We both love Thai food, and living in the Bay Area gives us access to some great Thai restaurants, so while we are here in Bangkok, we thought it would be great to learn how to make Thai food. Alby and I registered for a half day cooking course at the Blue Elephant. What a GREAT experience! The cooking school is on the top floors of this beautiful colonial house (the restaurant is on the first 2 floors). The sous chef greeted us when we arrived and we waited for the rest of the students to arrive. It was interesting to see the different people that were taking the cooking class with us. One lady was from Japan, and her husband was moved to Bangkok for work for a few years. Back in Japan she was a cooking instructor, so she thought while here in Thailand she could learn Thai Cuisine and take it back with her to Japan. There was another family there (mom, dad, and 2 sons), and group of friends, and another woman who has been coming to Bangkok for work for years, and had been wanting to take a weekend off and take this course for some time. The cooking class is not cheap ($80-90/person), but dinner at the Blue Elephant is much more, so we figured why not have the experience, and in the end we get to eat our meals anyways :)

Once the class arrived we headed to the Sky Train so we could go to the market and see how they pick the ingredients for traditional thai food. It was great seeing the whole cooking experience from the very beginning. They introduced us to the different spices that are used and we were able to smell them to help draw the connection to the taste later on. In the market we also go to sample some different tropical fruits. The mangosteen was pretty yummy. You twist off half of the cover and inside the fruit looks almost like a bunch of garlic cloves. The fruit inside is very sweet and sticky. Definitely a good treat.

After the market we headed back to the Blue Elephant to start class. Our class included four courses: Massaman Kai (Chicken Massaman Curry), Poo Jah (Stuffed Crab Shells), Kee Moa Seafood (Stir-fried Hot Chillies with Seafood), and Kluay Buad Chee (Banana in Coconut Milk). The chefs that taught us our lessons were great. One of them has been a chef with the Blue Elephant since they opened their first restaurant in Brussels. She even has her own cooking program on television. It was a fun experience since after each demonstration by the chef, we were able to go into the practice kitchen and make the dish ourselves. We had plenty of help from the sous chefs, which made it a lot easier to make the dishes on our own. They helped us figure out how to taste the food to see what flavor needs to be added.

Now that Alby's been trained, I'm just waiting for us to get home so he can make me dinner ;)