Schooled in Curry

Pops and I did a Thai cooking class one evening in Chiang Mai. The school is Zab-E-Lee, and the young Thai woman Anne who runs it is incredible. We started with a visit to a local market on the east side that I wish I had known about sooner. Good tips on ingredients right out of the gate. 

Here's my wok station back at the cooking school. The 4 giant bottles are:

- vegetable oil

- soy sauce

- fish sauce

- oyster sauce

The other key bottles we used were chili oil, chili jam, and palm sugar paste.  Chili jam is, in fact, my jam. 

Here's a shot of the school, which is open-air but enclosed. It was a really great setup for something like this: an area to prepare, an area to cook, an area to EAT!

Below, I'm sautéing all the stuff that makes Thai food awesome that I almost never buy: lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, fresh galangal, king chilies, and Thai garlic. Of all that, the garlic is the only one you're supposed to actually eat.  

Here is a mortar and pestal the size of my head. I'm crushing up all the stuff to make the base flavor for green papaya salad (Som Tum): chilies, lime, garlic, dried shrimp, palm sugar, fish sauce, peanuts, and some beans. 

Finished papaya salad! YAYAYAYA!! 

All the stuff the goes into making a red curry paste (minus the red chilies) is below. So many ingredients and so much  work to grind this into a paste, that I will likely continue buying the cans...

Ingredients from the top include: lemongrass, coriander seeds, peppercorns, cumin seeds, fresh turmeric, cilantro stems, kaffir like peel, galangal, Thai ginger, shallots, and garlic. 

Here is the Phanaeng Curry my dad made using the paste above! 

I made Khao Soi, the signature noodle dish of Chiang Mai. Anne came by with her spoon to test all the curries and I waited with bated breath, but passed the check. Can't wait to try it again when I'm back home. 

Class was 5 hours, 800 baht. Recommend!