We finally made a plan in Singapore and decided to fly to Chaing Mai in Thailand. The first flight from Singapore to KL went swimmingly, we had a 6 hour wait at KL airport and thought 'we can find somewhere to have a cheeky little nap'! I expected a little carpeted area in the airport or some seats! KL airport is just full of marbled floors and had a lack of seats so we opted for the marble floor as there wasn't any other option! I popped my headphones in and tried to have a little snooze, this lasted all of 20mins and then we were being told we had to leave the departure lounge as they wanted to fumergate! So we basically ended up sleeping outside on the carpark which you can imagine was interesting! No marble just pure concrete!!
We finally boarded our flight for Chaing Mai and arrived early morning. We stayed at a lovely hotel called Imm Eco which had a swimming pool, lovely clean rooms with air-con, breakfast, good fruit smoothies- absolute luxury! and all for £4 a night- bargain!
I met up with my friend Jaks, and we all ventured off to the night bazaar for some dinner, we went to a place called 'The Yellow Tables' which consisted of many food stalls which sold everything from Thai, noodles, rice, indian, fruit smoothies, pancakes, ice-cream and much more. Once you had decided what you wanted to eat, you visited the lady in the booth and brought some food coupons. This was where I enjoyed my first Pad Thai dish and some lovely cookies and cream ice-cream!!
The next day we decided to find a local cake shop called Love At First Bite and boy it was love at first bite. I have never seen such an extensive cake menu and fell in love with the look of the chocolate brownie and homemade vanilla ice-cream! I was not disappointed, it was the best chocolate brownie I have ever tasted! A beautiful friendship was formed that day!!
I decided to attend a thai cookery course which was run by a company called Asia Scenic. The course consisted of a visiting the herb garden and learning about all the herbs and spices that are used in thai cooking. We visited the local market and saw the locals making noodles ( I didn't know they were so many different types of noodles)! and then it was back into the kitchen to start preparing our first dish.
I decided to make the following dishes:
Pad Thai- noodle dish with egg- one of the easist dishes to make and it consisted of hardly any ingredients. I will definately be able to source these ingredients back at home.
Massaman curry- I learnt how to make a massaman curry paste which consisted of many spices that needed to be grinded together- you need good arm muscles for this! Once all the spices were grinded together, you basically add coconut milk, meat/fish and some vegetables- and there you have a massaman curry! Served with rice.
Chicken and cashew nut stirfry (my favourite dish). This was very easy to make and was delicious if I do say so myself!
Coconut curry soup- this was my least favourite dish, mainly because I put too much lime in it, but I would definately try cooking this at home. Minus the lime!
During cooking all the dishes, I realised I shouldn't apply for next year's masterchef! The pressure of cooking 4 dishes was challenging enough for me. After spending four hours in total going to the market and learning to cook a range of dishes, it was time to sit back and enjoy our masterpieces. Watch out friends and family, your going to be subjected to trying these dishes when I get back home!!
The following days in Chaing Mai consisted of swimming, eating yummy cake, drinking amazing fruit smoothies, shopping and more shopping. I LOVE CHAING MAI!
