June 2: Cooking Class!

The cooking class was a highlight of my entire trip, up there with the two days in Ha Long / Lan Ha Bay. And one reason it was so fun is that my friend Laini was there!!! She arrived late morning and we went straight to lunch.

I found out the restaurant washed their vegetables in filtered water, so I felt obligated to order a salad!

tie-dye flowers!

Our cooking class started with us getting picked up in a pick-up.

We were driven to a local market, where our guide showed us the ingredients we'd be using.

I also wandered around and took photos of all the fascinating and beautiful foods:

Then we were driven to a farm where we harvested the actual ingredients we'd be using!

While staffed prepped our ingredients Hello Fresh-style, we relaxed with butterfly pea flower tea and cookies. It came with lime, because adding lime juice to the blue tea turns it purple 🤩

Our first step in the cooking process was grinding spices together with a stone mortar and pestle.

Then we did a tiny amount of chopping to help us feel like we contributed to that process, but it was mostly for the pictures:

This is how the ingredients were presented to us.

Then we cooked! I made pad thai (of course), a classic Northern Thailand soup called khao soi, green papaya salad (my favorite), and a vegetarian tom yum soup (which I think was actually tom kha because it had coconut milk in it).

Aaaand mango sticky rice! With butterfly pea flower decoration!!

They prepped the base ingredients like this.

We cooked the rice with coconut cream and butterfly pea flowers for color, and assembled the final dish. The crunchy mung beans on top truly make the dish.

Along with the other two people in the class, it was a truly incredible spread.

tom kha! sooooo delicious.

After dropping off our leftovers at the homestay, Laini and I set out again to visit a massive street market in the Old Town. I bought a few souvenirs and these crispy sesame balls with sweet mung bean paste inside:

This is my favorite souvenir from the whole trip!