I commented on my Facebook account the other day that I was eating lots of green papaya salad and sticky rice with mango here in Chiang Mai, Thailand, and that I would miss it when we came home. A friend of mine commented back that I shouldn't be too sad to leave, since I can get green papaya salad and sticky rice with mango in Canada, too.
I chuckled kind of wistfully when I read that...
Well, yes...
Maybe I can put together a green papaya salad in Canada if I can find the right ingredients. But I can't go to the park after strolling around the city in short sleeved shirt and sandles and find the lady with the Som Tam cart with her big wooden mortar and pestle. I can't order and watch her throw the chillies and the garlic and the palm sugar and coconut sugar and lime juice and fish sauce in and mix them around with her pestle. I can't watch her cut up the tomatoes and squish them around. I can't watch her shave the green papaya with her special shaver and throw it into the mortar and squish everything up a little more. I can't watch her pull out a bit and taste it and offer some to me, so that if I want it hotter (add more chilies) or sweeter (add more sugar) or saltier (add more fish sauce) or sourer (add more lime juice) she can do that. And then I can't watch her add some hand roasted peanuts after fishing all the contents of her mortar out onto a plate and I can't drink the sauce off the plate before I spill it all down my skirt. And I can't eat it in the park under the tree watching the big (huge) catfish eating the pellets that the children buy from the vendors on the street.
As for mango with sticky rice...I'm HOPING that I can reproduce sticky rice once we get home. I have a recipe. You have to soak the rice overnight, and then you have to steam it while it sits in a cotton sack (I think I'll try a pillowcase), preferably in a bamboo-like steamer. Ah, but the mangos. The mangos in Canada are usually from Mexico, unless you happen to live in a place like Toronto or Vancouver, where they might bring the special mangos in from South East Asia and India during the season. The mangos from Mexico are quite tart, and a bit stringy compared to the mangos that you get here, and I've had a bit of trouble with mangos in Dawson...they don't like the cold much. In Thailand, you can easily cut through the bright orange very juicy mango flesh with a spoon. And the flesh isn't tart, it's sweet and and mild and buttery. And then they put on this coconut sauce and these little yellow seeds that give it a bit of a crunch and you start eating and you hope that you can make it last because it's the most delicious thing that you've ever tasted, but you finish it all too soon and vow to go back for more tomorrow.
There's nothing quite like being there and ordering it like the natives do it, and watching it being made, and eating it where it was invented. But I will look forward to trying to reproduce the taste and telling people the story of what it was like when I was in Thailand (and I was warm) and that what we are eating now is good...but not quite the same.
Happy day!
ACDB
I chuckled kind of wistfully when I read that...
Well, yes...
Maybe I can put together a green papaya salad in Canada if I can find the right ingredients. But I can't go to the park after strolling around the city in short sleeved shirt and sandles and find the lady with the Som Tam cart with her big wooden mortar and pestle. I can't order and watch her throw the chillies and the garlic and the palm sugar and coconut sugar and lime juice and fish sauce in and mix them around with her pestle. I can't watch her cut up the tomatoes and squish them around. I can't watch her shave the green papaya with her special shaver and throw it into the mortar and squish everything up a little more. I can't watch her pull out a bit and taste it and offer some to me, so that if I want it hotter (add more chilies) or sweeter (add more sugar) or saltier (add more fish sauce) or sourer (add more lime juice) she can do that. And then I can't watch her add some hand roasted peanuts after fishing all the contents of her mortar out onto a plate and I can't drink the sauce off the plate before I spill it all down my skirt. And I can't eat it in the park under the tree watching the big (huge) catfish eating the pellets that the children buy from the vendors on the street.
As for mango with sticky rice...I'm HOPING that I can reproduce sticky rice once we get home. I have a recipe. You have to soak the rice overnight, and then you have to steam it while it sits in a cotton sack (I think I'll try a pillowcase), preferably in a bamboo-like steamer. Ah, but the mangos. The mangos in Canada are usually from Mexico, unless you happen to live in a place like Toronto or Vancouver, where they might bring the special mangos in from South East Asia and India during the season. The mangos from Mexico are quite tart, and a bit stringy compared to the mangos that you get here, and I've had a bit of trouble with mangos in Dawson...they don't like the cold much. In Thailand, you can easily cut through the bright orange very juicy mango flesh with a spoon. And the flesh isn't tart, it's sweet and and mild and buttery. And then they put on this coconut sauce and these little yellow seeds that give it a bit of a crunch and you start eating and you hope that you can make it last because it's the most delicious thing that you've ever tasted, but you finish it all too soon and vow to go back for more tomorrow.
There's nothing quite like being there and ordering it like the natives do it, and watching it being made, and eating it where it was invented. But I will look forward to trying to reproduce the taste and telling people the story of what it was like when I was in Thailand (and I was warm) and that what we are eating now is good...but not quite the same.
Happy day!
ACDB
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