3 October 2013-

It's time to chill out in our hotel room for a few minutes before heading out to our cooking class: 

Our room on the first floor …. I'd recommend getting a room on either the second or third floor of this hotel so that you can have a covered walk-way to your room. Every time it rained we got wet trying to walk to our room! Regardless, the rooms were very clean and updated looking.  

 We're ready to head out to Le Tigre de Papier  (the Paper Tiger) located on Pub Street in Siem Reap.  Are you ready to learn how to cook Khmer-style dishes?

Okay…the tuk-tuk driver dropped us off here but this looks like a restaurant….where is the cooking class????

Ah, we finally found someone that can help us.  They just handed us a menu and we're each supposed to pick out one appetizer and one entree.  ???  Oh!  You mean we get to choose what we can make?  I thought it'd be a set meal that we make.  Hmmmmm….what to choose?  All the dishes sound good.  I think I'll go for green papaya salad and fried noodles, Mark and Ava are both getting the banana flower salad and Annika wants to make fresh spring rolls.  Ava wants the Khmer style fish (with chips…sigh.), Annika wants the pork and baby corn dish and Mark wants to try some interesting Khmer-style chicken dish.

We just met Sam, she'll be our cooking instructor tonight.  She just explained that we'll first take a quick tour of the Old Market and pick up a few ingredients (the majority of the ingredients are already prepared for us).  

The Old Market is just a hop away from the restaurant.  It looks a lot like the markets I go shopping at in China: 

One key difference between the market here in Cambodia and those in China is that here the vendors are sitting on the tables alongside their produce/wares.

That's green pepper! (and I don't mean bell pepper). It seems that they use a lot of black pepper in their cooking here.

Mmmm…crabs!

Sam said that these flowers were for the upcoming Cambodian public holiday.

This lady is shredding coconut.

I never did figure out what's in these bags. Looks like some glutinous globs of stuff.

Sam said these were morning glory leaves.

Meat!

Ooo!!!!  Sam just stopped at us one of the stalls that sells all sorts of spices.  We picked up black pepper, powdered coconut, green curry mix, dried lemongrass, dried kaffir lime leaves, and a few other things.  Rats!  I forgot to take a photo of all those packets of spices!  

It's time to head back to the restaurant and start cooking:

Annika and Sam (our cooking instructor)

Littlest Chef, Baby Ava!

Mark's ready to get cooking!

The ingredients for the green papaya salad: green papaya, tomato, lime, basil, carrot, green beans

A closer look at the inside of the banana flower. Those tiny flowers would have turned into bananas.

Annika and Mark concentrating on their chopping and dicing skills. With Angkor beers for the grown-ups and mint syrup and soda for the girls.  :-)

Super fragrant array of fresh spices going into Mark's main dish. I've never seen fresh turmeric before! And yes, it stains everything yellow just as badly as the dried, powdered stuff!!!!

Sam is showing Annika how to make carrot flowers using the vegetable peeler. Funny thing about that veggie peeler – it's Kiwi brand (with kiwi bird as a logo) but it's made in THAILAND. Huh. Do they have kiwi birds in Thailand????

Remember that photo up above with the fragrant array of fresh spices? They all went into this mortar and now Mark is supposed to turn them into a paste.

The paste Mark made in the mortar and pestle is a coating for his chicken.

Time to start the actual cooking: 

Yes, even the girls are going to get a turn cooking on the stove!

Our cute little blondie chefs!

The blue flame! That jar that looks like peanut butter on the right? That's palm sugar. I seriously thought that was peanut butter!

 Annika is going to make our dessert : cooked bananas

Annika practicing her fresh spring roll making skills:

 I even have rice paper at home.  Annika, can you make these for us when we return home????

Nearly done now…and getting kind of hungry! 

Woo hoo!!!! All the dishes are done and we've even cut a banana leaf into a pretty flower shape for decoration. There is SO MUCH FOOD!!! The dishes all tasted phenomenal but there's no way we can eat all this food!!!! I'm STUFFED!

bon appétit!!!!!