Pad Thai Cookery School

I took the sleeper train from Bangkok north to Chiang Mai. I've met many travellers who are smitten with the Northern city and amongst Thai's it holds an almost mythic status. There is a strong contrast between the islands of the South and the North. Although I really enjoyed the South, it does feel more like a beach holiday, than an adventure and I think the area has become far too developed.

This is my bed on the sleeper, without a window I had the strange sensation I was going into space.

I got chatting to an American guy Jesse, at the train station, we were both going to the same guesthouse. I spent my first day wandering around the streets of Chiang Mai, it's a fairly condensed city centre, with the usual number of temples to visit, it's also quite famous for it's night bazaar. You can buy any colour of La Coste polo shirt you want.
I decided to spend my second day in Chiang Mai at the Pad Thai cookery school. I choose this particular school after a rigorous investigation and because Pad Thai is my favourite dish.
Each student is given a menu with a choice of about 20 dishes, from this you choose the six dishes you want to make and at the end of the day you are presented a certificate and a cookery book, so you can actually make all the dishes at home.
Another guest at my guesthouse, Neil (CAN) was signed up to the class and we were collected by a typical open taxi. Along with the other students we were driven to the local produce market, we handed over our choice of dishes and someone bought the ingredients for us. While this was happening our teacher explained all the local produce. All the teachers spoke really good English and had a great sense of humour. On some trips the jokes are a little stale, but here I felt we really got to see some Thai humour, dry and sarcastic.

Class begins at the market.

The Pad Thai Cookery School has a great set up, we were put in groups, depending on which dish we wanted to make. Gathered around a table, we each had a tray of ingredients for the dish and our teacher would make the dish step by step. We would then go over to a cooking station and first watch our teacher and then cook for ourselves.

Making Pad Thai, it took all my will power not to eat the ingredients raw.

The teachers made everything seem so easy and I'm pleased to say I managed to follow the instructions. This is something I normally find hard to do, my mind starts to wander, I stop listening and next minute I have no idea what I'm meant to be doing. Thankfully I'm pleased to report this only happened once or twice during the day.
I made Pad Thai (of course), a mushroom stir fry, a green Thai curry, spring rolls, sticky rice and mango pudding and a fruit salad. As we ate what we made, by the end of the day I needed a wheel barrow just to get out of the class.

Enjoying the results.

Cooking up a storm.

The last dish for me caused the most confusion. We gathered around a small table, ready to make a Thai fruit salad, as usual all our ingredients were in a small tray next to each workstation. There was plenty of fruit, pineapple, mango, papaya (I tried to drop this on the floor - I absolutely hate the stuff), carrot, green beans - wait a minute! Had the kitchen staff become confused? Not according to our teacher. Worse was to come, we added garlic and chillies. Yes to fruit salad. The amazing part? I couldn't taste the papaya.