Amirra

In my previous post I mentioned that I was on a hunt for obscure ethnic restaurants in Bangkok. Well, after a bit of research, I think it's safe to say that it doesn't get much more obscure than my most recent discovery. Amirra is a minuscule, family-run restaurant that serves the food of the African nation of Cameroon.

I was introduced to the restaurant-- in reality more an open dining room -- by Stanley, a Cameroonian football teammate of my buddy Newley. Arriving in the Nana area one recent afternoon, Stanley led us down a narrow alley, up four flights of stairs and past a very domestic living room to a tiny dining room with three tables. We were greeted by the friendly eponymous owner, and Stanley, speaking rapid French, proceeded to order a virtual West African feast. There was haricots:

a beef and kidney bean stew traditionally eaten with deep-fried or steamed plantains. He explained that this is one of the more common street dishes in Cameroun and apologized for the fact it isn't possible to get "real" plantains in Bangkok, claiming that what we were eating were simply bananas.

There was also gumbo:

stewed okra with chicken, as well as a bowl of légumes, stewed greens with beef, a dish not unlike the US soul food staple collard greens. In fact, Newley, who is from South Carolina, noticed several similarities between these dishes and traditional food of America's south. All the vegetable-based dishes were meant to be taken with couscous de Cameroun, a dish not like the Moroccan-style couscous most of us are familiar with, but rather a variant of fufu, the starchy West African staple. Stanley explained that in Cameroon couscous can be made from any available starch, in particular cassava, but here in Bangkok Amirra has to make do with the next best substitute: cornmeal. Everything was accompanied by a deliciously spicy chili sauce called peppée.

Amirra is not the most sophisticated dining experience in Bangkok, and is a bit of a struggle to find, but for hearty eats and mad street cred, there's no comparison. To get to Amirra from Soi 3, enter the street side street that connects to Soi 3/1, and turn right into the sub-Soi that leads to Masjid Nana. Enter the red door on the right and proceed to the 4th floor.

Amirra 4th fl, directly above the 7-Eleven at the intersection of Soi 3 and Thanon Sukhumvit 089 824 7204 Noon-midnight

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New Mabuhay

  I'm currently at work on a piece about obscure ethnic restaurants for the Bangkok pages of CNNGo.  You wouldn't think that other Southeast Asian cuisines would fit in this category, but for some reason, there are remarkably few here in Bangkok, and New Mabuhay is the only place my friend, a Filipina and nearly 30-year resident of Bangkok, knew of that served Filipino food.

Arriving on a lazy Saturday, we ordered adobo, one of the most famous Filipino dishes:

And justifiably so -- this was my first adobo, and I loved the combination of vinegar sourness and black pepper bite. In fact, the dish, with its use of fatty pork and copious shallots, reminded me a lot of Mae Hong Son-style kaeng hang lay.

There was pinakbet:

mixed vegetables fried with shrimp paste. This dish reminded me of a kaeng som without the broth and sourness, or even kaeng paa without the soup and spice.

We meant to order sinigang na pusit, which I was told is a soup of squid in its own ink, but due to a communication error (my own fault; I was speaking Thai when I should have just used English), we got a rather bland dish of veggies fried with squid:

We also forgot to order sinigang na Bangus (fish with sour broth), and that day the restaurant wasn't making relyenong bangus (deep fried stuffed fish), but this is just all the more reason to return.

Continuing my research for the piece, on Wednesday I'll be heading to a Cameroonian restaurant (cheers, Newley!). If anybody has any tips for other obscure cuisines in Bangkok, drop me a comment or an email.

New Mabuhay 1/31 Soi 19, Thanon Phetchaburi, Bangkok 02 255 2689 8.30am-10pm

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Sam Chuk Market

After lunch at Mae Buay, we headed north to Suphanburi's Sam Chuk Market. The market, which was recently recognised by UNESCO for its efforts in conservation and preservation, is today a popular tourist destination among Thais, despite apparently nearly having died a decade ago. It's located along the banks of Tha Jeen River, and is comprised of several well-preserved wooden buildings, some of which are over 100 years-old. It's touristy, but in the Thai sense, which means that the emphasis is on food. You'll find lots of central Thai-style curries, salted eggs, chili dips, sweets, noodles and old-skool coffee shops. To view a slideshow of images from Sam Chuk Market, click on the image above and use keyboard arrows or hold your mouse above the images to navigate through them. (On the nerd front, these images have been edited using Adobe Lightroom on my new iMac. This is my first time using the programme, so you can expect to see some variation in quality among images until I get the hang of it.)

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Mae Buay

When I find myself in an unfamiliar province somewhere in Thailand and am in need of something to eat, my first course of action is typically to call Suthon Sukphisit. Khun Suthon writes the Cornucopia column that runs every Sunday in the Bangkok Post and is a wealth of knowledge about regional Thai food and interesting restaurants. In fact, I think Khun Suthon has been so many restaurants around Thailand that he's beginning to get them mixed up. On a recent trip to Suphanburi, a province about two hours north of Bangkok, I called Khun Suthon to ask if he had any recommendations and without hesitation he replied, "You should go to Paa Muay, it's in Pang Plaa Maa District, just outside Suphanburi." I made a mental note and headed off to Bang Plaa Maa, only to find that there was no Paa Muay, but rather the almost identically-named restaurants Phii Muay, Paa Muay (different tone) and Mae Buay. Not wanting to bother Khun Suthon any more, we placed our bets on Mae Buay, grandest of the lot. And although I haven't yet confirmed it with Khun Suthon, I'm pretty sure we made the right choice.

If you can read Thai, the best thing you can do in provincial restaurants is to order straight from the list of recommended dishes, usually the first page of the menu. Mae Buay's recommended dishes included mee krob, shown above. Unusually, the dish included egg and was garnished with crispy pork rinds. The slightly sweet noodles were great tamed by the crispy/sour/sweet sides of pickled garlic and Chinese chives.

There was hor mok plaa chon:

a 'steamed curry', as David Thompson likes to call it, of snakehead fish. Slightly spicier than most, creamy from coconut milk and revolving around freshwater fish, the dish exemplified central Thai flavours and ingredients.

There was phat chaa plaa maa:

a central Thai-style spicy stir-fry using the somewhat coarse freshwater fish that is the district's namesake. Although oily, I love this dish particularly for its typically generous amount of garlic and green peppercorns, ingredients typically used in an effort to mask 'strong' tasting meat or fish.

And finally there was the sour soup, tom som plaa khang:

Unlike the more popular sour Thai soup tom yam, tom som is made tart by the addition of dried/salted plum and young ginger. The plum provides the soup's sourness with a salty undertone, and coupled with the very fresh freshwater fish, the dish was the perfect bookend to a delicious, balanced central Thai meal.

Thanks, Khun Suthon.

Mae Buay 44 Moo 5, Bang Plaa Maa District, Suphanburi 035 587 077

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Café Ou Mun

I was originally drawn to Café Ou Mun, a tiny café in central Macau, for little more than an early morning galão (the Portuguese equivalent of a café au lait) and a pastry. But the quality of the food led me to make a few more visits, including one proper meal.

At first glance, the emphasis at Café Ou Mun is on sweets:

And not only do they look great, but they were some of the tastiest desserts I've encountered in a long time. My hands-down favourite was the sweet pictured at the top of this post, tijelada. Translated as Portuguese egg pudding, tijelada is a wonderfully eggy and barely-sweet pastry that I later tried to recreate at home with disastrous results (go here for an interesting video, narrated in Portuguese, about making tijeladas the traditional way).

However in addition to sweets, Café Ou Mun also serves a few prepared savoury snacks, including pastéis de bacalhau, the famous Portuguese salt cod croquettes:

not to mention an à la carte menu of traditional Portuguese dishes. Stopping by for dinner one night, we started with a salad-like appetizer of octopus:

served with olive oil and pickled minced onion. I ordered bacalhau à brás:

salt cod (bacalhau) sauteed with shoestring potatoes, onions and egg. Café Ou Mun's version was a bit gloopy and heavy, but I've enjoyed the dish on previous occasions, and while in Macau picked up some bacalhau and plan to make the dish myself, following this recipe. And finally there was porco à Alentejana:

the famous dish of cubes of pork marinated in white wine before being braised with clams and served with deep-fried potatoes and parsley.

The main courses perhaps weren't as impressive as the phenomenal pastries, but Café Ou Mun is a great place for a snack or a simple meal. Wish we had a branch here in Bangkok...

Café Ou Mun 12 Travessa de São Domingos, Macau +853 2837 2207 8am-11pm Tues-Sun

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Another stab at dim sum

Despite my previous tirade, I was still willing to subject myself to more dim sum.  This was partly for nostalgic reasons, as I wanted to revisit a dim sum restaurant in Macau that I remembered from a previous visit.

Beginning at the Ruínas de São Paulo and wandering along hilly lanes until we reached the beautiful Jardim de Luís de Camões, I spotted the restaurant and we stepped in. The choices appeared a bit more diverse than those at restaurants I'd encountered in Hong Kong:

and actually included some vegetables. Beginning at 1 o'clock and moving clockwise, there was steamed fish balls, deep-fried wontons, eggplant with a fish paste filling, steamed pork-filled buns, firm tofu stuffed with pork, and in the middle, fish head with black beans. Unfortunately it was a bit of a cold morning and most dishes chilled upon arrival, but we kept warm with hot tea:

Unfortunately the food was not quite as tasty as I remembered, and as a frustrating but appropriate footnote to my dim sum experience,  I suspect that the red fish balls gave me one of the worst cases of upset stomach I've had in years.

Regardless, if you're willing to risk it, the restaurant is located near the entrance to Jardim de Luís de Camões:

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Riquexó

Those wishing to taste the true flavours of old Macau can do no better than stop by Riquexó, a restaurant serving Macanese cuisine, a blend of Portuguese, Chinese, and on occasion, Southeast Asian ingredients and cooking styles.

The restaurant is still run by its original owner, Aida Jesus:

who despite being in her mid-90s, continues to look after Riquexó on a daily basis and, on occasion, even contributes dishes herself, such as xarope de figo, a sweet drink made from fig leaves. Besides being one of the few interested in preserving the culinary heritage of Macau, Dona Aida is also apparently one of the only remaining native speakers of Pátua, an old dialect of Portuguese that was previously spoken in the former Portuguese colony.

As the sign (above) suggests, Riquexó is self-service, and in fact is more like a cafeteria. You queue up, point to whatever looks good, and a tray will be brought to you.

Scanning the day’s offerings I immediately ordered capela:

I’d read about this traditional Macanese meat loaf, but had never previously tried it. The dish was rich and well seasoned, and the steamed greens were a perfect accompaniment. The cheesy crust and minced olives were signs of the dish’s Portuguese origins, and accompanied by rice and a cold Sagres, it was my favourite part of the meal.

We also ordered a dish of feijoada:

the bean stew that is also the unofficial national dish of Brazil, another former Portuguese colony. Riquexó’s feijoada featured a thick broth, the result of using a pig foot, and was supplemented with cubes of pork, carrots and cabbage.

And finally we ordered what is probably the most beloved Macanese dish of all, minchi:

Paradoxically, the dish has little resemblance to anything Portuguese or Chinese, and the name is most likely a corruption of the English word “minced”, but according to Célia Jorge, author of À Mesa da Diáspora, a book on Macanese cuisine, minchi single handedly embodies comfort food for people of mixed Portuguese and Chinese heritage. The dish combines minced beef (or pork, or a blend of the two) wok-fried with little more than onions and two types of soy sauce, and is served over rice or cubes of deep-fried potatoes with, on occasion, a fried egg. I’ve made it at home on a couple occasions and was particularly excited to try the ‘real’ version, which to be honest, wasn't quite as tasty when served at room temperature.

Additional information about Riquexó and Aida Jesus is available in this article, which also has a recipe for capela.

Riquexó 69 Avenida Sidónio Pais, Macau +853 2856 5655 Noon-10pm

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A Bangkok soup vendor's working day

  Art critic and mate Steven Pettifor has put together this photo essay for the BBC on a day in the life of a Bangkok soup vendor.

Margaret's Café e Nata

Despite having owned the place for five centuries, the Portuguese influence on Macau is actually quite superficial. The Macau of today is essentially a very Chinese city with a few Portuguese-style buildings, a very small minority of people of Portuguese descent, a handful of Portuguese restaurants and an abundance of azulejos (Portuguese blue tiles). Fortunately Macau is rather compact, so for those interested, seeking out the remnants of Portuguese culture, particularly those that are edible, is not difficult. And perhaps the most ubiquitous and tastiest remnant of the Portuguese colonial legacy are pastéis de nata, or more commonly in Macau, Portuguese egg tarts.

Having been denied the gene that grants one the ability to bake, I would never even dream of attempting making them at home, and am thus limited to eating them when I'm in Macau (although there is a decent vendor of the sweet here in Bangkok that I'll blog about soon). And although they're available just about everywhere nowadays, I'm partial to Margaret's:

The shop appears to be one of the more popular vendors, particularly among tourists, and I spend a few minutes here virtually every day I'm in Macau. If you're willing to put up with the mediocre coffee, they do an excellent egg tart (pictured above): flaky, buttery (I've read that the original version was made with lard), expertly scorched and not overtly sweet.

Margaret's Café e Nata Gum Loi Building, off Avenida do Infante Dom Henrique, Macau +853 710 032

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Lin Heung Tea House

I've always liked the idea of dim sum -- countless small Chinese dishes served with an endless flow of green tea (one of my favourite things to drink) sounds wonderful to me -- but I'd yet to encounter a version that I truly enjoyed. My first authentic dim sum meals in Macau and Malaysia were fun, but too meaty and oily for my taste, while much of the dim sum I've come across in Thailand has been processed and flavourless (in addition to being meaty and oily). I thought for sure that I would finally meet my fantasy dim sum in Hong Kong, a city virtually synonymous with the dish, and to a certain extent, I did. In Lin Heung Tea House I found a restaurant that fit my preconceived notion of how a dim sum place should be: a great old hall complete with grumpy waiters, creaking trolleys, old men reading newspapers, lazy ceiling fans and lots of cigarette smoke and tea. But as with previous attempts, I was let down by the food.

Don't get me wrong; there was nothing wrong with the dim sum at Lin Heung Tea House, but the dishes were just as meaty, oily and heavy as those I'd had before. Arriving late one afternoon we were given some of the restaurant's 'special' dishes: shown above at 6 o'clock is fish maw and minced pork wrapped in tofu skin and steamed, at 9 o'clock a type of pig stomach, at 12 o'clock a type of sweet bun called 'Malaysian cake', and at 3 o'clock, pork liver fried in an oily garlic sauce. The volume of meat and oil made the cleansing properties of extremely strong tea a necessity:

and effectively marked the end of my search: dim sum is what it is, and I should stop looking for a salad in a steak house.

Lin Heung Tea House 160-164 Wellington Street, Hong Kong +852 544 4556

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Yung Kee

  In 2008 the Michelin guide expanded its borders to include Hong Kong and Macau. This gained quite a bit of attention in the international media, as the influential guide had previously limited itself to fine dining in Western countries. This apparently also generated a great deal of interest in Hong Kong, as in an effort to promote the accomplishment, I was taken to two Michelin-starred restaurants on my recent press trip there. Of these, the restaurant that stands out the most in my mind is Yung Kee, a nearly 60 year-old Hong Kong staple and recent recipient of a single Michelin star.

Unfortunately, we arrived at Yung Kee at the end of a day in which I'd probably eaten more than any previous in my life. In the space of a few hours we'd been to a Japanese buffet, an old-school dim sum restaurant and now this. But the food at Yung Kee was so good, I somehow found a way to make room.

Yung Kee's most famous dish by far is its roast goose:

I'm not a huge fan of duck or goose in general, but enjoyed this well enough -- it was pleasantly meaty, oily, crispy and tender. But I was more blown away by Yung Kee's dictionary perfect stir-fried dishes, which due to our somewhat uncollaborative ordering, comprised the remainder of our meal. These included Shredded chicken with chili:

the chili in this case actually a very mild bell pepper, which like all of the restaurant's ingredients, was expertly and attractively sliced, and like all vegetables to follow, was perfectly fried, retaining all of its fresh crispiness. There was Chinese sausage fried with kai lan:

the sausages, which I think were a mixture of pork and goose liver, were on the waxy side, as Chinese sausages typically are, but again this was a masterpiece of deft stir-frying and subtle-yet-adequate seasoning. Sauteed sliced beef and vegetable was similar:

although here, for me at least, it was the meat the stood out. The beef appeared to have been pounded until tender and marinated, giving it a nearly fall-apart texture and a pleasantly salty flavour. Again, the technique took the forefront here, and the beef was simultaneously just-cooked and partially singed. Our final stir-fry was eggplant flash-fried with crab meat:

I can't imagine this dish involved more than five ingredients (eggplant, crab meat, salt, oil and perhaps a bit of corn starch), but was wonderful: smokey, well-seasoned and relatively un-oily -- everything a good stir-fried dish should be.

Reeling from having consumed so much food, I sat back and looked around the restaurant and noticed that, despite the accolades, Yung Kee appeared more or less like any other upscale-ish restaurant in Asia: there were a few tourists, but most diners appeared to be middle-to-upper-class locals, including several families. The dining room was boisterous and service was equal parts professional and informal. It struck me that this is exactly what a lauded restaurant should be like -- excellent food that everybody can enjoy without the baggage of formality and snobbery. I can't wait for the chance go back to Yung Kee on an empty stomach and try a greater repertoire of dishes.

Yung Kee 32-40 Wellington Street, Hong Kong +852 2522 1624 www.yungkee.com.hk 11am-11.30pm

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Nathan Congee and Noodle

While in Hong Kong I got the chance to eat at some Michelin-starred restaurants (one of which I'll blog on soon) and a few other similarly upscale places, but to be honest, what I really wanted to do was eat what regular Hong Kong people eat. I finally got my chance at Nathan Congee and Noodle, a closet-sized restaurant in Kowloon.

The place is allegedly famous with local foodies, but also apparently has a reputation among visitors, as the menu was written in, of all languages, Thai:

We started with a few classic Hong Kong-style side dishes, such as kai lan with oyster sauce:

jellyfish salad with 1000 year-old eggs:

and lettuce with oyster sauce:

But the emphasis here is congee, made to order by a man in a small booth:

I ordered a bowl of fishball congee (shown at the top of this post), and like the bowls of the stuff I've encountered in Thailand, it was pleasantly bland, blandly pleasant, inoffensive stuff. I've never been a huge fan of congee, but can see why others like it, and by all standards, this was a pretty good bowl. I particularly liked the crispy deep-fried fingers of dough, which unlike other places, were still crispy.

Despite it not being the most delicious meal of my trip, I probably found it the most memorable, simply because it seemed representative of what people in Hong Kong really liked to eat, and didn't involve foam.

Nathan Congee and Noodle 11 Saigon Street, Kowloon, Hong Kong 2771 4285 7.30am-11.30pm

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Hong Kong and Macau

Chefs at work in the kitchen of the InterContinental Hong Kong's Chinese restaurant

I apologise for my silence -- I've spent the last several days in Hong Kong (my first time there) and Macau (my third) and have had no time to blog. I'll be posting on some of the more interesting things I saw and ate in these two places over the next few days.

Jay 2009

  I'm a bit late on relaying this, but Thailand's annual Jay or vegetarian festival is currently is full swing. I've made a couple trips to Bangkok's Chinatown, the centre of activity, and I can report with confidence that the offerings are as vegetable-free and oily as ever:

Although, at least as far as I'm aware, there have never been claims that the food sold during the vegetarian festival includes vegetables or is supposed to be healthy, I'm shocked at how overwhelmingly veggie-free and deep-fried, and how eerily meat-like the offerings are (is going without meat for 10 days really so difficult that it necessitates the invention of mock pork intestines?). A more accurate name for the event would be the Deep-Fried Fake Meat and Carbohydrate festival. I also find it fascinating that an event with apparent origins in sacrifice and asceticism has instead become an exercise in gluttonous indulgence. But I'd be a hypocrite to slag off anything with copious amounts of food as a central tenet, particularly when this is the only time of the year when I can get freshly-made khanom tub tap. This is a sweet made by pounding syrup and peanuts into a flaky shell (the process of which is pictured at the top of this post), which then is stretched and rolled around more ground peanuts -- the Asian version of a Butterfinger candy bar.

Enjoy the meat-free fun until Tuesday, October 29. But if it's veggies you're looking for, I'd suggest staying at home and fixing yourself a nice salad.

Pok Pok on Diners, Drive-ins and Dives

More Thai food-related a/v content: Portland, Oregon restaurant Pok Pok was recently featured on the US television programme, Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives. Some brilliant recipes to be had, and I love how it's raining every time they step outside. I miss Oregon...

"it just tastes bloody good"

Apparently the primary appeal of Thai food according to Australian chef David Thompson. My buddy Newley Purnell interviewed Thompson at Bangkok's recent World Gourmet Festival and put together this audio slideshow of the meeting for CNNGo Bangkok, a recently-launched website that I've also contributed to.

Phai Kiaw

  Phai Kiaw ('Green Bamboo') is, as far as I'm aware, the only place in Bangkok where one can get Sichuan-style hot pot. It's not as delicious as the huo guo I've encountered in China, but is a fair approximation, and a welcome change from MK or Coca (the preeminent Thai hot pot chains). The broth at Phai Khiaw is possibly even oilier and spicier than I remember it being in China, but Phai Khiaw's ingredients are on the whole probably better, and on my most recent visit (pictured above) we also ordered several other Chinese dishes and everything was quite tasty indeed.

At the end of the meal, and to our surprise, our buddy W pulled out a bottle of absinthe. We dug in, and Phai Khiaw's Burmese/Chinese staff didn't seem to notice, let alone mind, that we were in their restaurant burning sugar on suspicious-looking spoons:

It was my first time drinking the stuff, and the picture below, depicting the tuk tuk ride to our next destination, pretty much sums up the night:

Or was it the Sichuan pepper?

Phai Khiaw Ground floor, Silom Plaza (corner Th Silom & Th Narathiwat) 02 635 2724, 085 699 2277

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Piang Kee

Piang Kee is both the most noteworthy and quirkiest restaurant I've come across in Bangkok in a long while. For starters, the Chinatown-based restaurant specialises in Hakka Chinese dishes, a relative rarity here in Bangkok. The restaurant itself is unabashedly old-school, and the lovely middle-aged couple who have run the place for the last few decades are still incredibly enthusiastic about what they do. And to round it off, Piang Kee is both rather difficult to find and maintains inconvenient opening times, at least for those who would like to visit for dinner.

I had heard about the restaurant on a Thai television programme, and with a bit of help, was eventually able to track it down. The photos below constitute two separate visits to Piang Kee, the first with the clever food researcher who was kind enough to find the restaurant for me, and the second with Bo and Dylan of Bangkok buzz restaurant Bo.lan, and David and P'Tong from London's Michelin-starred Nahm:

On both visits we ordered the dishes shown at the top of this post, stuffed tofu served in a broth seasoned with khao maak, fermented rice, and 'drunken' chicken. The former is my favourite dish, mostly because of the broth, which is made salty and red from the addition of the fermented rice, an unusual ingredient used in several dishes here. The chicken is tender and silky and made fragrant and slightly tart by the addition of the rice wine.

Another house specialty is deep-fried stuffed tofu skins:

These are deliciously crispy, and like many dishes here, are filled with a mixture of minced pork and dried squid that has been dry roasted and minced. They're served, also like just about everything here, with a specific dipping sauce, in this case a syrupy plum sauce.

The house dipping sauce, on the other hand:

is a simple mixture of fresh chilies and salt that is left to ferment overnight. It's amazing stuff that's pleasantly spicy and sour, and the owners suggest it as a dipping sauce to the tofu and chicken dishes above.

Another dish associated with the restaurant is dumplings made from daikon and carrot and supplemented with dried shrimp:

The shrimp provide the dish with a briny taste and the thick soy sauce dip provides a sweet counterpoint, although in general I found the dumplings to be a bit gloopy and heavy.

A must-order dish is the pork belly served over preserved greens:

The meat has a subtle smokiness and is fall-apart tender, and I really enjoyed the slightly crispy re-hydrated spinach.

On one visit there was a dish of sliced pork belly:

a specific type of pork belly, according to the owner, and served chilled over bean sprouts with a tart/spicy dressing.

One of my favourite dishes at Piang Kee is goat braised in red sauce:

extremely meaty and rich, with a subtle herbal flavour. As is the case elsewhere in Chinatown, the dish is served with a thin dipping sauce based around dried galangal.

The couple do their own perfectly-seasoned fishballs, made from plaa kray, a type of freshwater fish:

and a very unusual stir-fry of lettuce and the ubiquitous khao maak:

Somebody ordered kaeng jeut, normally a predominately salty broth:

but in this case both salty, from pork and dried squid dumplings, and aggressively tart, from the used of dried plum.

And fermented rice was employed yet again in this stir-fry of thin rice noodles and pork:

A dish that was rather bland on its own, but wonderful when taken with a bit of the wonderful chili sauce.

The restaurant normally closes at 6pm, but if you want to have a slightly later dinner and can speak Thai (or Hakka), call ahead and I imagine you'll find that they're normally willing to accommodate.

Piang Kee Trok Wat Kuson Samakhon (off Th Ratchawong, across from Grand China Princess Hotel) 02 221 6024, 086 832 8849 11am-6pm

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Four Seasons Bangkok WGF10: Fulvio Siccardi

Chef Fulvio Siccardi shaving truffles at the Four Seasons Bangkok World Gourmet Festival

Chef Fulvio Siccardi was born in Turin in the Piedmont area of north-western Italy in 1969.

Since 2004 he has been owner and Chef of Ristorante Conti Roero at Monticello d’Alba, where he received his second Michelin star. His dinner for the Four Seasons Bangkok World Gourmet Festival was classically Italian, combining simple but high-quality ingredients with an emphasis on the tastes and ingredients of the country's north.

Our starter combined peppery pastrami-like sheets of beef, crispy greens and a rich mustard sauce:

Chef Fulvio Siccardi's Lightly smoked marinated beef tenderloin with grain mustard and chives emulsion

all of which were (generously) supplemented by truffles, shaved just before service by the chef himself (shown at the top of this post).

Our second course, which Siccardi calls alternatively Egg in jail or Vertical egg, is the his signature meal, and was quite possibly my favourite single course of the entire festival:

Chef Fulvio Siccardi's Egg in jail

The full name of the dish is Egg with black truffle, scented Parmesan and milk sauce, and these ingredients are combined in a special kind of heat-resistant plastic bag and baked at approximately 450F for seven minutes. To eat, we untied our bags, added the crispy croutons:

Egg in jail

and using a spoon, scooped out every last bit. The eggs were rich and creamy, and had a wonderful Parmesan pungency that I can still recall clearly the next day.

This was followed by a very northern Italian gnocchi with a rich ragu:

Chef Fulvio Siccardi's Potato gnocchi with bra sausage and veal ragu

The next course we had previously encountered at the Gala Dinner, although this version was supplemented with chanterelle mushrooms:

Chef Fulvio Siccardi's Carmelized vinegar goose leg with Belgium endive and chanterelle mushroom

The chef explained that with this dish he's attempted to combine all off the basic flavours: bitter from the endive, sweet and sour from the carmelized vinegar sauce and meaty and salty via the mushrooms and goose. Siccardi told us that the goose leg was cooked for several hours confit-style, but to our surprise the meat had none of the crispiness or stickiness associated with this method of cooking, and could easily have passed as sous-vide.

Dessert was three variations on yet another northern Italian dish, panna cotta:

Chef Fulvio Siccardi's Panna cotta trilogy

the version on the left was a seriously impossibly light cream topped with a delicious salty caramel -- it was probably my favourite dessert course of the entire festival -- while the panna cotta in the centre was supplemented with hazelnuts in the traditional manner.

Fulvio will be hosting his final dinner at the Four Seasons Bangkok tonight, October 11. Some of the events are already sold out, so if you’re in Bangkok and interested, act fast. Call the Four Seasons at +66 (0) 2 126 8866, or email the hotel at wgf.bangkok@fourseasons.com.

Four Seasons Bangkok WGF10: Gala Dinner

At the Four Seasons Bangkok World Gourmet Festival's Gala Dinner

Friday night was the Four Seasons Bangkok World Gourmet Festival's Gala Dinner.

Each of the chefs involved in the event prepared a dish for the occasion. Some, such as Chef Christine Manfield, served a variation on her dish served a few nights earlier:

Chef Christine Manfield's Woodbridge smoked ocean trout, tea smoked oysters, blood sausage, celeriac and apple salad

while others, such as foie gras king Michael Ginor, created a dish specifically for the event:

Michael Ginor's Citrus butter poached lobster with sea beans and potato cream

If the above doesn't already sound rich enough, Ginor's dish was then garnished with flakes of foie gras that had been cured in kelp:

Chef David Kinch providing a foie gras garnish at the Four Seasons Bangkok World Gourmet Festival's Gala Dinner

Behind the scenes, there was a surprising amount of cooperation between the chefs:

Inside the kitchen at the Four Seasons Bangkok World Gourmet Festival's Gala Dinner

such as American chef David Kinch helping Japanese chef Kazumi Sawada prepare the latter's deep-fried conger eel. There was also equally as much discipline, both in preparation and in service:

Dinner service at the Four Seasons Bangkok World Gourmet Festival's Gala Dinner

And the night ended with pastry chef Francois Payard's chocolate-centric creation:

Chef Francois Payard's Palet d'or with hot and cold chocolate

and several glasses of Yamazaki malt whisky from Japan.