| Dear Food Lover |
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| Banh chung is a glutinous rice "cake" stuffed with sugary pork and mung beans, tightly wrapped in banana leaves, |
| and boiled 8 hours. In Vietnam, it's the traditional celebratory food for New Year. Unctuous pork fat surprises westerners tasting this treat for the first time -- an unusual combo of sweet and savory. |
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 Mark your calendars now for our next two Globetrotting Gourmet® food tours to Asia: Northern Vietnam July 12-22 '09, and China's Yunnan mid January '10. |
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• FESTIVALS |
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| What 's called Chinese New Year in the West, is known as Tet Nguyen-Den in Vietnamese, and Spring Festival in China. Dates change annually on the lunar calendar, and next year it falls on Valentine's Day. Confusingly held mid winter, it actually celebrates the advent of spring sowing. While not a national holiday in Mekong countries outside of China and Vietnam, the festival reigns supreme throughout the Chinese diaspora. |
Morrison and Robert were in China's Yunnan for this year's lead up, and in Thailand we spotted popular royal princess Sirindhorn opening the festival in Yaowarat, Bangkok's Chinatown district. This is a time of out-with-the-old and in-with-the-new, and families reunite over food and presents.
FESTIVALS >>>
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• VIETNAM & YUNNAN |
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JULY 2009 Our next Globetrotting Gourmet® adventure tours Northern Vietnam, where we reunite with celebratory chef Didier Corlou and top guide Vu Minh Tho, who hosted improbably edible programs for Vietnam TV2 and also with bizarre supremo Andrew Zimmern on US cable.
We're offering an add-on dinner to Le Mat village, where you can sample "traditional" foods like cobra -- but that evening is strictly optional!!! DAILY ITINERARY >>> |
| Our July northern Vietnam trip also includes market tour and cooking class with Chef Corlou, and rarefied dining at Le Verticale in Hanoi, which deftly fuses French ingredients with Vietnamese flavors. |
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| (To paraphrase Brillat-Savarin, the man who invents a new dish accomplishes more than one who discovers a new planet.) Examples: grilled duck foie gras with lemongrass; spring roll with truffles; caramelized cream with young rice. Personally, we can't go beyond Corlou's extraordinary combo of curried clams with globe artichokes. Pure ambrosia. Recently, Globetrotting Gourmet® took groups to other Corlou-inspired restaurants: l'Escale des Arts et des Sens in Siem Reap, Cambodia; and On the 6 in Ho Chi Minh City. We can say Didier has truly evolved into one of the world's great chefs. www.didiercorlou.com |
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Attending IACP Denver: see our Showcase stand Friday 3 April.
We're also exhibiting at Good Food Melbourne, May 5-8
& Good Food Sydney July 3-5; both events open to general public. |
JANUARY 2010 China continues to rate high interest from our readers, consequently Globetrotting Gourmet® plans a Yunnan tour in mid January, '10. Register your interest now for early bird specials: contact us
Boasting the most diverse ethnic groups in all of China, its cuisine is varied -- and delicious! Yunnan is proclaimed "China's most beautiful province" and its capital city Kunming for "eternal spring" climate. It certainly boasts China's bluest winter skies, and January is a beautiful time to visit without the domestic Chinese tourist onslaught. The country is also revving up for Chinese New Year, so shopping is never better. We'll also visit Shilin's stone forest of eroded limestone pinnacles; ancient Dali; plus Unesco heritage listed Lijiang; and neighboring mountain villages bordering Tibet.
CHINA ITINERARY >>> |
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• TRUFFLES & BANDICOOTS |
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Truffles save bandicoots from extinction is not quite the spin from this story. But close… First it was pigs, then dogs, and now add Australian marsupials to the list of keen truffle sniffers....
READ MORE... |
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• BEST & WORST LISTS |
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| How to be a great international ambassador while travelling overseas: eat local foods, learn foreign expressions, pick up in your hotel, and dress fashionably, so say the gurus at Expedia. |
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• RESPONSIBLE TOURISM |
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"Every kind of existing tourism operation can become Sustainable Tourism if tourism managers take responsibility for the destinations social-cultural and natural environment."
Order your
free booklet from consirv@tat.or.th
Globetrotting Gourmet® is committed to sustainable and responsible tourism, and donate a portion of our proceeds after every tour >>> |
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• SHOPPING THERAPY |
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We love vast and chichi Paragon mall in Bangkok www.siamparagon.co.th especially its huge Kinokuniya and Asia bookstores with their massive range of English-language books. Even more overjoyed to see latest reprint of Robert's book, Thai Home Cooking, on the store's bestselling non-fiction list. It's still selling strong after 5 years continuous publication.
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| Don't miss Paragon's basement food hall -- teeming tropical fruit and vegetable stands, and regional Thai promotions. This is a foodie mecca, including The Orient Hotel's bakery & deli; and Lenotre pastry shop. (On last visit, its macroons disappointing.) And our favorite: Spice Story. We regularly stock up on their jars filled variously with brown cardamom, star anise, cloves, allspice. And we're won us over by Thai ground cinnamon sold by the litre, which we now buy regularly as gifts. spicestory@artchit.com |
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• RESTAURANTS BANGKOK |
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| Café Chilli. There's several prestige eateries in Paragon, but we keep hearing about www.cafechilli.com. What's all the fuss? Redefining peasant Isan cooking for Bangkok's hi-so (= High Society in Thai lingua) is one thing, but from the moment we scanned the menu, 'twas apparent there's damn little northeastern here. Call it fusion, call it mismatch. Whatever, the translations fail, abysmally. We have Thai friends who disagree, mind you. |
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Ruen Urai. Tucked away in a labyrinth near Bangkok's Patpong market, this century-old traditional teak house was transported to its present location, adjacent to The Rose hotel, and neighboring Montien. While left cold by the small rooms at The Rose, we relished the atmosphere of its Ruen Urai restaurant. Downstairs is modern Thai, sumptuously overlooking the hotel's wee glamour pool, but upstairs its strictly Spartan teak and Thai traditional. Tasty food, and well recommended. www.rosehotelbkk.com |
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• BOOKS |
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| We're so enamored by Fuchsia Dunlop's latest memoirs Shark's Fin & Sichuan Pepper that we went out & bought her other volumes, Sichuan Cookery, & Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook. Ever since acquiring our copy of Henry Chung's Hunan Style Chinese Cookbook some 30 years ago, we've been fans of this regional fare. Alarmingly, Dunlop's memoirs of Hunan are not as complimentary as her earlier life in Sichuan. Prickly ash, by the way, is the cause of the mouth-numbing tingly feeling when eating Southwest & central Chinese food. It's other name: Sichuan pepper. |
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| We gobble up cooking encyclopedias, so relished our copy of Edible, the illustrated guide to the world's food plants. Even better, one of our favorite food historians, Barbara Santich, is its principal consultant. Our only quibble: alternative names omit North American usage. Rocket, for example, ignores its Italian and American namesake arugula. |
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Cassia is given short shift, and grades of cinnamon bark vs. inner quills ignored. As for pepper, red-ripened pepper is actually black pepper grown an additional 8-9 days on the vine until red hued. Only a few berries can be cultivated from each strand, lest it stop fruiting. Not to be confused with pink or red peppercorns, which are sumac and not pepper at all. Cameron House (Australia), A$39.95. |
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| Lucio's Ligurian Kitchen, by Lucio Galletto and David Dale. How does one say "no" to yet another Italian cookbook clamouring for space on an already crowded bookshelf? Easy, when Better Crocker writes it! Mercifully, not all Italian tomes are so facile, versus deliciously simple. Lucio's restaurant is a Sydney institution, and we're always impressed by co-author Dale's passion and expertise in food. But what's different in this book from some two dozen others |
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| vying for attention? Frankly, a lot -- and especially the recipes' easy, timely freshness so geared for this decade. Not so easy, but fulfilling: Lucio's complex mint ice cream cake with chocolate fudge. Allen & Unwin (Australia), A$65. |
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France's gastronomic guidebook has found its way to Hong Kong and Macau. The Michelin Guide of the former colonies lists 251 restaurants and hotels, with eight places receiving its highest three-star rating. Following last year's controversial Japan edition, we hear Beijing and Shanghai are next. www.michelinguide.com In Europe, Michelin's 100th edition just came out, with French president Nicolas Sarkozy’s favorite chef, Eric Frechon of The Bristol, the only new chef promoted to three-star elite. |
| While Michelin reaches for stars, humble hawker fare rates rice bowls and chopsticks in Asia. There's hardly a better city for cheap eats than Singapore, and its food courts are excellently covered in the city-state's www.makansutra.com. We're doubly delighted about the '09 premier of Makansutra Beijing. In these austere economic times, we suspect this street food guide may outsell Michelin. |
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• CAMBODIA |
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It took us several visits to warm to the place, but we now adore Cambodia's capital Phnom Penh, with the exception of its congested traffic. The city feels safer, and its art scene taking off. An overwhelming highlight of our latest trip was a tour led by passionate architectural students. Traveling by trishaw (a three wheeled bicycle with chaise longue at back), members stood in awe of simple things like steel girders imported from France at the turn of the century, and balustrades carved from a single trunk of ancient teak. We also toured decaying temples and cathedrals now turned into shanty dormitories. Sadly, many sites are slated for imminent demolition. With Phnom Penh housing prices jumping ten fold in just two years, pressure by moneyed builders is just too great a temptation. Likewise, city parks are mysteriously rezoned as "state-private development zones." Schedule your architectural tour through www.ka-tours.org And, ask for our friend Sokly! |
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• HOTEL RAVES |
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| In December Robert & Morrison stayed at Bangkok's Chaophaya Park hotel. We loved its adjoining spa facilities -- large enough to cater to groups of 40 or more at a time with great Thai massage -- and we were especially impressed with the hotel's Green Initiative. Vacant land near the adjoining golf driving range is now grows organic vegetables for the hotel's five restaurants, with the remainder packaged and sold under the Park Organic Veggies label. There's also a mushroom nursery surrounded by herbaceous shrubs of kale, celery, cucumber, lettuce, spinach. The hotel offers free walking tours. www.chaophyapark.com |
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| Paying by the hour for a room has many connotations, but for an airport hotel, it makes perfect sense. Novotel Suvarnabhumi launches an hourly tariff, with a minimum of two hours. Just a short shuttle to the airport, and its restaurants are exceptional -- no surprise, considering the many banquets hosted here by Thai Airways for visiting big wigs. >>> |
| Vie opened its Bangkok doors in mid December, and we luxuriated in one of the best hotel beds we've slept in for years! Bathrooms extravagant, almost vulgarly large, with hefty plate glass doors that require a Muscle Mary to swing. MORE >>> Although we visited during "soft opening" phase, breakfast was interminably slow, and expensive in-room wi-fi prompted us to check out after only one day. But we're eager to return -- especially as the hotel's new GM assures us that internet pricing is being re-studied. |
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Which leads to our next blurb: hotel internet is now free in ALL Shangri-La and Traders hotels, worldwide. Their reason: with more tourists traveling with a laptop these days, internet is considered a standard amenity rather than a purchased luxury. More likely: competition from boutique hotels, which freely connect. This is one of our pet bugaboos (next to expensive hotel ice buckets!) but sales execs retort that business travelers are on expense accounts, so the added charge is no problem. Huh???? |
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5 stars is the traditional rating for best hotel category, but as standards and amenities rise, so do ratings. Sofitel recently launched an upgraded 5-star plus status, while conversely re-branding some two thirds of its former livery to Pullman and Grand Mercure. And now the advent of 7 stars begins with Burj Al Arab (Tower of the Arabs) in Dubai, and Fairmont's Hainan island property in China. Unfortunately, there is no global organization mandating star standards. Conversely, why do restaurant guides adopt the Gault Millau standard of 1-20 ratings, when even 11 is considered abysmal failure? Fancy a 20-star hotel, anyone?
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• FLYING HIGH |
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| We've previously written about the Airbus A380 but were surprised to hear complaints that it's too quiet! According to Flight International, Emirate pilots suffer onboard sleep deprivation because the plane's silent engines don't drown out passenger noise. Even earplugs don't work. One option: installing machines to generate ambient noise in the crew-rest area. More sensible is the track taken by Singapore & Qantas: their crew retire behind the cockpit, the area where Emirates now puts its First Class cabin. Emirates staff sleep back of the bus. |
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American Airlines introduces "cashless cabins" on all U.S. & Canada flights. As of June, flight attendants will only accept credit- and debit cards for headsets, snacks and alcohol. Seems this will speed up cabin service, as attendants will no longer need to search for spare change. But with so little service already, what will the crew do during their spare time? AA's international flights accept cash for duty free purchases, & presumably for in-flight drinks that other international carriers provide free. |
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| After November's Bangkok airport closure, Suvarnabhumi is now guarded by special police force to prevent a repeat. That blockage cost airport retail monopoly King Power $14 million. Now Airports of Thailand (AOT) proposes compensation. MORE |
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• PRESS |
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| Lonely Planet commissioned Robert & Morrison to write their Food & Drinks chapter for its Greater Mekong 2 edition. We compiled the culinary cultures of five countries and regions, from China's Yunnan, to Thailand's Isan, plus Laos, Cambodia and delta Vietnam, and adds Robert: "its quite a feat to synopsize a nation's cooking in just one paragraph." |
| To Myanmar with Love and To Japan with Love, both from Things Asian Press are slated for April publication. Look for Robert and Morrison's chapters in both. |
| Did you hear Robert's interview on South Australian radio's Food Program with Stan Thomspon, speaking about Asian vegetables? |
etravel Blackboard profiled our latest Globetrotting Gourmet® Epicurean Adventure along the Mekong.
Oct. '08. >>> |
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Christine Salins' Bites column in Capital magazine features our "Globetrotting Adventures," saying we offer "terrific insight into south-east Asian cuisines. The Sydney-based pair have a wealth of food knowledge."
Oct-Nov '08. >>> |
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• UPCOMING FoodTOURS |
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| Join us for a gastronomic adventure of a lifetime |
| Northern Vietnam July 12-22, 2009 |
| China's Yunnan province late January 2010 |
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| further details on www.asianfoodtours.com |
Cheers,
Robert & Morrison |
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