Traditional Thai Cooking Class
*All pictures are taken with my iPhone and any cuties were asked permission prior to snapping their photograph*
When you arrive in Bangkok you’re going to have a ton of options for how to spend your day. Even simply picking a cooking class is going to overwhelm you because you’re going to have a ton of options! I personally recommend putting this traditional Thai cooking class with Siamese Cookery House at the top of your to-do list in Bangkok. It was fun, informative, tasty and cost-effective is an understatement-you get so much for $30 USD.
My Top Five Reasons for booking a Thai cooking class with Siamese Cookery House. (I will elaborate on them throughout the post)
- Great Price, they even send you home with a cookbook!
- They teach you the traditional Thai cooking techniques
- Professional and Certified Chefs/Guides- they speak fluent English, are fun, informative and inclusive!
- Small Class Size
- Class is in a gorgeous 100-year-old Thai House
My favorite part of this class was that it was traditional. Just like everywhere else in the world, when it comes to cooking, we have become quite lazy. Need tamarind paste? Perfect, I can buy it in a can or a jar. Coconut milk? Same thing. But here at the Siamese Cookery House, everything is made fresh, with so much love, the homemade and traditional way. Does it take longer? Absolutely. But does it taste better? You bet ya!
TRADITIONAL THAI COOKING CLASS MEET AND GREET
The Meeting Point is Exit 1 at the MRT Huai Khwang Subway station. To be honest, subways scared me until I went to Bangkok. I had only been on them a few times and it was always with someone else leading the way. But then I was told it was rush hour and there was no way I’d make it to my Thai cooking class if I took a taxi, so I faced my fears and it ended up being so liberating! Pathetic to someone who uses it everyday, but to me it was a victory! The Bangkok Subway is in Thai and English so they make it so easy for first timers like myself!
I came up the escalator and saw about 10 friendly faces and a woman yelled “Samantha, one person?” Yup, that’s me! They handed out a cutie shopping basket with a bottle of water and told us about the itinerary for our day. We left the station and started the ten minute walk to the local market.
On the
So yum!
Huai Khwang Local Market Tour and Lecture
I really loved this part of the day. As a tourist, visiting a local market is a blast but it can also be very overwhelming. It was so awesome to go with Nammy and learn some things I never would have going by myself. You can tell she has great relationships with the vendors and get the freshest ingredients, all while teaching the group so much! She taught us in Thailand they don’t buy any seafood unless it’s still moving, otherwise, you know it was caught days prior and isn’t as fresh.
The fruits and vegetables were so fresh. It was fun to see all the different kinds of fruit that grows in Thailand! Some I had never seen before!
Larvae, anyone? It’s actually really expensive.
So funny to see eggs already cracked for anyone who is lazy or doesn’t have the time, and also pickled eggs.
Tuk Tuk to Siamese Cookery House
After about 30 minutes at the market, Nammy called a couple of tuk-tuks to get us to the Siamese Cookery House. It’s less than 10 minutes away and a fun way to get around! Most people visiting SE Asia take these to get around the city, I personally think they charge more because they have become quite touristy, but it’s still a blast to ride around in one and it’s included in the tour so if you haven’t done it before you’ll love it!
Siamese Cookery House, Let’s eat!
You’ll arrive at the Siamese Cookery House, which has actually been in Nammy’s family for 100 years! It’s so cute. Keep in mind the traditional way to cook Thai does not include air conditioners. You’ll spend some time preparing inside, then prepare your food in an open-air Thai style kitchen and then you’ll get to enjoy your meal in an air-conditioned room. I was here in February so it was very hot, so just dress appropriately, the cool room is a great reward for your hard work!
Here is what an open-air Thai style kitchen looks like.
Another reason I loved this Thai cooking class was that they had very small group sizes, taking no more than eight people per group. One group had six people and mine had just five people in it! If you are coming in a larger group they can accommodate up to 16 people at once, but they want to create an intimate experience, so just know you will be split up into two groups of eight!
They do a great job with their presentations! The food always looked so beautiful even before we started preparing it. They switch up the menu a bit, (scroll down to the bottom of the post to see the day to day menu) but I came on a Tuesday so we made Tom Yum Goong, Pad Thai, Green Curry
Ok, now I can start gushing about how amazing Nammy is! She did such an incredible job explaining everything to us, being patient when we had no idea what we were doing and most importantly made it so enjoyable! She knows so much about food so don’t hesitate to ask her any questions. I went down to see the other group and they were laughing have a great time as well so I know all the chefs/guides are great, but if you have a chance to request, I couldn’t recommend Nammy more.
Remember earlier when I said we’ve gotten quite lazy? Well not here! We made our own coconut milk. You do this process (squeeze the coconut and water together and strain) three times to perfect it, and although it was time-consuming, it was incredible. We bought the coconut from the market and they used an electric shredder, so yes, we could have been even more traditional but we would have been there all day!
Once again look at that beautiful presentation!
Nammy always took the time to slowly explain the process of what we were doing and why we were doing it that way.
Ok, so I’m not going to go through the process of everything we made
Here is our group while we started to make our Pad Thai. Aside from everything else awesome, Nammy was great at taking my camera and taking so many
The finished product. I love how they use banana leaves to cook and display with, it can add flavor and also make a dish look so beautiful.
Everyone took a turn learning the different techniques used in traditional Thai cooking.
Yummy Green Curry!
And now for my favorite part of the class! Mango Sticky Rice! Always wonder what makes the sticky rice blue? Well, it’s a beautiful flower call the butterfly pea and it’s what Nammy is grabbing in that basket. They dry them and use them as a dye. It’s actually used for many things in Thai cooking, including a kool-aid like drink for kids!
Who know cutting a mango and making it look this beautiful was so easy. ugh I am missing this so much as I write about it.
All in all this tour is about 4 hours lonh and as I stated a million times, it is so much fun and you have to do it if you are ever in Bangkok! Other Thai cooking classes are great I’m sure, but this one just seems so unique and you can really see how much love they put into it. Scroll down to learn the times you can book a Thai cooking class, the menu for each day, some other info and where to book!
Morning Class 09:00 am.
Afternoon Class 1:30 pm.
Evening Class 5:00 pm (this class doesn’t include a market tour, because the market closes at 5).
Wed: Tom Yum Goong, Pad Thai, Panang curry.
*they make mango sticky rice everyday for the dessert*
*Most of the dishes you make are made in the traditional way, preparing them on the floor with a
You can book this experience with Airbnb or directly on their website. To book with “Airbnb Experiences” click this link, Learn Thai Cooking with Siamese
Have you ever done a Thai cooking class!? Where and what did you make? Don’t forget to check back on Daisy Rae Travel, I’ll be posting more and more blogs on Thailand over the next few weeks!
