ROYAL THAI CUISINE

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ROYAL THAI CUISINE

• A PowerPoint presentation by
• Master Chef Marco P. Brüschweiler
• Thai Master Chef Rangsan Mumana

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History of Thai Cuisine
Thai food is very rich in variety like almost no
other food in the world. It is as rich as the
Thai culture. due to the fact that is actually in
harmony to the culture, is has this for the
foreigners strange, but fascinating
taste. Eating food goes back to the early
evaluation of the humans on this earth. In
Thailand is a proof that already 300 years BC,
natives of the today culture where living in the
northern part of Thailand, where today Chiang Mai
and Lampoon are located. The food at the time was
very simple, just fruits, some dry fish and on a
festive day a game. The people at this time
where not even farmers just some kind of hunters
and food collectors for the daily use. The
methods to prepare this kind of food was besides
drying at the sun, just grilling and stewing.
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More History
Then during the time of Sukhothai in the early
11th century, an influence of other cultures,
such as Chinese, Indian, Laos, Burma and Khmer
where developed in the culture and of course in
the food. It where most likely the Indians, that
brought the curry to Thailand. Desserts at those
period where only fresh fruit. The Chinese had a
large impact on the Thai food, as still today
many Chinese food items are similar to the Thai
dish. It were the Chinese who introduced the
frying, stir-frying and the deep frying to the
Thai cuisine. The area of Ayutthaya, in the 13th
and the 16th century brought a big change in the
lifestyle on the Royal families first, and later
down to the rural population of Thailand. There
were starting to trading there rich agricultural
products, that the fruitful valleys along the
Chaophaya River produced, as they could not eat
all by them selfs.
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Foreign Influences
This rich agricultural land was most likely one
of the reasons the Burmese came down from their
mountains in the north to intrude Thailand.
Besides the neighbors countries, like Vietnam,
Khmer, Burma, Malaysia and Laos, strong trade
relations where build up especially with the
Portuguese, the British, the Dutch and the
kingdom of Persia. It were also the Portuguese
who most likely introduced the sweet desserts to
the Thais, which are still known today, based on
egg yolks sugar. Also the Chilies where brought
in by Portuguese, from there originally place of
grow. As Missionaries who has been in South
America before they where transferred to this
country, had them in there traveling bags, a fact
that today almost no Thai ever remembers.
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Religion Cuisine
Another influence in the food preparation is the
Buddhism religion, as the Buddhism does not allow
the killing of large mammals for food. But some
cheeky people always looking for a way around the
law, and this maybe one of the reason, why the
Thai food has no large chunks of meat, everything
is cut in small bits and pieces or very fine
chopped. Due the destroying of Ayutthaya by the
Burmese, Bangkok becomes the new Capital city of
Thailand, as it was much closer to the sea and
the beaches of the Andaman-sea and the Gulf of
Siam. The seafood became a large aspect of the
Thai cuisine just imagine a TOM YAM GOONG
without any of those delicious shrimps.
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Typical Thai Dishes
So many typical Thai dishes would just not be as
delicate and exclusive without the bounty of the
sea. lakes and rivers that are running through
this beautiful country. TOD MAN PLA, deep fried
fish cakes, HOR MOK, steamed seafood pudding in
banana leave, or POO CHA, the crab shell stuffed
with there own meat, and then deep fried, just a
few of the large selection Thai cuisine has to
offer. TODAY The Royal Thai Cuisine is still
practiced in the places were the royal families
are reside. The difference to the simple Thai
food, is that those dishes are carefully prepared
to make sure the balances of at least three
different taste directions. Such as sweet, spicy
and sour, or salty, bitter and aromatic. By the
use of all the different herbs and spices the
balances are easy to obtain, if one masters all
there flavors.
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Food Size Decor
Another important part is the size of the food
products, as almost everything is cut into bite
sizes, to allow the royalties just using fork and
spoon, as this is the traditional cutlery in Thai
cuisine. The most important of all is the
decoration of the dishes were those chefs at the
palaces are but great effort and details to it,
also the serving dishes that are used for the
individual dishes are carefully selected, to make
sure they enhance the presentation and the visual
effect accordingly. The dishes that are used in
this cuisine, are mainly from the central plains
region, as they have the largest varieties, with
and abundance of food ingredients from the land,
sea and the river in that areas.
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World Famous Cuisine
The Thai Cuisine is famous worldwide for being
fierce hot and laced with a lot of chilies. Over
the past 10 years or so, the Thai food had
tremendous up way trend along the Asian cuisines,
as in every larger city in Europe, America, Asia,
Australia and even Africa were ever there are
Thai community. She is rich in flavors, from
the burning hot curries to the strange mixture of
chilies with sugar for the fresh fruits. Thai
cuisine is light to digest easy and healthy
cooking methods make it a fast cooking method.
Due to the short cooking time all the nutrients
stay in the food it selfs and get not destroyed
as it is done in many western cuisines. There
fore the Thai Cuisine and there culture is well
liked and well know in almost everyones mouth
and taste bud. This fact, is one of the major
reasons, that Thai Food is on the uprising way to
the hall of fame in world Cuisines, and help to
increase the tourism in this lovely country.
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Thai Cooks Overseas
There are over 5000 Thai Restaurant meanwhile
worldwide, 400 alone in England's main City
London and over 650 in Germany. The Thai
government has spend huge amounts of money on
promoting Thai restaurants overseas, to increase
Thai restaurants to 8000 in the year 2015, with
the simple reason if there are a huge amount of
Thai restaurants overseas, one can export more
and more food and other products , as well as
Thai cooks, as the good ones in high demand in
those days. There are over 250 Thai cooks going
to work alone in Germany Switzerland every
year, and our association have send many Cooks to
Kenya, Maldives, England, China, Croatia, Korea,
Pakistan und India Guatemala, Dubai, Mexico,
Fiji, USA, New Zealand, during the past 12
months. The local hotels and restaurant facing
harder problems to find good and qualified cooks
and chefs, as there salaries overseas, 2-3 as
much as back home!
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Thai Food Ingredients
One can find most of the Thai food ingredients in
the entire world, you can find all types of curry
pastes in Europe, America und Asian, Durian (the
strong smelling fruit) are exported to Hong-Kong,
China und Singapore container loads during the
season, und Thai shrimp have a large share in the
word market. The larges food export is still on
KHAU HOM MALI, (Thai Jasmine Rice) even Thailand
is not the largest producer, but definitely the
largest exporter, and with over 150 types of
rice, there is for everyone, his favorite choice
to find, even Japanese rice is cultivated, but
mainly goes into the export. This and many
other reasons have helped to make the Thai
cuisine more popular and have helped her, to move
up in the World cuisines, as it is well another
part of the increasing tourism in the land of
smile.
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How to eat Thai Food
You do not need to study Thai cuisine for 3-4
years to understand the basic of this flavor-full
and excellent light cuisine, but however you need
to understand the basics of it, to be able to
come up with some simple Thai dishes that
everyone would love and enjoy. The Thais take
their repasts seated on a bamboo mat or carpet
and the dishes are served in containers with a
cover of Chinese pottery nicely painted. The
meats are cut into small pieces the unsalted
steamed rice is served in a different container.
Each person will have his own plate, where the
rice will be given around first, and then you
help your selfs from each dish a little on your
plate, depend on your choices. Almost always,
eating Thai style will involve a number of
people, usually a family or friend group, as for
being forced to eat alone ranks high on the Thai
scale of misfortunes.
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Many different Flavors
Every Thai dish offers various flavor directions
sweet, salty, spicy, sour, bitter, und aromatic.
The general rule is that at least 3 flavors are
used, whereby all three goes well together but
one or two are dominate. For a quick meal the
Thais prefer a light cooked dish of raw or
blanched vegetables with a NAM PRIK a Chili-Dip
made from dried shrimp or shrimp paste, or just
with NAM PLA the famous Thai fish sauce. The
unbelievable mixture of the Thai cuisine are made
of chilies, garlic, shallot, coriander leaves
roots, 3 types of basil, lemon grass, galangal,
kaffir lime leaves, shrimp paste and again the
fish sauce. To sour something one use either the
flavored lime juice, or the pulp of the dried
tamarind's, rice vinegar is not often used in
there cuisine. To sweeten something you have
again some choices, by either using unrefined
brown sugar, crystallized sugar or the more like
a paste looking palm sugar, which is less sweet
than the root or cane sugars.
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Seasonings Spices
To salting something you have again 3 choices,
first the sea salt, that is cultivated along the
coasts, than of course the fish sauce, and the
oyster sauce or soy sauce, were by there are 3
variations, from the light low salt, until the
dark and thick soy sauce. Seasonings are done
with ginger, galangal, rhizome, basil or lemon
grass. You can of course combine any variation
you like of them, but one need to know and master
in how much of each would just be fine to get a
well blended balance, as otherwise you will end
up with an un-blended balance that would then
completely destroy the taste. To get the spices
and the hotness that you like , there are around
15 different spices of Chilies, there are fresh
dried, pickled and in powder available. The
hotness of the chilies also vary, and mostly as
smaller they are, as hotter they burn. To
produce something bitter, is not as easy, but
there are a few local herbs and vegetables that
have the bitterness in itself for use.
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Thai Curries
The Thai currys are more favorable amongst
westerners, as due to the coconut milk, it makes
it milder than the Indian or Sri Lanka curries,
those one burning not only the month, if you have
never experienced before. The Thai Curries
known 5 different main types, that conclude from
a paste rather than a powder. The Green Thai
curry whereby the color comes from the skin of
the Kaffir Lime and the fresh green chilies.
The Red curry is where the fresh red chilies
gives the main color along with some other herbs
and spices that are daily freshly pound together.
The Massaman Curry uses dry red chilies and
peanuts, which explains the brown color of it.
The Yellow Curry is mainly used for seafood
fish, as it is not so spicy, the main color gives
the curcuma powder. The Panaeng Curry is as
well red, but milder, as the main ingredients are
the dry red chilies, and mainly used in a stir
fried curry.
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How to serve Thai Food
To serve Thai food the traditional way is quiet
simple, as all the dishes are placed on the table
the same time and can be eaten in no particular
order. Nor they are any rigid rules about what
goes with what as diners are free to mix dishes
according to the individual taste. Diners at
the table serve themselves only one or two
mouthful of a dish at the time, unless you have a
charming Hostess at your table that does the
traditional serving for you as well. Serving
plates are refilled when they are empty.
Freshly steamed jasmine rice is always served
just before the diners start there meals, and
will be refilled, during the meal, as one need
some more staples. Dessert for a formal meal
consists again of several dishes usually fruits
skillfully carved, served with a strange mixture
of salt-sugar-chili powder, were the fresh fruits
are dipped in before they are eaten. Other sweets
are mainly consisting of jellies, based on palm
sugar, coconut milk or egg yolks you may also
find candied pumpkin, sweet potatoes and sweet
corn as part of desserts.
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Many dishes at Once
Ideally, a Thai meal offers a combination of
flavors sweet, hot sour, salty and bitter. As a
general rule there is almost no dish that has not
the combination of at least three of them in one
single creation, subtle blending, while in other
dishes just one or two flavors predominate.
Besides the large bowl of rice, there will be a
soup of some kind, a curry, a steamed dish, a
fried one, a salad and one or more basic dips or
sauces based on NAM PRIK chili paste or NAM PLA
fish sauce. There is in general enough food to
accommodate any unexpected guest who may drop in,
as this is again part of the Thai hospitality.
Almost always there will be a variety of
dishes, for it takes more than one or two
preparations to achieve the blend of flavors
Thais like. An ample supply of rice is always the
centerpiece. Traditionally all of the dishes are
served at the same time and hardly ever real hot,
just luke warm when served.
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How to eat Thai
SANUK SABAI MAI PEN LAI are probably the
best way to explain the Thai way of life, or
style, which would be translated into fun,
good mood und not important. Eating is
definitely one of the three and most likely the
SANUK one. A Visit to a Thai house begins with
the warm welcome that is the hallmark of the Thai
hospitality, The host will offer some refreshing
cool drinks mainly juices as a beginning of a
light conversation, as Thai people enjoy telling
jokes and teasing each others, so that talk, not
food, may occupy much of the early part of any
visit. But then comes the time to enjoy together
a meal. The Thais take their repasts seated on
a bamboo mat or carpet and the dishes are served
in containers with a cover of Chinese pottery
nicely painted.
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How to eat Thai Meals
The meats are cut into small pieces the unsalted
steamed rice is served in a different container.
Each person will have his own plate, where the
rice will be given around first, and then you
help your selfs from each dish a little on your
plate, depend on your choices. Almost always,
eating Thai style will involve a number of
people, usually a familiar or friend group, as
for being forced to eat alone ranks high on the
Thai scale of misfortunes. Dishes are usually
comprised of bite sized portions, and meal
service typically includes only a fork and a
spoon. In fact a century or so ago, no cutlery
was used, except for serving the dishes in the
traditional meals. The rice whether jasmine or
glutinous, was pressed into small balls with
fingers and then dipped into the other dishes,
spoons and forks only appeared in the 19th
century, at first in royal circles and then later
down to the rural population the custom today is
to eat with a large dessert sized spoon, using
the fork only to move the food around the plates.
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Northern Thai Food
Almost always there will be a variety of dishes,
for it takes more than one or two preparations to
achieve the blend of flavors Thais like. The Thai
chefs strives for a balance of flavors, textures
and colors. Another part of the eating culture
are the artfully decorated dishes, with
skillfully carved carrots, cucumbers, as a
garnish, or a fruit or other vegetables that have
quickly been transformed into a little piece of
art. In the north of Thailand there is another
dining style that is called KHANTOK and backdates
to the times of the LANA Princesses. It consists
of a 25 cm high rattan or wooden stand of about
50 cm diameter, whereby 7 different dishes in
small bowls presented, and every customer has his
own small table. The variations are that great
that one believe he has his own little buffet for
himself. Until 200 years ago even in the places
they were taken there food with the fingers, and
even today in rural areas, the sticky rice is
still eaten that way in this times.
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Thai Chefs Innovations
There is in general enough food to accommodate
any unexpected guest who may drop in, as this is
again part of the Thai hospitality. The
preferences of individual cooks chefs will
dictate how strongly the various flavors are
emphasized and it is up to the individual again
how to indicate there type of Thai cuisine. The
Thai chefs strives for a balance of flavors,
textures and colors. A presentation of 3 dishes
will follow after this demonstration, along with
the authentic recipes from the Dusit district in
Bangkok. TOM YUM GOONG (Spicy sour shrimp
soup) PHAD THAI (Fried noodles Thai
style) GAENG KIEW WAN GAI (Green Thai Chicken
Curry)
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TOM YUM GOONG
Spicy Sour Prawns Soup
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PHAD THAI
Fried Noodles Thai Style
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GAENG KIEW WAAN GAI
Green Thai Chicken Curry
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Thai Cuisine Spices Board
For more information about Thai food festivals
please contact the following e-mail
address thaicook_at_loxinfo.co.th