Today we saw a different side of Bangkok that was amazing. We took a Thai food cooking class which is a must if ever in Thailand. It began at 9am where our fabulous tour guide/chef Nancy took us to a local market and showed us what to buy for what we will be cooking.  We got to try some delicious unique fresh fruits like jackfruit, rambutan, longan, sapodilla and rose apples.

We got an explanation of everything we were buying and the purpose of every specific ingredient in our dishes. This market was local (no tourists) so we really were able to see the authentic shopping experience.

In the market you can buy a Tom Ka Gai kit, basically a pre-made kit of basil, lemongrass, chili and galangal (type of ginger) to make the delicious chicken coconut soup.

We then got an excellent very hands on experience of cooking four different Thai dishes including Tom Ka Gai soup (the chicken coconut soup), red chicken curry, a pomelo salad (a mix between orange and grapefruit) and the fan favorite mango with sticky rice.

Everything was yummy especially knowing that we made it from scratch. We have a new appreciation for Thai cuisine since we got to see all the work that goes into the food especially making homemade curry paste.

The best part was watching the Asian group taking notes on the tips and tricks on how to prepare delicious Thai food. Sarah of course memorized it instead as she has already advanced knowledge of Asian gastronomy.

Sarah got better in her already lacking cooking skills so Eitan has gain some hope that our kids will be well fed (even if it’s only with red curry or sticky rice)

The whole experience was about 6 hours and afterwards we walked back to the hostel with a food comma and took a nap.  We also did laundry for the first time because this hostel had washing machines; it feels so good to have clean (shrank) clothes!!!

Eitan’s tripod broke so he was on a mission to find another one. Bangkok was the perfect place for that mission. We headed towards the shopping mall areas where Siam Plaza and MBK mall are located. The Siam plaza it’s a huge modern shopping complex full of designer stores, it was one of the nicest mall we have ever been but Eitan was not going to find his tripod inside the Hugo Boss store so we went to the MBK mall.

This mall is more like an indoor market with absolutely everything you could ever need. It took us probably less than 10 minutes to find and purchase the exact same tripod that broke. Mission accomplished…  this blog will keep its quality photography!!

We met Taipe, this awesome guy from San Francisco who we befriended at the cooking school and ended up going out with him later that night! Today’s night life choice would be “The Ping Pong Show”. We went to the famous touristy street Soi Cowboy where it’s full of bars, prostitutes, stip clubs, more prostitutes, more bars, prostitutes, restaurants, did I say prostitutes? Well, also around this area you can find the Ping Pong show which became kind of famous from the movie The Hangover 3. If you know what this show is all about then you will understand why Sarah got traumatized; if you don’t know about it, you will have to read about it somewhere else because I want to keep this blog PG13.

The next morning we leave Thailand for our next destination: The untouched Myanmar, blogpost to come!

Bonus pic of the day: We noticed a Dan Wolf specimen walking the streets of Bangkok, let’s see if you can identify him in this photo!