"Thailand" news and stories

Have you ever sat down in a Thai restaurant and found yourself confused by the menu and so went with the most seemingly innocuous item? However adventurous or timid an eater you might be, there are certain cultural differences that once explained, would enlighten your ordering.

Pailin Chongchitnant, a culinary student and guest writer at the San Francisco Chronicle, first noticed the drastic differences between Thai and North American culture when she moved from Thailand to Canada. Having been hit with this culture shock, Pailin offers her personal guide to ordering Thai food, to enable you to venture beyond curry and partake in a more authentic Thai dining experience.

Here are some spicy chili peppers to heat up your Tuesday morning (and with snow predicted here in Philadelphia, we can use all the heat we can get). I'm guessing that these suckers are pretty powerful, as the smaller the pepper, the spicier it is.

Thanks to Ayngelina, for adding this image to the Slashfood Flickr pool.

Source

Since the 1800's in Thailand, there has been a yearly vegetarian festival in which attendees participate in rituals from eating to piercing themselves with spears to drive away evil spirits. Everyone refrains from sex and meat-eating, and they dance and celebrate to bring luck to their community!

The Vegetarian Festival began in 1825. A traveling Chinese opera company came to Phuket and immediately fell ill with a mysterious disease. While they were sick, they observed a brief two-day tradition of honoring past emperors by refraining from eating meat. These two events would seem to be unrelated, but the opera company members' illness vanished! The people of Phuket were fascinated, and learned the vegetarian rituals the company had followed to cure themselves. They continue to honor vegetarianism as restorative and cleansing, and the festival is now a 10-day affair during the 9th lunar month.

The Vegetarian Festival, alive and well, took place from September 28th to October 7th this year, and below is our gallery. If you're feeling brave, you can see pictures of the piercings here, and you can read more about the history and traditions of the festival here.

Source

Dotcomedy.com's Sean R. recently took a jaunt to Bangkok, Thailand. Being an avid carnivore, he took his camera on a long, languid lap around a market's sausage counter. Come and take a stroll with him, why don't you?


Seven Deadly Seans

Next - Midnight Sausage: Paris

There may be a new, energy efficient way to roast food coming soon. According to InventorSpot, a food stand owner in Thailand has invented a solar powered roasting oven.

The oven uses mirrors to focus sunlight on the food, and in the case of its inventor the food is chicken. The inventor says he got the idea from childhood memories of playing with magnifying glasses to focus sunlight. He claims that his oven can roast a small chicken in ten minutes on a sunny day and twenty when it's cloudy out.

The article also comments on the food stand owners' power bill: nothing. In a time of rising energy costs and environmental worries, this is the kind of invention that needs to be developed and promoted world wide. It's great for third world cooks, but I hope it can be developed for my kitchen as well.

Source