may kaidee cooking class in bangkok, thailand

I remember the moment we bought this cookbook called May Kaidee’s Thai Vegetarian Recipes by Ma Bodhi Vistara from Vegan Society’s Cruelty Free Festival stall. It was about four years ago when the festival was held indoors. There is one page in the book that has been used several times by my husband –the evidence comes from food stains– which is the page where Pad Thai recipe is on. This is how we found out about vegetarian and vegan cooking classes in Thailand.

When we were in Bangkok in 2013, we decided to go and take May Kaidee’s vegetarian and vegan cooking class as a husband-and-wife team. To book for the class, we went there a day before because some people mentioned the fact that the venue is a little difficult to find. Traffic in Bangkok can be quite unpredictable. You don’t want to rush to find the place on the day you’re taking a class and perhaps late. And of course, we wanted to have try the restaurant as well. You find the restaurant, you also find the venue as the cooking classes are held upstairs.

We decided to take the morning class which is from 9am till 1pm. It is recommended that you eat so little for breakfast as you cook and eat during the class. That was a good advice.

May Kaidee Thai Vegetarian and Vegan Cooking Class started with meet and greet. May introduced herself and so did everybody else. I must admit, May’s story is quite an interesting one. Anyway, we were then given out the course material (as seen below).

Our course booklet had all the recipes that we would be cooking after the market trip. And, the recipes are:

• Tom Yam Soup
• Tom Kha Soup
• Issan Vegetables
• Fried Vegetables with Ginger and Cashew Nuts
• Pad Thai
• Peanut Sauce
• Masaman Curry
• Green Curry

How to Make Chili Paste
Chili paste is the basis of Thai style curries and the original recipes have shrimp paste. So, it’s important to to be able to make your own if you do not consume animal products. So, a lesson in making chili paste is taught prior to the morning market trip.

This is also the time to learn how to use mortar and pestle for food preparation which is a common tool in Thai cooking. Raw ingredients come alive when crushed with mortar and pestle and these aromas and flavours are used in Thai chili paste.

Introduction to Thai Spices and Herbs
An introduction to Thai herbs and spices is given just before we were off to local market but May Kadiee carried on talking about them all the way there. And with that, we hit the market.

Trip to Market
We walked up to this openair local market with May Kaidee who was wearing a traditional outfit. She is a bit of a celebrity there for doing this for quite some time. Durng our trip to the market, we learnt how to identify specific ingredients and we were introduced to a range of local vegetables and fruits, as well as oils and sauces which are important in Thai cooking.

On our return from the local market, we found out that the staff prepared all the ingredients for us (below). Now we are ready to cook.

First dish that we made was Tom Yam soup. I had a problem with my gas cooker but it was solved immediately. After we finished cooking, May came around and tasted the soup and made recommendations. Mine needed a little bit more lime juice. Tom Kha soup is a variation of Tom Yam by the way. You make one, can make the other one.

Issan vegetables is a wonderful, regional dish from Northeast of Thailand. The original recipe uses a type of sausage. It was substituted with suitable vegetarian sausages. One of the other staple in this recipe is rice powder which is dry roasted rice ground to a coarse powder. That’s what our version of Isaan vegetables looks like:

Fried Vegetables with Ginger and Cashew Nuts (as seen below) was one of the dishes we learnt to cook during the cooking class. I had a feeling that I would definitely make this one when I got home. I just need the right knife to cut the carrots like in the photo.

It wasn’t just us who did the cooking simply because it was a hands-on type of cooking class. In this video below, you see May making pumpkin hummus (tam fak tong).

Traditional Thai Dancing
Okay, we didn’t see this coming. At this stage of the cooking class, you are shown and encouraged to perform this traditional Thai dance while singing a cooking song called sap. Sap means delicious just like “Ah-roy” but the word originates from Lao language. The lyrics were at the back of the course booklet but honestly, still, good luck with that. Good luck with trying to dance like May Kaidee, too! I guess this was the moment we were encouraged to make a total mockery of ourselves. We probably laughed more than danced. Watch the video below for the original Sap song.

Sticky Rice and Mango Dessert (Khao Niew Ma-Muang)
Well, we didn’t make this but the recipe is in our booklet. It was a complimentary dessert to finish off our cooking class and I love the way black rice changes the colour of rice mixture here.

After the class, we walked downstairs to the restaurant and i bought May’s cookbook and a couple of peeling/cutting gadgets.

Details of May Kaidee Restaurant and Cooking School can be found in their website.