We had an all-day cooking class today with Red Bridge Cookery in Hoi An. There were five of us today – Mimi, our instructor, and a couple and their adult daughter from Germany. We started the class with a drive of about 30 minutes to ‘Tra Que Vegetable Village’, a commune of local organic farmers. We met with one of the farmers who demonstrated the techniques they use to prepare the soil and plant their crops. It’s all organic using traditional techniques.
Next, we visited the local market back in the town to buy the items needed to prepare our meal. The market is a big, busy place that carried everything from fruits and vegetables, many types of fresh noodles, herbs, fish, seafood, meat and poultry. Mimi spent quite a bit of time showing us what to look for in a product, some of which were very exotic. A last-minute purchase involved some type of bean curd with tapioca (it looked like soup) all put in a plastic bag. Nothing is wrapped in cellophane here as even liquids are placed in a plastic bag and sealed.
After the market we headed over to the cooking school. On the menu today were ‘Grilled Chicken and Banana Flower Salad’, ‘Hanoi Beef and Rice Noodle soup’, ‘Lemongrass Shrimp grilled in Banana Leaves’ and ‘Clay Pot Fish with Fresh Dill’. All the cooking took place over a wood fire. Mimi gave us our assignments and we got to work slicing and shredding vegetables and pounding spices and chilis in a mortar and pestle. The old fashioned way! It was lots of work but well worth the effort as the food was delicious.
We returned to Hoi An from the Red Bridge kitchen by a small boat on the river. Peter and Vu meet us at the docking point and took us to the tailor to pick up our additional purchases. There was no need for dinner tonight as we had more than enough food at the class. Of course, we visited the hotel lounge for happy hour as it was our last night in Hoi An.
Mary