The first immersethrough session was just great. Everything went as well as, and often far better than, we had hoped or imagined. If every group is as energetic and enthusiastic as that first one, this whole project will feel like flying!
The next session of immersethrough will be in Chiang Mai from Sunday January 24 until Saturday January 30, 2010.
Please let me know if you are interested in joining us this January. As with the first session we will be based in Chiang Mai and will use food as our entry point to northern Thai culture. We've shortened the session a little for this second tour (and lowered the price).
The first four days of the tour are the most intensive, a kind of diving in at the deep end.
Participants (a maximum of ten people) will shop at Gat Luang, the old market, and at Muang Mai, the even huger central market, in the morning. We'll divide into two groups, each with a guide (one goes with Fern, the other with me), and we'll help you shop for the list of ingredients that we will be using in our cooking session that day.
Walking to the markets and shopping are strenuous and engaging, because there is so much to see, so much to learn.
The first two days, of northern Thai food, are taught by Koon Mae, who is a fabulous home-cook who lives in the country north of here. She is Fern's mother, and a natural teacher. Those days we'll be in Chiang Mai.
Each day, after shopping, everyone will chop and pound in a mortar and peel and fry and steam and shape food under the direction of the teacher, and then when it's all done, we'll sit down together to eat what we've made.
Cooking is over traditional charcoal braziers, and chopping and grinding are done the traditional way, using a variety of knives on a tamarind cutting board, and several different kinds of mortar and pestle. The results are traditional and incomparable.
Rather than pre-written recipes, participants receive a list of ingredients, with quantities marked, and then once we've cooked and eaten, we review the method and the ingredients so everyone can make notes and ask questions. This is the way food knowledge is best transmitted, I believe, by hands-on experience, rather than by a pre-set printed list of instructions.
On the fifth day (Friday), cooking is back in Chiang Mai. There's the wonderful Haw Market, that takes place Fridays only, to explore, and then in the late afternoon we'll assemble for our last cooking session to make grills and Thai salads of many kinds, the foods often known as "gap glaem" or Thai drinking foods. They are intensely flavored and often very simple to make, so they translate easily to a North American kitchen (and grill). Of course you can't have grilled meat without dipping sauces, so those too are part of the session.
So, to recap the shape of the week:
Sunday: meet for drinks at 6 and then walk to the market to eat kanom jiin (noodles with curry sauce) and a first taste of street food.
Monday: market shop and then first hands-on cooking class of northern Thai dishes. Supper at a northern Thai resturant.
Tuesday: as Monday for shopping and cooking, then depart in two comfortable vans heading to the hills. After a three- hour drive (including a short stop at a rural market) we'll reach Fang, where we'll spend two nights outside town at a small resort hotel.
Wednesday: An early stop at the huge weekly market in Fang, to which people of various ethnicities come bringing vegetables and other food products they've produced for sale. The market is one of the great sights of the region. We drive from there about ten minutes to Fern's lychee farm, where we have a hands-on cooking session with Jam, in the open air.
Thursday: A leisurely morning departure, after checking out of the hotel, and then another cooking lesson at the farm, hands-on, with Jam. We leave mid-afternoon to drive back to Chiang Mai. Supper in the city at a local restaurant.
Friday: This is foraging day, free for market shopping, but there's also time to make an excursion, so we'll discuss with participants what people want to do and go from there. We will cook from 4 o'clock on, making Thai salads and grills. After cooking comes eating, and then Friday is a good night to go dancing, to hear live music, or go to the night market, or even all of the above.
Saturday: Departure day.
Accommodations in Chiang Mai, and on the excursion to Fang, are comfortable and also distinctively Thai. We've found a wonderful hotel in Chiang Mai, the Banthai Village. It opened just a year ago, is beautiful and calm, located on a lane behind a temple (Wat Bupparam) and only a five minute walk from the apartments.
All accommodation will be singles, unless we receive a request from two people who wish to share a double. The food we prepare together will be authentic, not adapted for foreign tastes or preferences.
The next session is planned for late January 2010, from Sunday January 24 to Saturday JAnuary 3, 2010. Please write to me or get in touch with Deb if you want to pin the dates down early.
The price, which includes a total of six nights hotel and meals in Chiang Mai and environs, five days of cooking classes and marketing, and the two nights and days excursion out of town, is US$2700. (For those who have visited this site earlier, we had originally planned an eight night tour, but that is too much time for many people, so both dates and price have changed.)
Not included are transportation to and from Chiang Mai, departure taxes, travel documents, or travel insurance, nor items of a personal nature such as laundry, gratuities, special diets.
To sign up, please contact travel agent Deb Olson, my partner in Immerse Through LLC. You can reach her by email at deb@laramietravel.com or call her at 307-745-7191.
Deb is a long-time friend and is also a very experienced travel agent. She is widely travelled and very practical and thorough, so I recommend that you consider asking her to make your other travel arrangements too, including booking for any travel you may want to do in the region before the tour starts or after it is over. I recommend that you also ask her about travel insurance.
Before committing to the trip, please read very carefully the terms and conditions that Deb will send you if you are interested in participating. You'll need to fax to her a signed copy of the terms to indicate that you have read and understood them, and agreed to them; that, along with a deposit of US$1000, will reserve you a place, if available. The balance of the cost is payable not later than 60 days before the start of the session you are booking.
preliminary advice: Please make sure that you have a valid passport, the term of which is longer than six months after the date on which you plan to return home. Once you have booked, Deb will provide you with some more travel advice, for example about what to bring with you, and what to leave at home. The weather is warm in late January in the day, but with cool nights, so plan on layers of light cottons, with maybe a sweater for the evenings and for very air-conditioned places, and comfortable shoes or sandals. I also recommend that you bring earplugs; the tropics can be a noisy place to sleep for light sleepers.
