Last year, I wanted to get more into making soups more frequently. They’re nourishing and always satisfying, but I don’t think I got into a decent groove with it until this year. I sourced a place for pork ribs under my nose at the Chinese supermarket I usually go to, and since then, I’ve been looking at more recipes and tinkering with them. The latest soup I made today is Hot Thai Kitchen’s gaeng jued woon sen. In Thai, that literally means “bland curry with glass noodles,” but the only reason it’s called bland is that it’s not spicy at all. It’s meant to be a “wet” component of a Thai meal next to rice and other more spiced / hot dishes. It has a lot in common with Chinese soups I’ve grown up with: it uses pork bones, daikon for sweetness, and has really simple seasonings, such as fish sauce, soy sauce, and white pepper. It’s given more heft with rustic spoon-flicked pork meatballs that are quickly tossed together, different vegetables (I used napa cabbage and “seafood” mushrooms, almost like thicker enoki mushrooms), and even egg (I used egg tofu today). Then, it’s topped with garnishes like cilantro, scallions, and the true flavor bombs: fried crispy garlic chips with its residual garlic oil.

If anyone had this soup and actually thought it was bland, I probably wouldn’t want to associate with them. This is the epitome of Thai home cooking, and in many ways, very similar to comforting, homely Chinese soups I grew up eating, just with a garlicky twist. Variations of this soup will definitely be kept on rotation for us.

For Christmas, Chris gifted me a South African cooking class at a cooking school in the Lower East Side. I attended the class on Saturday night, and unexpectedly didn’t arrive home until midnight. When he asked me how the class was the next morning, I told him that while I love him, to please never, ever get me another cooking class at this school ever again.

The class was over capacity, lacked a proper kitchen setup, was cramped and borderline claustrophobic (22 students, two teachers, a bartender, two photographers, and an assistant in a tiny basement room), completely lacked instruction or teaching of any technique or background of any recipe, was disorganized in that the ingredients were not laid out well or explained; the class started over 35 min late. 

For some details on what happened in this class: 

1. The class was over capacity in a cramped, tight space that is certainly not meant for a cooking class: The class was in a small room in Abigail’s Kitchen’s (a restaurant) basement. It had a bar setting, so I’d imagine the room is usually used for small private parties. The class was basically in this small room with several long tables set up where class participants were meant to gather, eight at each table. They somehow managed to cram 22 people (there were 24 people who originally signed up, and 2 didn’t show) into this tiny space. Abby and Lorna (the guest chef/teacher who is from South Africa) kept emphasizing over and over that the class would be “cozy.” “Cozy” is simply real-estate code-speak for a crammed and extremely tight space. 

2. No instruction or technique was taught. We were told the names of dishes, but not their cultural significance or any special techniques on how to make them. We were simply told to follow the recipe, and the chefs would walk around, observe, and give feedback. Copies of recipes were not distributed. Instead, each table got the equivalent of 2-3 parts of the different recipes. We all had to look over each other’s shoulders just to see how much of a single ingredient to measure out. In my pair (I randomly paired up with someone standing next to me), we worked on the yeasted dough for the South African donuts. Lorna kept telling us that the dough was too dry, while Abby told us it was just right. We had no direction on the recipe card and conflicting messages from both of them about what the dough should be like. 

3. There’s no kitchen setup here, and ingredients/materials were disorganized. The space had some makeshift stove setups and random kitchen items laid out. You aren’t able to see the items go into the oven and be taken out as a result. You aren’t able to do a part of every recipe, either. Because I worked on the yeasted donut dough, I had a LOT of time where I was simply observing other students try to figure out their recipes and how to execute on them. When I needed something basic like black pepper, I had to hunt for it. When I asked Abby, she simply responded that it was where “all the other spices” were laid out, but this actually wasn’t the case. 

4. The class does not start on time AT ALL, and it ends LATE. The official start time is 7pm. Most cooking schools are prompt and start on the dot. This cooking class started at 7:35pm. We didn’t get served dinner until 10:15, and dessert did not come out until past 11. We were all starving. 

The one highlight of this class: unlike every other cooking class I’ve ever done, alcohol (beer and wine) were included and unlimited. This is pretty unheard of. So, it was no wonder that people were getting sloshed in this class. My donut yeast dough partner was already on his fourth beer before we started mixing our dough. People were visibly tipsy. I’m pretty certain repeat students of Abigail’s Kitchen come simply for the wine overflowing. 

There are a number of great cooking schools with proper cooking school setups throughout Manhattan, along with real instruction and background on recipe given. This is not one of them. Here, you won’t learn technique or any new skills. But, you will leave with lots of alcohol in your belly. That may be a fun night out with some food and lots of booze, but that doesn’t really make for a proper “cooking class” where you actually leave and can say you really learned something.

For the longest time, I’d walk into Asian and Latin supermarkets and notice this slightly wrinkly, green pear-shaped vegetable that I had no idea what to do with. It kind of looks like a gourd, maybe a squash, and potentially like a not so pretty fruit. In markets, they’d be labeled as “chayote,” so it sounded like it came from Mexico or another part of Latin America. Based on what I’ve read, chayote, also known as choko or “su su” in Vietnamese, origins in southern Mexico and Honduras, and is technically a vegetable in the gourd family. It’s used the same way summer squash is used; it’s lightly cooked to retain a slightly crisp but soft consistency. The gourd is high in fiber and also contains folate, magnesium, and vitamin C. It’s also supposed to have anti-inflammatory properties and be good for gut health.

I got inspired to buy and cook with it after Chris got me a copy of Thanh Truong’s (aka the Fruit Nerd!) book called Don’t Buy Fruit and Veg Without Me! The Fruit Nerd is Vietnamese Australian, and his book has a number of family recipes that have a Vietnamese twist. One of them is stir-fried choko, which is simply chayote sliced up and stir-fried with some garlic, shallots, and a bit of fish sauce. I bought these from Hong Kong Supermarket on Friday and stir-fried them today with Kaia. And I actually enjoyed them! It’s sort of like a cross between a cucumber and a summer squash, with a hint of sweetness similar to an apple. It’s a nice, versatile vegetable to add into our rotation and increase the diversity of plants being added to our diet. I just wish I had discovered this vegetable sooner!