Food Monday - Hot stuff

These small chilies we knew were hot. Gary avoided eating the altogether. He pulled one apart, wiped off his hands, then, later touched his lip and still felt the heat. The white crunchy julienne pieces Gary found out were hot when he ate some. I think I had the same stuff in a dish I had last week. The lady that served it to me assured me it was, "Mai Pet" (not hot) as I requested, but it was quite hot to me. I couldn't figure out what the hot part was. Now I think it might have been that crunchy white vegetable.

Gary tried a chicken burger at the KFC that is in the front of the department store. He didn't think he ordered a spicy one, but it was hot enough to bring tears and a little sweat.

Another surprise he had this week was when he asked for "Moo" (pork). He got pork liver (it was come kind of liver anyway). I ate it for him; it was good! I hadn't had liver in a long time, and never pork liver. Gary told me to make up a flash-card for liver like we have for squid, so we will know what to avoid. I made one up for "frog" too after we saw this tray of foods for sale at a market downtown.

Except for the KFC, these foods were all from the upstairs food court. Most of them have pictures and English words for their dishes. Even so, it is hard to tell what exactly

what the foods are that are pictured. One place has some corn chips in one section of their display. Those sounded good to me, so I figured out how to ask what plate of food they would come with. The lady pointed at three different bowls of white foods of different shapes. One was oval slices, one was white balls, and one was purse shaped things. I asked if they were “pla” (fish) and she nodded. Also she held up some rice noodles to show they were in there too. I went ahead and ordered it. She made up a soup of the noodles, some of each of the three kinds of shaped fish, and one corn chip. The soup tasted ok. I had it again the night I did aerobics after dinner since it was a light meal (it was mostly white, after all).

A couple of days ago I decided to try the crispy fried mussels. They are cooked in a crispy kind of omelet with bean sprouts. It tasted really good. I hardly noticed that the mussels were there. They have an oyster one too, but I think they would have more of a taste.

The best things Gary found up there are the popcorn and the soft serve ice cream. Those are becoming staples for him. The chocolate ice cream is almost meeting his chocolate craving. Chocolate is rare and expensive here, so he hasn’t had much of it.

Another good snack we found are roasted shelled peanuts. They are in a bulk bin downstairs. The attendant there let me taste a few before we bought them. Once, in an open market, we bought some in shell peanuts. They turned out to be raw. These roasted ones are very good, though.

:J