A true foodie cannot travel to Southeast Asia without seeing how the local people shop for their food. We visited markets in almost all of the major cities we visited along the way, and each market evokes different sensory experiences. We've all seen travel shows and food shows highlighting the bizarre and obscure foods found in the markets, but what we often don't see or even think to understand is the sheer resourcefulness of the local people. In America, consumers are so far removed from the actual source of our food, typically selecting food goods that have been so processed and removed from their natural state that something as simple as a chicken breast can taste entirely different than a chicken breast in, say, Laos. Don't get me wrong, my track record of food bourne illness at home is a pretty good one, and I'm quite happy to get a nice Tyson chicken breast or a USDA prime rated steak, but seeing the way developing countries eat and shop for food brings me back down to foodie reality.
The first thing that I, as an American, recognize every time I enter a local market, is the sheer amount of food that I can't help but consider to be foreign and strange. A typical example of some fine protein in Laos is pig fetus or congealed blood. In Vietnam, they believe eating a pig penis will help a man's libido. If a family member has recently suffered a heart attack, the Vietnamese will prepare a lovely pig's heart which they believe helps the heart to heal. In Thailand, they will mark their eggs with anumber. The number depicts how mature the chick inside the egg is. It is common for them to eat eggs that are days away from hatching-talk about feathers in your eggs! The people in this region of the world are farmers and gatherers and to them, every meal is precious. It is a disgrace to let any part of a slaughtered animal go to waste, including snouts, ears, testicles, and even the blood. If I were to walk into Tom Thumb or Whole Foods and request a buffalo fetus with a side of pig snout, I think they may call for security! It's a sad shame for us to be so entirely wasteful when there are parts of animals that could be sold cheaply to hungry Americans.
Southeast Asians are not only resourceful when it comes to animal products. The selection of fresh herbs and fruits is unbelievable. Exotic fruits such as the pink skinned dragon fruit, custard apples, rambutan, and the ever popular Durian fruit (which I find to smell like tar, but after six weeks traveling in Asia have gotten more accustomed to the stench) are bursting at the seems of every fruit stall in the markets! Similar to the meat, their resourcefulness when it comes to herbs is equally admirable. Things that I avoid while cooking, such as the skin of garlic or the leaves from the limes, are common ingredients in completing the final touches of a perfect traditional dish. I have fallen in love with so many dishes here and I know that my attempts to recreate them at home will be both costly and difficult as the herbs and fresh ingredients will be extremely hard to come across.
I couldn't complete this post Without mentioning the most fabulous part of these markets-the seafood. Between the Mekong, the Irewaddy, the Andaman Sea, etc the Southeast Asian countries we visited rely on bodies of water as their lifeline which results in the most spectacular showing of fresh seafood I have ever seen. It is not uncommon to see women waking up at four in the morning to go select their fish for the day while it's still swimming, and watch the stall operator clean and filet the fish in front of them. Lobsters, crabs, prawns, eels, and even frogs abound! It makes the seafood case at Whole Foods look like the amateur show. My selection of farm raised, previously frozen salmon is such a bore in comparison. Granted, the Vietnamese people's love for fish of all stages, fresh, fermented, and in sauce, definitely singed my nose on more than one occasion.
Regardless of the unfamiliarity of some of the more bizarre foods I encountered in SE Asian food markets, I was constantly amazed at how well each culture knows their food. They have such an intimate relationship with the food selection process and their knowledge of how to prepare such a vast array of delectable dishes would make even Julia Child envious. For them, each meal is special. It is to be savored and enjoyed, and it is common to spend the entire day preparing dinner. The next time I come home from work tired and reach for an instant frozen dinner or a microwave pizza pocket, I will try to remind myself that cooking a lovely meal is not that difficult. If a farmer in Laos can prepare a decadent meal, why can't I!?
Our cooking instructor showing us the variety of fresh herbs and vegetables at the market in Luang Prabang, Laos.
Dried goods at a market in Yangon, Myanmar (better known to many Americans as Rangoon, Burma).
A selection of fruits in a fruit stand in Saigon, Vietnam
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