After yoga and a light lunch of Vietnamese sandwiches, we rested before starting a cooking class at a nearby restaurant.
We were taught to make things the old fashioned way with a cobek (grinding stone) and lesong (mortar/pestle – stone mortar and long wooden pestle used standing up, as opposed to the Malaysian one used squatting down).
The menu comprised:
- Chicken meatball soup.
- Blanched vegetables in peanut sauce.
- Minced chicken in banana leaves.
- Fish in banana leaves.
- Pork in sweet soya sauce.
- Mi goreng (was meant to be nasi goreng at first).
- Pandan crepes filled with grated coconut and coconut sugar.
Even though, there was much I already knew (since it is largely the same cuisine), I did learn a few things:
- the aromatic ginger is another ginger variety which is different from galanga
- while I fry my sambal after grinding it, it is possible to fry the ingredients before grinding it (different texture)
- the candlenut (similar to macadamia) is something I don’t bother with but it lends a creamy texture to food, especially if prepared as a vegetarian option.
The afternoon with a Canadian couple was very enjoyable. The food was delicious but in some ways, not as tasty as what I would make at home since I go heavier on all the tasty ingredients. I loved having a go with the cobek (grinding stone) since it is an alternative to the lesong (mortar and pestle) which I’m familiar with.
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- The menu for the day, with some items bearing the Balinese rather than Indonesian name.
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- Introduction to ingredients.
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- Preparing the ingredients.
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- Off-menu item. Chicken meatball soup (sambal and coconut into the soup base for more flavour).
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- Mi goreng and salad.
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- Fish and chicken in banana leaves.
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- Desserts, of which only the green crepe were made by us.