Breakfast near the market

In real-estate the primary thing is location, location. This restaurant has that and a great menu. It is located next to the entrance to the market and across the street from a pagoda. I know it looks like a biker bar but it is really a breakfast restaurant.



The young lady cooking is full of energy; but she doesn't waste any motions. She has the large grill full of bean sprouts, fried Chinese noodles, fried eggs and small pastries filled with vegetables. She taps an egg with the flipper, the egg goes on the grill and the shell into the basket in one smooth motion. She fills plates or to go boxes, (here they use Styrofoam rather than the plastic sacks) with a practiced hand.



The sauce is a mixture of vinegar and what I call Cambodian ketchup (a pepper sauce).





Very good!!!

A laundry basket can have many uses in Cambodia. Here it holds the pastries before they go on the grill. There is another laundry basket below the grill used for a trash basket. Cambodians are very practical.

Breakfast across the Mekong

A friend suggested that I use a photo of the Kizuna bridge as a header for my blog. She had suggested that I take the photo from the left hand end of what you now see in the blog header. The best time for that would be early morning.

I arrived on the far side of the bridge and there was a restaurant. Hummm, it is time for breakfast and I have been trying different breakfast menus. I guess this is breakfast.



This restaurant had its choices in a display. The display was not like in Japan where the display food is plastic, this was the real thing.




The World Cup was on the TV. I sat on the other end of the room so I could hear myself think.



Breakfast was simple, beef and rice. This is one of the places that I validated my belief that beef in Cambodia is just recycled show leather.

Beef vs. pork

Having spent a lot of time in Morocco, a Muslim country, I had not eaten pork for some time. Now in Cambodia, that is my meat of choice. In the last post, I mentioned how chicken is hacked up into pieces with bones in it, that is not an option.

Chicken is out, that leaves beef, fish and pork. Most of the fish in the Kampong Cham market are from the Mekong, to me they taste muddy. Another option down.

Cattle in Cambodia are only for meat, there is no dairy industry here. I have not been able to find out why. Take a look at the two cows below, which one looks like it would give a tender steak and which one would be a bit on the shoe leather side. Well, from my taste test of the Cambodian meat, is very similar to shoe leather. Even when sliced thin, it's tough, looking at the Cambodian cow, I think you can see why.



Figure 1 Swiss cow






Figure 2 Cambodian cow

Here is my preferred option. This one has a comfortable last ride.



Going to your end upside down must be very uncomfortable and quite embarrassing.



The little guys below are packed in like sardines and will meet the same end as the ones above.



Sweet and sour pork please!

My lunch time hangout

I have been going to the same restaurant for lunch for the past months. I almost have the menu memorized and usually have one four dishes. The restaurant is located just off the Kizuna bridge in town; I sit there and watch the traffic. I can also watch Tom and Jerry cartoons from the Cartoon Network on the large and loud TV.

Each plate with rice and tea is 7,000 real ($1.75). The staff do NOT speak English and when I have tire my Khmer language I get a blank stare. So I point and nod.



Before moving to Cambodia, I ate a lot of chicken, but here I have changed to pork. Today I for some reason ordered chicken soup.



Above is the reason I normally do not order chicken. In a Khmer kitchen a chicken is chopped into roughly 1 inch square pieces with a cleaver in a chopping motion. That means meat and bone are in the pieces. It seems like most of what I get is bone and gristle.

Sweeter than sweet

When living in Morocco, I learned to drink my mint tea with sugar, sweet like the locals; and I have always liked my desserts.

Last week, though, I discovered something that was too sweet, even for me.

On the way back to Kampong Cham after photographing a school's celebration for International Children's Day, we were invited for lunch at the home of the father of a KAPE colleague, Marry. It was a great meal.



We had fish, eggs, some meat I did not recognize, with a great fish sauce and of course, rice. The meal was served on the floor. As good as everything was, there was no dessert afterward.

Marry wanted something sweet for desert. So, after leaving her father's house we stopped at a small restaurant for coffee with milk. I must explain this a little. In Cambodia, cows are used only for meat, they are not dairy animals. Most milk available here is in the form of canned, sweetened condensed milk. Coffee in most places is Nescafe instant coffee. Marry had coffee with condensed milk, the driver had just coffee. Because I do not drink coffee I got condensed milk with sugar. What a hit of sweet.

Luckily there was a lot of ice in the sack of milk. I could let the ice melt, which diluted the sugar somewhat.



Figure 1 Marry - coffee with milk



Figure 2 a sack of coffee



Figure 3 Our driver

Ice

In Cambodia ice is still used as the main means of refrigeration. The ice man delivers to the shop, using his old moto with a cart behind, you can follow an ice cart very easily; just follow the trail of water.



He cuts the ice into pieces and delivers them to his customers.



On a hot morning, I saw a ice wagon parked and saw a beautiful cloud of steam raising from the ice.

Post office – Bus station

In Cambodia there is a post office but it's not used much, instead, I must pick up and drop off envelopes at the bus station.



Figure 1 The Capital bus station in Kampong Cham

When something arrives, the attendant calls you on your mobile phone number that is on the package. When you arrive to pick you parcel up, you give them your phone number (yes the phone number not your name). They check this against the log book. Then they call the number on the parcel and check that it is your phone that is ringing. Then you can sign for the parcel.



Figure 2 Waiting for my signature



Figure 3 Other parcels waiting for pickup

This process was not completely new to me. It's very similar to the process used in Fez, Morocco when you send money by Western Union. You put the person's name on the send to and their mobile phone number, when the money arrives; they call the person and check their id.

A gift for lunch

I was called to my back door by my landlord, he handed me a plate piled high with small squid, shrimp and two crabs. It was fresh from the sea. His family had been to the coast and brought back a cooler of seafood.



How do I cook the squid, it can be tough if not done correctly. I looked up a recipe on the internet. I didn't have all of the ingredients in any of the recopies. I decided to use my minimalist approach, I would fry them. After cleaning the shrimp, I flash fried them and ate them while I was preparing the squid. They were delicate and a great appetizer.

After cleaning the squid, making sure to take out the backbone and the tooth, I fried them with a little salt and pepper. After the squid ink boiled off I left them fry for about four to five minutes and tested one, it was tender.

The photo below is of about half of the squid, I was in a hurry to eat them and forgot to take the photo until I was half done. They were tender and tasty.

A new breakfast stand

After the last breakfast post, I realized there are so many places for breakfast; I should really have some variety in my life. This morning I went to the market and tried a new breakfast location. Walking through the market, there must be 15 to 25 small breakfast stalls on the Mekong side of the market. How do you choose? This one looks good.



I sat down and the proprietor/cook made a motion like "do I want to eat?" I nodded. I don't know what I am having. I should have gone to one of the stands where there were people sitting then I would have known what they were eating. This is an adventure right.

In just a moment there was an orange plastic platter in front of me, looks great.



Hum, lettuce for breakfast, well, I haven't been eating enough green, mostly white, lettuce is good. I tried one of the pieces of cucumber in the peanut sauce to see how that was like. It was peanut with light vinegar, very good. I ate the omelet with my chopsticks, a bit of a challenge. When I was just about done, the cook came over and showed me that I should have put the omelet and some of the leaves in the lettuce leaf, dipped that in the peanut sauce and eaten it that way. Another downside to not having anyone to watch.

After I finished, I watched how the omelet was made.



Figure 1 eggs into a hot wok



Figure 2 more eggs to get a smooth coating



Figure 3 even it out



Figure 4 add the filling (bean sprouts and pork)

New market

I went to the market and found something very strange. The market was gone!



What happened? Then I remembered that the city had been building a new market area not far away. I drove there and the market has moved.


There is a new building with stalls for vendors.


There is a large walk area that is choked with vendors who have set up as they did on the street.






Everyone seems to be enjoying the new market.

Breakfast

Several weeks ago, I was introduced to a small restaurant for breakfast. It's about 500 meters from my house and now is a regular morning hang out.



Figure 1 The restaurant



Figure 2 The proprietor and a customer


 


Figure 3 The proprietor making my breakfast



Figure 4 My breakfast


 


Figure 5 HOT peppers and tea


 


Figure 6 Another customer



Figure 7 Making To Go





Figure 8 To Go ready to go



Figure 9 It was GREAT!