It is the second day of our exclusive Pascal Barbot promotion and I am already tried! Waking up this morning at 6:45am when the alarm went off was honestly a very painful experience! Obviously I stayed in bed until the very last minute…so now I’m in turbo speed mode. Knowing the last 3 days is fully booked for lunch and dinner makes me seriously think of indulging in a grand breakfast with lots of healthy “fat”, protein and carb-focused breakfast cereals. Breakfast this morning was quick and delicious. I rushed to the hotel with a local crazy motor-bike driver without an accident or broken bones!

Sitting in the morning meeting with our General Manager and the rest of the executive team members was quite challenging after a long night with our three star Michelin Chef. The only thing I had in my head was to return to my office and close the door, and casually put my feet up on of my desk, rest my head back, can’t wait to close my eyes and catch a few z’s. But that of course evaporated very quickly like dew vanishing into thin air!

We only had four hours to get ready until the La Scala doors open again to the next wave of excited guests who understandably have sky-high expectations, so it was all hands on deck to make sure everything gets done. No matter what the dish, if the essential foundation preparation is not carried out correctly, then what follows is a waste of time. There is no time for corrections later.

The lunch service went amazingly smoothly and fast too. Chef Pascal was calm and relaxed. It is truly a pleasure to have him and his team members with us at The Sukhothai Bangkok.

An exhausted Chef Nam!

Yesterday was a very busy day for me with three star Michelin chef Pascal Barbot’s promotion in full swing at La Scala restaurant. I was intoxicated by the busy agenda and happened to be walking fast through Colonnade restaurant. Here was our beloved regular guest Thai artist Khun Petch Osathanugrah. Khun Petch has his usual lunch with friends in Colonnade very regularly, and briefly I stopped by to greet him and saw incidentally his guitar beside him. I just needed to cool down and jokingly asked Khun Petch if he could sing a song for me. To my great surprise he quickly took up his guitar and gave a spontaneous live performance of his very beloved song “Chan Mai Chai Pu Viseth”—I’m not a magic man. It is a beautiful uplifting song and has such a nice flow that it made me feel so cheerful, it almost got me up and dancing!

Thanks Khun Petch for making my day.

Nam

Two weeks ago, world-renowned chefs Charlie Trotter and Ken Hom came for dinner at our Thai restaurant, Celadon. It was my great honor to cook a very humble meal for them. They are men of learning and letters and are real gentlemen.

Chef Charlie has just gotten married and I was lucky enough to meet his beautiful wife.

Just want to share with you my latest food discovery.

Last week we were fortunate to host the celebration for Bulgaria’s National Day here in The Sukhothai Bangkok. During that occasion, The Bulgarian Ambassador’s wife, Madame Maya Velichkova, and her mother came to introduce their native land’s cooking to me and my team members, and it was an eye opening experience for me culinary-wise. The food was delicious, with superb flavour, and tasty. Greek and Turkish influences are apparent in Bulgarian cuisine. It is not too heavy or fatty and there are no “weird” or exotic ingredients to worry about. All cooked dishes are generously seasoned with a mixed of dried herbs, of which “chubritsa” is exclusively Bulgarian, and as a result it offered a final unique flavour.

The Bulgarian yoghurt has a great taste, and its texture is creamy and smooth with a natural tang. I love their tasty flat sausage called “Lukanka” and dipping sauces, “Lyutenitsa” (pepper relish) and Kyopolu (eggplant, pepper and tomato chutney). The Rhodopean Musaka is to die for.

So the Bulgarian cuisine is definitely underrated and if you have never eaten Bulgarian food, I urge you to try it.

I would like to take this opportunity to extend my warmest heartfelt thanks to Madame Maya Velichkova and her mother for giving me and my team member an opportunity to learn something new. She cooked and explained to us and it was the best education I could have asked for.

The problem today is lots of the chicken you see in the supermarket is not naturally grown chicken, but flour and protein based chicken. They raise chickens on farms which keep the lights on around the clock. The chickens are fooled into believing it’s daylight so they keep on eating non-stop. The normal six month period of growth is shortened to 2-3 months, after which they can sell these chickens. Chickens are not reared naturally but intensively bred with chemicals.

Younger generations today don’t often go to the fresh markets and don’t cook at home. They all eat out, unaware of the toxic contamination in this kind of food. Expensive fast food or junk food often contains flour and dairy products. How can it not be fattening? When you eat only dairy products and fats followed by carbonated soft drinks, very soon after this you are hungry again, so you eat the same old food repeatedly. Without a proper warning, future kids will receive a non-hygienic and non-nutritious diet. How will they be able to have good intellectual capacity and good health? It’s an often-overlooked crisis, in my opinion.

Anyway, we all ended up in a neighborhood restaurant and tried out the local authentic Hainanese chicken with rice. It was super-fresh and full of flavor. Beyond anything you could get in a supermarket or fast food restaurant …

There are more than 30 varieties of truffles, all members of Terfezia genera, cousins of the white and black (Tuber magnatum/melanosporum). The black truffle can be found in France’s Perigord region and in Spain, particularly in the Catalonian region, all the way down to Valencia. And it grows in Italy too, primarily in the Marches and Umbria. There it is often called the Norcia truffle, after the Umbrian town of that name.

And do you also know that truffles can be found in the Middle East and the Himalayas too? The areas along the North African coast from Morocco to Egypt and farther east across the great dessert, from Damascus in Syria to Basra in Iraq, in all these regions, people gather truffles for food. Desert truffle is widely believed to have been spawned by lightning and a clap of thunder. In Morocco they are called terfez, and in Egypt terfas. The Kuwaitis call them fagga, the Saudis faq, and in Syria they are known by their classical Arabic name, Kamaa. Several varieties of truffle are also found in the lowland areas along the entire length of the Himalayas, where they grow under pine trees. The flavor of these truffles, also called Chinese truffles, varies widely. Some have little taste at all, while others smell like petroleum. The United States, Australia and New Zealand have been very successful producing commercial truffles for decades.

However, although they are the same species, Black truffles from Perigord and Umbria are the best, most fragrance and intense in flavor. European Black truffles are in season from late November through March and are usually at their best from December to March.

In La Scala restaurant we prefer the Norcia truffle. I’ve just received 2 kg Norcia truffle today, and the best way to find out why is to just get your hands on one of these amazing wonders of the world and come try it for yourself. I’ll see you then…

As a child in Denmark, Easter was always one of my favorite holidays. I found this fascinating ritual of decorating with yellow chicks and painted eggs everywhere really fun and cozy. Originally, eggs were always coloured red, using onion skins, coffee grounds or rose pigment. As the custom spread, it became a favourite among children. Onion skins were replaced by watercolours, and the “works of art” themselves acquired a new range of cheerful pigments. Chocolate eggs later replaced decorated hens’ egg. The first chocolate eggs were real eggshells filled with fine chocolate.

The best is of course the Easter tables. The Danish love to eat and we loved to have a buffet with lots of choices. No one ever left any of my mom’s tables hungry.

Easter is also the time to welcome the refreshing spring season, meaning the end of the long, dark winter. For members of the Russian Orthodox church, Easter means both a joyful festival and the end of the longest fast of the year.

So, in The Sukhothai, the celebration of Easter Sunday is with a beautiful Easter Sunday Buffet in Colonnade restaurant. Young lamb, Glazed Ham, Roma Easter Soup and Hungarian Goulash are among traditional Easter dishes, and there will be something particularly special for dessert. It’s a great opportunity to get together with your family members and enjoy the holiday to the fullest at the Colonnade on April 4.

I am very excited to present one of the brightest culinary talents today from France, Chef Pascal Barbot who will be visiting us at The Sukhothai Bangkok in early March. Chef Pascal Barbot was born in 1972 in Vichy, France. After attending culinary institute he gained an internship at Maxim’s in Paris before moving to Michelin starred restaurants. In 2000 Chef Pascal Barbot opened L’Astrance, his three-Michelin star restaurant in Paris. He draws influence from all around the world and is doing nothing less than reinventing French cooking. Barbot’s cooking is light, minimalist with a modern twist. His culinary philosophy centers on pure clean flavours that are decisive and completely refined. Actually Barbot’s cuisine reminded me of Japanese cuisine, no one flavour overwhelms the other, but all go hand in hand harmoniously.

I met Chef Barbot months ago and found him cheerful and humble, with a tremendous energy about him. His peacefulness and calmness have had an immensely positive effect on my approach to kitchen life and cooking.

The waiting list is long and can be up to two months in his restaurant in Paris, so it is a great chance or the only chance for you to try his petit and poetic cuisine during 2-6 March 2010 in La Scala restaurant. Chef Barbot will cook for both lunch and dinner over these dates. If you want to experience Chef Barbot’s superb cuisine, you really do have to make advance dining reservations very soon. The dinner service is almost fully booked. So hurry up…if you don’t want to be disappointed.

All chefs of the GVCI (Virtual Group of Italian Cooks), a network of over a thousand professionals in Italian oenogastronomy who work all over the world, will lead and promote this global event. This year’s dish of International Day of Italian Cuisines (IDIC) will be Tagliatelle al ragù alla Bolognese. The previous two years, the dishes to be celebrated and protected were Carbonara and Risotto ala Milanese.

To show our respect to Italian cuisine and culture, our La Scala Chef Maurizio Menconi will demonstrate the art of a Traditional ragù alla Bolognese. Chef Maurizio said “traditional ragù alla Bolognese is a meat sauce that is slow simmered for at least 2-3 hours to develop a complex flavour and proper thickness”. Chef Maurizio used only minced beef from either thin skirt or flank brisket. I guess, because the meat is fatty and full of flavours.

All the traditional recipes contain milk, Chef Maurizio added “meat was tough in the past and milk breaks down its fibers, but also to mellow the acidity of the raw tomatoes and wine”.

It is traditionally served with homemade tagliatelle, a long, thin flat egg pasta about ¼ wide, and it’s also never served with spaghetti!

So, I hope to see you on 18 January in La Scala to celebrate this classic, robust, hearty dish from Bologna, which Chef Maurizio has preserved its lively spirit.

Viva la Italia!