








2. Chicken and Banana Bud Salad
The first course was essentially the size of an amuse bouche. I liked the texture of the fibrous pomolo salad which was topped with salty and pungent dried shrimp and deep fried pork. Good flavors but it was hard to eat the heap of salad with a spoon and in one bite.
The second course was a salad which was rather refreshingly. The chicken was white meat and a bit dry, but it was seasoned with a lot of fish sauce. The banana and heart of palm were sliced thin and added a crunch to the salad.
Maam, which is fermented fish paste cooked in banana leaf, was quite interesting in flavor. It was salty and a bit sour, and I liked its meatiness. The crudite of jicama and cucumber helped to balance out the fishiness of the Maam.
The curry had a pineapple flavor, and was rather mild and not spicy. I wonder if that is how Khmer curries usually are, or if the kitchen tempers the spice level for tourists. It was tough to eat this dish without a serving bowl. We were told to eat the rice first, then the soup, but the rice wasn't even flavored. Although the curry was lacking in spice, I liked the tang from the pineapples.
The frog naturally tasted like chicken but was a bit dry. I thought the grilled frog from Pub Street that I had the night before was cooked better. There was too much ginger which was rather unbearable - there was a whole clump in my dish whilr my friend had almost none. Must have been a kitchen error.
The soup looked rather ordinary but I really enjoyed it. I liked the semi-soft mild tasting radish and the meat which had a nice amount of tendon, but was still tender. The soup was even better after adding freshly squeezed lime juice, which brought a sharp acidic essence to the dish.
7. Assorted Khmer Sweets
Not sure how I forgot to take a photo of this. The selection included tapioca cake, sticky rice with 3 bean, cloudless green cake, coconut cake, and something similar to bubur cha cha (yam and sago). It was a nice smattering of desserts which were rich and sweet.
Because the courses were served in pairs, it didn't feel like a seven course tasting menu. In fact, we were done after 1.5 hrs. Not necessarily a bad thing, just that I was expecting something more progressive. Overall, it was a good way to sample the local cuisine in a gorgeous environment. It's tough to describe what Khmer cuisine is, I still am not entirely sure. But I do know that it packs flavor, and they do like their frogs here.
Meric at Hotel de la Paix
Sivutha Boulevard
Siem Reap, Cambodia
(855) 63 966 000
No comments:
Post a Comment