Cooking Thai Food: Pomelo Salad

It's hard to name a favorite Thai dish, but I'm pretty certain that Pomelo Salad (yam som-o) gets my vote for #1.  Unfortunately it isn't one that is served widely outside of Thailand. Sad, because it's one of those dishes that blends together all of the flavors and textures into a well-balanced delicious dish.

If you want to try the real thing, Baan Khanitha in Bangkok makes the best one I've ever had. Then again, they make almost everything incredibly well. I highly recommend a feast there!

As with other Thai "salads," this is a main dish that you enjoy with your other dishes family style, not a side salad in the US/European style. It's great with some satay and a fish dish.

These days pomelos are available throughout the US and Europe, and the other ingredients all are readily available at any Asian grocery store.  When it's just Herr J and I eating it, I take a few shortcuts, since peeling the pomelo is enough work: buy roasted chicken from the deli counter and buy the fried garlic and shallots rather than cooking them anew each time. You could also fry up batches and store them, which is what I do with roasted peanuts and toasted coconut.  Except for the meat, fruit, and herbs, you can keep most of the ingredients on hand in the pantry.  Unless I'm going to use a whole can of coconut cream cooking something else, I usually cheat a little and mix up some from powdered coconut milk.  It works fine where used as a flavoring, but I would recommend using the liquid for curries and other coconut milk-based dishes.

Though it's an impressive tasting dish and a daunting ingredient list, it's a surprisingly simple dish to make and one that requires no real cooking.

The first step is finding and peeling the pomelo.  You can find them in Munich at the Semmel (Edeka) on Einsteinstrasse or at Galleria Kaufhof, as well as in many Asian markets.  In the US they'll be in most Asian or Hispanic markets.  They're a bit larger than grapefruit and usually slightly oblong.  This one was green, but they often are yellow and wrapped in orange netting like this:

If we were in Thailand, we could just buy the peeled pomelo sections in the store. I'm ashamed to admit that about 3 years into living in Bangkok I asked, "What kind of fruit is that?" because I had never seen pomelo in its natural state. Once you try to peel one for the first time, you'll understand why someone does the work for you.....  But I've found a pretty efficient method for peeling them (I do the same with grapefruits):

1) Slice pomelo in half:

2) See how thick the peel is?  

3) Now slice off the bottom, just to the beginning of the meat:

4) Trim off the sides

5) Trim most of the remaining white stuff off the bottom (so that the sections are all open at the bottom)
You'll be left with two cores of meat and a big pile of peel.  The peel makes one of the best deodorizers in existence (much better than baking soda).  Take a few of the bigger pieces and stick them in your fridge for a couple of days. 

6) I often use a regular or butter knife to help with this part.  Split the pomelo in half and then start pulling the sections of meat out from their sections.  Pomelos usually come apart pretty easily, but the knife can help slip in between the membrane and the meat.

7) And finally you'll have a bowl of pomelo meat (and the dividers to throw away). The hard work is done!

Pomelo Salad (Yam Som-O):
(adapted from David Thompson's Classic Thai Cuisine)  

Salad
1 pomelo
5-10 (depending on size) cooked, shelled shrimp
shredded, cooked meat from 1 large chicken breast 
3 Tbsp roasted, shredded coconut
1 tsp fried, sliced garlic (or 2 cloves, if you slice thinly and fry yourself)
2 Tbsp fried, sliced shallots (or 3 shallots, if you slice thinly and fry yourself)
1-2 Tbsp coarsely ground roasted peanuts (unsalted)
2-5 fresh small chilies, thinly sliced (start with 1 or 2 if using prik kii noo or other really hot ones. And be careful with the cutting! Serrano chilies also work well)
4-6 mint leaves, torn
2 Tbsp chopped coriander leaves

Dressing

1.5 Tbsp fish sauce (can substitute light soy sauce) 
4 tsp palm sugar
2.5 tsp lime juice
2 Tbsp chili jam (nam prik pao - I recommend Pantainorasingh brand, which is widely available in US and Europe) 
4 Tbsp coconut cream

Put all the salad ingredients in a bowl with the pomelo chunks. Stir together the dressing ingredients, adjusting as necessary to have a salty/sweet dressing.  Pour dressing over salad and toss to mix well.  Be careful not to break up the pomelo too much.  As with most Thai dishes, you can adjust the spiciness to fit your tastes.  The sugar and coconut will help reduce spiciness, the lime will add sour, and the fish sauce will add salt.  There will be a little spice to the chili jam, but your real heat will come from the chilies, so choose them (and the quantity) according to your tastes. 

Serve immediately after assembling. This dish is best served fresh while the textures and flavors all play off one another.

Sit back and enjoy, possibly with some cold Singha beer.

You can play around a bit and make it artistically beautiful by cooking the shrimp with the tails on and carefully sprinkling the herbs and shallots.  In this case, we couldn't wait to eat it!

As a little bonus, pomelos on the tree in My Tho, Vietnam. Sometimes it's really cool to see something in its natural state!

The Höllentalklamm [1]: From Munich to the "AlpspiX"

Frau A and I have visited the Garmisch-Partenkirchen area a few times now, once for the Women's Skiing World Cup and another time to hike through the Partnachklamm ("klamm" = gorge).

We choose to return recently to hike through the other popular gorge in this area, the Höllentalklamm.  So we checked the train schedule for that Sunday, prepared the cameras, and loaded the backpacks. 

The train ride from Munich to Garmisch would normally take about 90 minutes.  Unfortunately, we had some early misfortune, which turned our trip into something like "Planes, Trains, and Automobiles".

To start, the regular regional trains were NOT departing from Munich due to track construction/repair.  So the Bahn provided a bus instead, a shuttle to a station beyond the track repairs.  

Due to the confusion, the busses departed perhaps 20 minutes later than the train would have.  After a half-hour ride, the bus dropped us off at a train station called Gauting.  It would normally take just 20 minutes to get there, but we were already past the 40 minute mark, with a long way to go towards the Austrian border...  

At Gauting station, a regional train was waiting.  We all boarded.  And waited.  And waited some more.  Eventually, the train departed (after the next wave of busses from Munich arrived).
With another 40 minute delay here, the total impact was now almost 1.5 hours! 

Finally we arrived at the Garmisch-Partenkirchen train station and could begin the next phase of our day...
which of course required another train ride!  This train ride was planned, however.

Let's look at the map below.  As a reference, the Partnachklamm (our prior gorge hike) can be seen on the far left, outlined in a yellow box.  The "Start" point is along the bottom, at the Garmisch train station.  From here we will: 

- Transfer to the Zugspitzbahn (black & white marked train tracks, headed left-to-right on the map)
- Disembark at the "Kreuzeckbahn" (underlined in yellow) and take this ski lift (yellow arrow) up to the Kreuzeck
- Hike up (trails are in red color on the map) to the Hochalm ("alm" = hut, bottom of the upper yellow arrow)
- Take the next gondola (upper yellow arrow) up to the Osterfelderkopf
- Hike down a bit, then trek left-to-right along the Hupfleitenjoch (outlined in yellow).
  Next milestone is the Höllentalangerhütte ("hütte" = hut, also outlined in yellow)
- Hike down through the Höllentalklamm to the Höllentaleingangshütte (the bottom yellow box)
- Hike down one last red path to the town of Hammersbach marked "End"
- Board the Zugspitzbahn (underlined in yellow) back to Garmisch, and return home to Munich

Simple, right?  That's what the hiking book said, at least!  

Thankfully, things started looking up as soon as the regional train reached Garmisch.  The weather was great, and the Zugspitzbahn is quaint (below).  It was a quick 10 minutes to our stop.  Had we stayed on, the train eventually goes into rack-rail mode and up 25% slopes to the foot of the Zugspitze, a gain of 1800m! 

It was a short walk from the Kreuzeck station to the Kreuzeckbahn (a gondola) and we boarded without delay: 

From the top of this first lift, we saw a lot of people paragliding overhead... an activity that is creeping higher and higher on our "must-try" list.  The sky was very blue, with just whisps of clouds and a slight breeze - gorgeous. 

At this point, we finally had some actual hiking to do!  From the top of the Kreuzeckbahn it takes about 30 minutes to ascend to the base of the next lift, climbing 300-400 feet over a broad, gentle trail.

The mountain views continued to get better & better along the way: 

At the base of the next gondola, some hiking trails branched out while cows were grazing... 

...but rather than take a trail down the mountain from here (or say hello to the cows, which Frau A wanted to do), we boarded the next ski lift.  Frau A held the door open while I snapped a photo.

It's not the greatest photo, but you get an idea what the view was like from inside the lift car:

This second lift brought us to the "Osterfelderkopf".  This was the height at which people were taking off with parasails (duly noted).  Also, a short hike from the lift sits a unique lookout platform called the AlpspiX.
The upper platform hangs 13 meters out from the edge of the cliff, with just steel "mesh" underfoot.

The capital "X" in name "AlpspiX" is supposed to represent the architecture of the crossing lookout platforms.
Note:  you can see the town of Garmisch in the valley below, and of course a panorama of mountains. 

 

Frau A is on the upper platform (picture below).  It's not a straight drop, but the view extends down 1000 meters!  Due to the steel "mesh" floor and plexiglass end barrier, the web site promises a "wobbly stomach".  

Wow - a bus, a train, a rack-train, a gondola, a short hike, and another gondola to a lookout!

Coming soon:  We'll share photos from the second half of this trip in a follow-up post.  From here we head across the face of the Hupfleitenjoch.  This will provide views of the Zugspitze, and entrance to the Hollental gorge.

Nymphenburg Palace & Gardens in August

Frau A and I had logged a photo-trip to Nymphenburg Palace & Gardens in June.  At that time (early Summer) there were a number of baby ducks waddling about and the swans were fighting and mating.

So, Frau A wanted to go back in late Summer to see how the babies (and potential babies) were developing.  Plus, it's a great excuse to re-visit one of the most popular Sunday destinations in all Munich.

The front facade of the main building still is covered in scaffolding, but they've planted lovely beds of "wildflowers" (carefully planted, I'm sure!) and we had beautiful clouds.

As ususal, the water in the front of the grounds is full of waterfowl.  We saw a new kind of goose we hadn't seen before...

...plus the usual swans, mallards, and gulls (like below):

Some of the swans were still fighting.  This "guy" (photo below) was mercilessly harassing another swan, with lots of splashes and honks.  You could hear the thump when his wings hit the other bird.  They're a lot tougher than they first appear!

This huge, older swan is often out front and seems to pose for pictures.

We then moved from the front of the grounds through the palace to the back, where the gardens start (with still more water).

The swans here were swimming peacefully - no fighting.  But these all had a family unit, so we're guessing the roughhousers in the front were lone juveniles.

When you reach the end of the gardens, there is a small waterfall peppered with Greek statues all around.  A few ducks just like to relax on the edge.

Looking back over the waterfalls toward the castle, there's another beautiful sky.

And the very border of the Nymphenburg grounds, a fence prevents people from coming in using the waterway.

This mallard was taking shelter from the hot sun, not far from the fence above -- but keeping an eye on me just in case.

Unsurprisingly, a wedding party arrived to take photos in the garden.  It is possible they ere getting married in a small building on one side of the gardens.  They got lucky with sunny weather.  We're guessing that they're NOT German by their choice of fashion, especially for the men...  Then again, we were walking around in our traditional trachten (lederhose and dirndl) before attending a party, so we probably made the photos of some of the tourists!

We'll probably go back again in Autumn to see how things continue to change.

Beating the Heat

After all my whining about a rainy, cool summer, the Hundestage finally have arrived!

We've been soaking up as much of the warmth as possible, enjoying local festivals, hiking, watching American football, and walking around town sipping iced coffee drinks.  Lots to catch up on and photos to share in the next week.

Though the heat here is nothing like what our friends in Texas have been facing, these are the 4 or 5 days per year when it's too hot to sleep or eat and I miss having air-conditioning.  But it's made me rediscover a treat from childhood, and one of the best ways to banish the heat.

Ice cold watermelon!!

Have you seen... [fun experiments]

YouTube is a great source of pop science!  Okay, maybe it's not science in strict terms, but rather cool phenomena.  In this case, slow-motion video gives a new perspective on fire & water.

First, what happens when you put a lighter in a blender?  (Not the best video quality...)

Second, the "Slow Mo Guys" fill a huge water balloon and pop it.

Their high school science teachers would be proud.

BMW Museum - Motorcycles

On a recent, rainy Sunday afternoon Frau A and I went to the BMW museum.  We had already visited the Porsche and Mercedes museums in Stuttgart, but somehow always put off BMW even though it is local.  With 250,000 visitors per year, it's the third most popular museum in Munich (after the Deutsches Museum and Museum of Modern Art).

The BMW museum is basically next to the Olympiapark and use the same U-bahn stop.  The museum is the bowl-shaped building on the right below:

The tall building is the BMW world headquarters, in the form of a four-cylinder engine.

NOTE:  The BMW museum is different from the Porsche and Mercedes museum in that it is organized by topic rather than in a strict timeline format.  The timeline format is nice in that you see how technology developed, but the BMW format lets enthusiasts of specific product types get their fix in one room!

At the beginning of the museum it is clear that BMW is big on motorcycles.  They produced motorcycles exclusively for 10 years before building their first automobile.  Here is the first BMW:

BMW R32, 3000 were produced from 1923-1926. Two cylinder + over-head valve engine, 8.5bhp, capable 100km/h (62mph).

There's a YouTube video of an original R32 in action:

The museum is also quick to show BMW's technology and racing orientation, with lists of innovative "firsts" and record-setting performances.  The enclosed motorcycle below is the "WR 500" -- WR stands for "weltrekord" (world record), but this bike is also referred to as "Das Ei" (the egg).  It's top speed of 173.8mph was set in 1937 and this mark lasted 14 years (aided, of course, by the WWII period that was focused on other technological challenges).

In this room are more racing bikes, with and without sidecars!

The motorcycle rooms were packed - there seemed to be a lot of die hards that spent more time here than other places in the museum.  My favorite was the late 1990's "Cruiser", which could be described as a Harley-like BMW.

BMW R1200c "Cruiser". 1997-2004. 2-cylinder "boxer" (flat-twin) engine, 61bhp, reaches 168km/h (104 mph).

In the next posts, we'll move on to the automobile rooms...

And now that we've visited the Porsche, Mercedes, and now BMW museums, there is one big one left - Volkswagon in Wolfsburg (don't think Audi has a museum in Ingolstadt).  Maybe this winter...

Lobster Cocktails, Italian Style

Since we had an extra tail left from Herr J's lobster cocktails, we decided to experiment with a little more Italian flavor and have a picnic in the English Garten.  (This is what I've been wanting to do all summer but have always been foiled by the weather.)

We brought some serrano ham, manchego cheese, and the rest of the wine. And of course, the football. Herr J is teaching me to throw a good spiral!

Though our presentation wasn't as nice (plastic cups, foil and tupperware!) as before, its was a great late afternoon picnic.

For the Italian style lobster cocktails, we added to the lobster: olive oil, fresh grated parmesan, salt, pepper, lemon juice, and a little bit of garlic. I was skeptical about the parmesan-lobster combo at first, but it was very tasty!