Hey everyone good morning hope you're having an amazing day. It's mark wiens, i'm in the small village of mung pam, which is in the mehong san province of northern thailand, and this village is home to a karen people. Community today is an extremely special day because my friend mook and siko mal they are going to cook what is one of the national dishes, foods of the karen people, i believe, that's called cowboy. I think i found my new favorite flower.

It is a beautiful morning. The entire town in this valley is blanketed in fog, and i'm gon na share all of the food with you. Now we're getting started cooking wake up in the morning. It's already past 7 a.m, but uh because we're in this valley, high in the mountains in the morning, it's just blanketed in fog and the fog is actually so thick that when i woke up this morning, you could actually feel the moisture in your face.

It feels wet walking through the air makes for a beautiful mystic morning in the mountains in the beautiful village, uh we're just lighting up the fire and we're gon na get started cooking. Okay, that's the main dish that we're going to be cooking today, kaboo in thai and in korean language, tapo, oh there's a hole in the bottom of the pan and he just said: i need a okay. This is for okay. This is sticky rice uh, that's gon! Na be steamed, but for a different dish called cow, another dish.

Okay, so that's the that's. The first dish that's going on because we need to steam the the sticky rice first there's a whole plate of white and uh black sesame seeds, which are going to be toasted, and that's going to go together with the sticky rice that was steamed already she's. Just gon na toast off those sesame seeds, those are some beautiful sesame. Seeds too, you can tell how homegrown unprocessed they are.

Oh with the fresh, sticky rice and the toasted sesame seeds we're going over to another house to then pound it up. I think it's going to be fully pounded into a paste. This village is so beautiful and it's it's getting warm already today, even though the fog still hasn't cleared, it doesn't clear until about 9 a.m, or so so. This is why we walked over to the neighbor's house.

They have a great stump mortar and pestle, where you can really pound big amounts. So immediately goes in the sesame seeds and literally mook just pounded for a couple seconds already. I can smell that vibrancy of those sesame seeds which they grow here themselves fresh and natural, there's a little bit of salt in there as well. Okay, we pounded up the sesame seeds just for about five minutes, then take out the sesame seeds put the whole blob of sticky rice into the bowl mortar and then start pounding that together as much as just slowly sprinkling in handfuls of the the sesame seeds.

Oh yeah, it is it's a lot of strength. I think, especially because of that stickiness that resistance foreign. Oh, i think this house, this house they make it they make it a lot of here i mean that's, why they have the mortar and pestles here and he made one earlier this morning, but not from sesame, but from uh poppyseed, sticky, rice dough. This is one way to really wake up and warm up in the morning after about 20 30 minutes of pounding, we have a blob of it, looks and uh feels very similar to if you're familiar with mochi uh.

But this is karen style. The sticky rice pounded the black sesame seeds found it, and so that so far that's all that's in it. Sticky rice sesame seeds and a little bit of salt you're left with this incredible. Just yeah really like mochi blob of pounded, sticky, rice, dough with uh the black sesame seed, just pounded and folded within it, and then the other family.

Where we went to go pound the pound it they gave us a sample of their the one that they pounded with poppy seeds. So two different versions: if you want you, can eat it, just salty and normal like this, or it's also common to eat a little bit sweet with condensed milk and cane sugar cane sugar, which they make here, which they grow here and then made into a block Of fresh cane sugar, the flavor of the black sesame seed is what just makes it and then that really elasticy gummy texture to wrap it up together the common way to eat it is to take a bite now of the the sticky rice dough. Then you pick up the hardened block of cane sugar and take a little bit and then mix it together in your mouth. Oh wow.

Oh, that is delicious. The cane sugar. This is natural cane sugar has an amazing, caramel taste to it and then, as you mix it together with the doughy sticky rice in your mouth, it sweetens your mouth. It almost has the texture of chewing gum, but then starts to dissolve in your mouth and then the last method is with condensed milk, which might be a little bit of a more modern approach.

That is good too, but i like the palm the i like. The cane sugar, better, the more natural caramely taste or i just like it, pure straight - is hearty though yeah that will, if you keep on eating, that you will get full okay next up. This is the one with poppy seeds mm-hmm, oh yeah, that one is good too. A different fragrance smoky aromatic we're gon na get started next on one of the ultimate karen foods first step.

They added rice, uh, that's regular rice, but mountain karen mountain rice and then also a bowl of bamboo shoots goes into the the boiling water. This is going to be one of the ingredients, a tree stump, i'm not totally sure what it is. I think it's a type of palm palm tree stump might be a heart of palm um and it is fishtail palm. I was suspecting, it was a fishtail palm tree uh, so we're gon na eat the the heart of the palm.

That's going to go into it. Okay, okay, she's taking the fishtail palm tree stump and slicing out just the heart of it, but you have to chop off the outer skin and then something that you have to do is kind of test it to see where it starts to get soft, because the Higher you go up on the tree, the older it is and therefore the less tender it becomes and uh it's unedible, it's just like a. I mean it turns to a tree, but what you want is the younger part, and you have to. She just has to kind of chop it to feel the texture of it to see if it's chewable, if it's edible, uh, but mostly we want that heart at the bottom portion of the tree trunk, okay, taste, the very very heart.

This is almost like: shreds of the the heart of that palm. Oh wow, oh, that's just like silky buttery in your mouth and sweet and then she's just chopping it into pieces, but you have to immediately soak it in water or it starts to brown. Oh okay and now in goes the fishtail palm me. You have to keep on boiling the rice mixture until it starts to thicken um and that's how you know it's cooked and also the starch is starting to be released, and so it's turning into a thicker porridge.

Also, what's going to go into, this is some pickled and then dried mustard, greens, color and mustard greens, plus some pork plus a type of flour, which i believe is a type of uh iso of isodone. It's a type of flower which i believe in english is called isodone, ternifolius, um and so a handful of those go in green rings and then there's another flower which is green, which is similar. But i think it's different and they said it has a really strong aroma um and it smells like a magnified coriander. I just love the use of chunky herbs and spices in karen cuisine.

Oh, it's ready, wow wow. That is amazing. She tosses in all that herb mixture uh gives it a quick stir, boils it only for another 30 seconds and then it's done off the fire, and so that's going to be more like aromatic herbs that go. It's really going to be herbal.

Now that the cowboy is ready, she's going to make a chili dip using corn chilies using garlic, tomatoes, fermented soy beans, some of the isodone tonifolius flowers and coriander, okay, okay, the roasted chilies go in the roasted garlic salt pound that down and then she added a Handful of the iso - oh iso, isodon ternafolius, leaves which have an aroma like lemongrass oil, but even stronger, now fermented soybean okay, it's going to be my first time to ever taste this dish, but i can already guarantee you that it's going to be one of the Most comforting one of those most warming dishes, one of the dishes that you want to be eating when it's cold and you're in the mountains like we are right now it is there's the cowbook that they made and then there's another one that another auntie made earlier. This morning, uh, which is similar but a different, i think that one is actually made with chicken and also with a type of kale pounded up in there, and that's why it's green in color. But they said you can i mean you can use a variety of different seasonal vegetables in the cowboy, but i think, probably the most unique part about this entire edition experience. That would be totally different from any other culture.

That i've seen is that it looks like a porridge. It feels like a porridge, it's the texture of a porridge, and yet it's not eaten as a porridge. It's eaten as a main dish, so you eat it with a plate of rice. You have a plate of rice and you use that almost as a gravy as a sauce, and so that's totally unique.

That's something that i have not come across in another culture in another community uh within thailand and the mustard greens are in there i'll add a little bit like that um and before adding any ingredients or chasing with herbs i'll just try it on its own. First, all the different ingredients come together. You've got the flavor, oh first of all, you really notice the flavor of those herbs and the flowers which just power that entire dish, the rice uh, has become a yeah like a thick thickened, sauce and gravy, and then every now and then you get bites of Meat you get bites of. I had a really sweet bite of the heart of palm, which is incredible, like the ultimate herbal porridge, but gravy that chili dip, which also i cannot wait to try and you can kind of mix that around you can get that into your porridge into the cobble Into the your rice as well - oh wow, oh man, that just bumps up you taste the smokiness of the chilies and the garlic and the tomato, the coriander in there, and especially the tuanel, the fermented soybean which just gives it a boost of umami.

That combination is perfect and then we got ta, try one more version, uh chasing it with leaves with lettuce and then with also those uh flowers. Let's explore the three different types of flowers. This one, you said, is kind of spicy um and then we've got this one. They said it's really strong in taste i'll, try them both.

Oh wow yeah. Well, that one is like. I don't even know it almost has a caramel taste to it, but it does have like a warming kind of a little bit warming as well, and maybe a little bit, not spicy, but it does kind of warm your tongue. Now that i wait a couple more seconds, my tongue is starting to to heat up.

I could feel like a a little bit of a numbing, a little bit of sichuan, pepper kind of numbing, but then heat at the same time like your. Your mouth is getting hot. Oh, that's incredible! Oh! I got ta eat a lot more of that. Okay, but next uh this other flour, that's like a an extra strong, double strength, coriander, lemony and floral.

At the same time, these flowers and the herbs are really what power this dish. What make this dish special, it truly is an herbal and herbal blend. A floral blend wow that yellow flower is amazing, though, and then finally, the last flower. This is the flower that was actually added to the to the kappa and also the the chili dip, the iso i i so don't turn a folios yeah.

It does have like a an extra strong, lemongrass oil taste to it. Okay, next up, i'm gon na try the other, the other one uh which is vegetables inside, and i believe, chicken and also the banana banana stock. I believe that one has some kind of a a little bit more of a acidic sour component to it, or that might be because my mouth is just going through a whirlwind of flavors and salivas from all those flowers, and i desperately have to chase that bite. Again with those yellow flowers, i'm gon na double up on this one yeah.

First, it tastes almost like a like you're eating kind of, like chrysanthemum, almost kind of that slight natural floral, caramel taste to it and then, in a couple seconds from now, i'm just gon na have this fire, but not chilly, but fire in a similar way. As chili kind of burns your tongue and melt it's incredible with a tingle as well. That is amazing. Never had this before and it's just blowing.

My taste buds take two of those flowers and it really does feel like sichuan pepper. My whole mouth is tingling. My tongue is tingling now and drink a little water. It's almost like fizz, oh man.

I think i found my new favorite flower. I cannot resist this opportunity to add a few more of those flowers on top wow. It is an experience in your mouth and they're starting to build now. Okay - and this is a another dish that was made in another house - pickled bamboo shoots along with pork, and you can see chili's in there.

You can see some herbs and flowers um and maybe lemon basil, oh wow. Yes, oh and those are pickled demo shoots, so you have another dimension of fermentation salty acidity. That is incredible. There's so many things going on in my mouth right now, and i think that, along with the the amazing flavor of this food, really the most unique thing that sets it apart is the method in which it's eaten.

Ah, it's been an amazing morning, an amazing time. In mung, pam village hanging out with mook and shikamo huge, thank you to them for hosting us here for cooking for us and mooc does full tours of her village. Here, where you can come to our village, you can stay in the village uh. You can learn about the karen culture, food arts, uh, clothing, uh hiking.

We did some trekking as well i'll have her link in the description box below, but when you're in me, hong son definitely contact her they're, so cool they will take care of you. Their hospitality is incredible and you'll get to learn so much about the amazing karen people and also remember to watch uh more of the videos we filmed some other videos in this village, as well with mook and shikamot, so be sure to check out those videos as Well - and i want to say a big thank you for watching, please remember to give this video a thumbs up if you enjoyed it, leave a comment below i'd love to hear from you and if you're not already subscribed, uh click subscribe and also click. The little bell icon and that way, you'll immediately get notified of the next video that i publish goodbye from me. Hongsan in northern thailand and i'll see you on the next video.

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