Red Shirt Rally Day 20: Political Deadlock

The Bangkok Post reports that the negotiations between the government and the Red Shirt leadership is deadlocked. They agree on one thing: calling new elections. But they do not agree on the time line. The Red Shirts want parliament dissolved in 15 days; the government says that's too soon and recommends new elections in 9 months.

It's hard to say how this will all end. Time describes it as the "classic class struggle." Indeed, we are stuck in the modernist mode of viewing the world in terms of either/or and neither/nor.

Red Shirt Rally Day 17: Dialogue

On Thai TV today, the prime minister and two advisors met with the Red Shirt leadership. Though they sat two feet across a table from each other, the ideological divide is wider and deeper. It's too soon to expect any resolution but at least they are talking.

Making Low-Fat Yogurt

Plain yogurt has so many uses. It's the base for a bowl of cereal in the morning. Just drizzle some honey on top and eat it with a scoop of home made Whole Lotta Nuts Granola. Yogurt is also a great substitute for sour cream. I use it whenever a recipe calls for sour cream, especially in my favorite  New York cheesecake recipe. Making yogurt is easier than it sounds, and you don't need a machine to make it!

Pour two liters of milk into a large pot. I used 1 liter of whole milk and 1 liter of zero percent milk to get this low-fat milk mixture. I discovered that zero percent milk yogurt does not set. It needs the fat in whole milk to make yogurt. You can use 2 liters of low fat milk but I found that when I did that,  I ended up with the watery consistency of a yogurt drink like lassi.

I use a candy thermometer to make sure the milk gets to 150 degrees Fahrenheit. It takes about 10 minutes on medium heat to get up to temperature. I stir the milk often to prevent the bottom from scorching.

When the milk got to 150 degrees, it started to steam. I let it cool to 120 degrees. My friend Lovan says that adding yogurt to the milk at a higher temperature will ensure two things: it will set quicker and it will thicken.

This was all the yogurt I had left over from last week's batch. Some cooks add powdered milk to thicken the yogurt, but I don't like the taste. Kishore, Lovan's husband, says that yogurt made with whole milk will do what we say in Jamaican patois "spring water."  In other words, you'll notice a by- product called whey, a yellowish liquid. Remember the nursery rhyme about Miss Muffet eating her curds and whey? I wonder if she was eating yogurt!

When the milk cooled to 120 degrees (warm to the touch) I added the yogurt and stirred well to combine.

I poured the milk and yogurt into two large porcelain bowls. Each bowl holds about 4 cups of the milk mixture. I prefer to use porcelain because I put the bowls in the oven to set the yogurt. Also, I think porcelain is easier to clean than plastic. If you're concerned about the chemicals in plastic leaching into food as I am, use porcelain bowls.

Here are the two bowls, covered with upside down plates, side by side in the oven. Do NOT turn on the oven. It's okay to leave on the pilot light. Any draft-free place will do to set the yogurt, as long as the bowls are covered with a dishtowel as well. In Thailand it is so easy to make yogurt, but in cool climates, the yogurt will need to be covered with a thick towel in order to set!

About 3 hours later, the yogurt had set.  When I took the bowls out of the oven, they were warm from the pilot light. You can see that the top is shiny, even reflecting the light from my kitchen window! Cover with plastic film and refrigerate to finish setting the yogurt. To make Greek-style yogurt or yogurt cheese, see my recipe's notes.

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Red Shirt Rally Day 15: A Bomb Scare

We had a bomb scare this afternoon at Piyarom.

I saw two policemen casually walking towards the entrance from the lobby, just as I was going up to the Fitness Pavilion at 5:30 this afternoon. They didn't look anxious.  I shrugged it off and forgot about it as I went to do my workout. After all, it's more important to tone up the flabby bits. 

We had dinner at Yentafo in the club's shopping mall. Tried to go vegetarian--it's Lent, after all. And I only ate 1/3 cup of rice. I felt dessert was due and shared iteem boran  with Andy and AJ. This is "old-fashioned ice cream" or coconut ice cream on a sweet bun with sticky rice, peanuts, red beans, and toddy palm seeds. Afterwards, AJ and I went to Tops Supermarket to pick up some groceries and Andy went to the motor show. Religion and capitalism. Two mutually exclusive ideas though a lot of capital was made in the promotion of religion. However, politics is another flashpoint in these parts.

Andy called and said there was a bomb scare at the club.  As AJ and I drove out of the parking lot we saw two police pickup trucks parked out front that weren't there before. One of them said "bomb squad"--in Thai, so it was just as well I couldn't read it.

Andy said he had asked what it was all about. After all,  security around the club is decent. The club uses a fingerprint identification system for members, and to get into the club compound, cars have to pass through security at the gate. Andy said the club had received a bomb threat via e-mail. Can't be too serious, right? Must be a prank, right?

Remembering Titi

Today it is exactly one year since Titi lost his brave fight.

In the year since, Lek took up parenting Nicky by herself, making sure he went to school and all  his after school activities. Though she is a Buddhist, she brought him to Mass every Saturday evening. It was what Titi wanted.

His was a life shortened by cancer. It's not what he would have wanted, I know. He wanted so much to live that he did everything the doctors asked.  To Titi, cancer wasn't reality. It was a mere inconvenience.  It irritated him to be so interrupted. To him, life was better spent centered around Nicky and Lek. On his list of things to do when he got well, he wrote "Always the two."

Red Shirt Rally Day 12: How will it end?

More important, when will it end?

There's talk now of the government sitting down at the table with the Red Shirt leadership. However, the anti-government leadership is fractured. With one radical holdout saying, no discussion, this leader is sticking to the group's original demand that the PM dissolve Parliament and call for new elections. 

One of the farang teachers wore a red t-shirt today. It was a mere fashion statement, but it goes to show how colors here can have such significance, even for the unwary. This week's Time magazine has an article explaining the color codes in Thailand. Find out why men wear pink!

Cake Monday: Golden Almond Butter Cake

The almonds sprinkled on top were indeed a nice touch; crunchy and toasted they had a nice feel in the mouth--pleasantly mealy and slightly bitter. The cake's texture was light, airy, and over-mixed--again! The color was good, though; the top was a light golden brown although it had been sitting in a too-hot oven and the inside was a pale golden yellow. After baking in a 9x2inch cake pan, the recommended pan size, I was surprised by the finished height, 3 inches in the center and 2 inches at the edge. All in all, a good cake recipe. It's not the perfect cake but I'm getting there!

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She Bakes and Cooks

Today I had so much energy. I made scones for breakfast, skillet pizza for lunch, and for dinner:  chicken pot pie with home made biscuits,  and for dessert, buttermilk spice cake with pear compote and crème fraîche. I also baked a Golden Almond Butter Cake for school tomorrow.

I added a dollop of St. Dalfour's strawberry jam on the plate. The scones were light, moist, and a tad too flat. The recipe is for 8 scones but I got 12. I had rolled out the dough to 1/2 inch thickness so I recommend patting it flat, rather than rolling it,  to 1 inch thickness then cutting it into rounds.

We invited Robert and Anne to dinner to try this new recipe for Quick Chicken Pot Pie. I felt confident because this recipe comes from America's Test Kitchen, and I haven't been disappointed so far. This recipe is supposed to be "quick" because of the refrigerator biscuits, store-bought rotisserie chicken, and the frozen veggies. But of course, there aren't any refrigerator biscuits in Bangkok so I made my own. Andy bought a whole freshly roasted chicken from Five Star. I adjusted this recipe by adding to the onion, 2 tablespoons minced fresh garlic, 2 cups fresh chopped okra instead of the prohibitively expensive celery, and 2 cups diced carrots. The biscuit, I realized, is really a savory scone to be eaten with hearty stews and thick soups like this pot pie.

The pièce de résistance! This is Bon Appetit's buttermilk spice cake with pear compote and crème fraîche. Making the crème fraîche with a hand mixer took 5 long minutes.  Just think of the muscles I'm developing. On my first attempt at the cake I made the silliest mistake: I forgot to flour the pan before lining it. The bottom fell out of the cake as I was unmolding it. The taste was warm and spicy but there were a good number of holes in the batter due to overmixing. The second time around, the cake was light and delicate; the texture had a fine moist crumb--nearly perfect! The spices were faintly detectable, not overpowering at all. It could be the spices are losing their flavor. In this heat, everything needs to be refrigerated. Sigh.

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Red Shirt Rally Day 9: How we braved the rally and went to Rengaya

The Red Shirts decided to have a mobile rally today. They left their "heavenly" headquarters at Phan Fa (Beyond the Sky) Bridge and drove around the city. It was as if Songkran (New Year) had come early. Pick up trucks and taxi cabs roamed the city loaded with smiling flag-waving demonstrators. There were drums, music, and tambourines; a coordinated Songkran celebration without the water. The color of the day was the ubiquitous red. It almost seemed spontaneous.

At the intersection of Rama IV and Silom this was the scene at 6 o'clock this evening. Andy parked the car in the Dusit Thani Hotel and we used the skybridge to walk over to the other side of Silom. We then walked the remaining 4 blocks to Rengaya, a Japanese yakinori (barbecue) restaurant in Thaniya Plaza in the Patpong area. It was practically empty, and so was the Plaza. The merchants in and around Bangkok must be hurting.

Tomorrow is Cheng Meng the Chinese Day of the Dead. How many of the up-country demonstrators will stay in the city now is the question. The estimates have fallen to 50,000 from 80,000 people on Day 9 of the anti-government rally. How do they know this? The Nation  newspaper helpfully reports that crowd size is calculated by the number of square meters multiplied by 4--apparently that's how many Thai people can fit into one square meter, assuming they are standing up, of course.

Red Shirt Rally Day 5: Bloody Wednesday

There was blood spilled on Bangkok sidewalks today.

The anti-government Red Shirts collected blood donated by the protesters. Then they poured it on the sidewalk outside the Democrat Party headquarters. If this sounds like voodoo, well, it is.  To understand this ceremonious blood-letting is to understand the kind of magic the Red Shirts were trying to invoke, and the motivation behind it.

It is a kind of magical thinking, the magical thinking of the desperate and the disenfranchised who want the power of instant redress, to force regret from the lips of their enemies, and to return honor to their names. Yet, it seems such a criminal waste, all that blood. Blood is life, after all, and blood transfusions saved Titi's life even though they couldn't cure his cancer.

The protesters pouring away their blood is a symbolic act. It doesn't mean disregard for life but certainly they have made a graphic point that the government, at the very least, belittled and disregarded their voices. Could they have accomplished their aims in some less graphic manner? Could there have been a win-win outcome for both government and anti-government forces? Both sides need to sit down at a table and talk about their differences. There are bound to be some commonalities.

Red Shirt Rally Day 4: Bizarre Newsbytes

How does a protest move through the traffic-choked streets of Bangkok?

Slowly.

Is it still a protest if you're stuck in traffic? 

According to The Nation the Red Shirts have issued a dramatic ultimatum. Dissolve the House or blood will be spilled. They meant it they would collect blood from protesters and on Tuesday, pour it in front of Democrat Party Headquarters, Government House, and the Prime Minister's residence.   

Red Shirt Rally Day 3: The Red Tide

The Red Shirts are comin'.

For days, the newspapers published routes to avoid. I stocked up the pantry and filled up the car with gas. 

Last night Andy and I ventured out to Wat Tat Thong, between Sukhumvit 71 and 63,  for a funeral.  On the way, Andy tuned in to the Thai traffic station jaw saw roi, where people can call in traffic reports. One man reported that over 100 cars blocked the Bangna-Srinakarin intersection.

The Red Shirts are here.

An English-language newspaper reported this morning that 80,000 demonstrators flooded Rajdamnern Avenue, where many government buildings are located. The Red Shirt leadership says they are prepared to stay seven days. Four days at least. It's like having unwelcome guests in your house. You can't tell them to get out because you're too polite to say so. 

Go home. Please. Somebody, turn out the lights when you leave.

Red Shirt Rally Day 2: Hype and Disillusionment

Anticipation is sometimes bigger than the event itself.

Yesterday's pro-Thaksin Red Shirt rally fizzled out. According to the newspapers, less than 7,000 people, far less than the anticipated number of demonstrators came to Bangkok. From an office tower on Silom Road that overlooks Lumpini Park, a witness said the police in the park outnumbered the Red Shirts.

All I know is that traffic was good since a lot of people stayed off the roads. Pundits say this (non)event  is a simple test of Thaksin's rallying power. He's fond of portraying himself as the self-made anti-elitist, despite his family background and his billions. Unfortunately, it's a tad awkward to hold a rally for democracy so close to a court conviction for abuse of power. However, those in the know are warning that this is all a prelude to the "real rally" on Sunday.

In other words, don't count the old boy out. Yet.

Red Shirt Rally Day 1: While the citizens were marching for democracy

Today, there is no school. Today my baking obsession converges with Lent and a political rally. It's Friday and I'd like to observe Lent by being virtuously vegetarian. Meanwhile, the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship or UDD, alias the Red Shirts, have made other plans for this day without consulting the residents of Bangkok,  but which involve us nevertheless.  They are converging on the city from the provinces to protest the Supreme Court's judgment against Thaksin. Late last month, the Court ruled that half of his fortune was ill-gotten profit while he was prime minister. Because of the rallies, school has been cancelled. I'm also homebound. For a change, the protesters are actually going to be marching through my end of Sukhumvit Road so the danger of violence along the route is very real. As Lent now coincides with the exercise of the democratic right to assemble,  I baked this variation on Stilton Bacon Scones, UDDerly Scrumptious Scones for Lent. (Forgive the bad pun.)

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Cake Monday: Chocolate Bread

This chocolate bread uses less than a cup of sugar in the batter and just a dusting of powdered sugar on top when it is baked.  Chocolate isn't Andy's favorite cake but he likes this one! It's moist and tender. 

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Spaghetti Coup d'État

Living in Thailand, an essential survival skill is adaptability. A case in point is my first coup d'état. It was February 1991 and Chatchai was just overthrown. I ran out of cooking gas and the shops weren't selling any, apparently on the principle that housewives might be tempted to make bombs out of fish sauce. My mother-in-law said starchily, you should have stocked up. The minute I knew it was a coup, I sent the driver to the gas station to fill up the gas tank. Oh, well, I said, meekly,  can I borrow your electric skillet? I managed to survive that coup and two more coups after that. In the process I learned that a cook needs to be nimble. A good lesson learned regardless of the political situation.

It's March 2010, 19 years after my first coup,  and 16 prime ministers later, and I'm facing another domestic crisis. In the stores, sugar is fast disappearing from the shelves, a sure sign, not of a coup to come, but of a price hike in the making. (In the background, the Red Shirts are waiting to assemble this weekend.) I have stocked 3 kg of superfine sugar in my pantry so I can keep baking for Cake Mondays. With a sugar shortage looming, I will have to hunt for low-sugar recipes.  Adding to the kitchen challenges is the heat of the Thai summer. It was  93 degrees today, and I'm crazy to cook in a hot kitchen. Anyway, come heat or sugar shortage, we must eat. For dinner, today, I made our favorite marinara sauce--with two adjustments. The guys balk at anything meatless so I added meatballs and sausages to the sauce. But cooking it requires about 25 minutes of standing in front of a hot stove (and oven while the meatballs were baking). If you can't stand the heat...!

 

Making the marinara sauce begins with cooking onions, tomatoes, and garlic (I never do what the recipe says with garlic. I use a free hand.). While it was cooking, I made the meatballs. I seasoned 1/2 pound ground chicken with a tablespoon of Italian seasoning and about 1/4 cup of Parmesan cheese.  I scooped the meat onto a tray sprayed with cooking oil and popped the meatballs in a 400˚F oven.

 

The meatballs took about 10 minutes to cook up. Meanwhile, I set a griddle on the stove and grilled the sausages. I used garlic and pepper sausage since I couldn't find sweet Italian sausages in casings. In Bangkok, one must improvise or dinner doesn't make it to the table.

 

Glen gave me this Braun blender when I moved to Illinois and it has been an essential part of my kitchen equipment ever since.  It still works fine attached to the Franzus converter that I got when we came to Thailand in 1989. I added the reserved tomatoes and processed the sauce in eight two-second bursts to make it chunky. 

 

I returned the sauce to the skillet and added the meatballs and sliced sausages.

And there you have it!  Spaghetti with marinara sauce, meatballs, and sausage.

This recipe for marinara sauce came from ATK. It cooks up in less than 30 minutes but tastes like it's been cooking all day!

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In Quest of the Perfect Cheesecake

Picture perfect! The top was a smooth pale yellow, the color of the new moon.  I made  Chantal's New York Cheesecake, my favorite. My problem is I haven't been able to get it to bake just right. The top invariably had a brown ridge around the edge and the sides were brown. Sometimes the cheesecake cracked in the middle because my oven has a broken thermostat and it got too hot.   So I decided to try a new method: the bain marie or water bath.  I wrapped the springform pan in double foil layers and put it in a roasting pan with about 1/2 inch hot water. I baked the cheesecake for one hour and let it sit in the oven with the heat off for another hour. 

I put it on a rack to cool for an hour. The sides of the cheesecake started to shrink from the sides of the pan. I slid a thin paring knife around the edge. I removed the springform pan sides and lo and behold: a soggy crust. I checked the inside of the foil: bone dry. I checked the internet. I discovered what they don't tell you is that soggy crust is a consequence of a water bath. No advice on how to make a soggy crust dry again. Sigh.

After 18 hours in the refrigerator, I sliced the cheesecake. It was a tad creamier than I would have liked but I was surprised to see that the crust towards the edge was somewhat drier than towards the center which was pudding-like in texture. Definitely, a longer baking time would have made a drier crust and a firmer center. Say, 1 1/2 hours. It's a beautiful cheesecake, the prettiest I'd ever made. Looks so professional, too. Now if I could only get the crust right, it'd be perfect!

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