A great start to the day; we got our morning coffee and an educational show at, “Mountain Coffee”, a little coffee place just steps down the lane from the Yindee. We ordered our “i-coffees” (Thai-style iced coffees) and were able to watch as the staff finished roasting a batch of Doi Chaang coffee beans. Cool, ‘cuz we’ll be heading to the Doi Chaang area the next morning. Check out our barista/coffee-roaster; he’s wearing a hat that is traditionally associated with the “Akha” – one of the northern Hill Tribes. Let me tell you… the aroma of the freshly roasted beans was… intoxicating.

Morning i-coffees.

Roasting coffee beans.

Freshly roasted coffee beans.

Pouring out the roasted beans.

After coffee, we high-tailed it back to the Yindee where “Ton” (our instructor) picked us up for a full-day cooking class at, the Siam Rice Thai Cookery School (http://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g293917-d1066025-Reviews-Siam_Rice_Thai_Cookery_School-Chiang_Mai.html). The first part of the class involved going to a local Chiang Mai market.

Starting off with a market tour.

Meat counters at the market.

Roasted caterpillars, anyone?

How about some fried chicken?!?!

After picking up fresh produce for the day’s class, Ton drove us to the school.

Siam Rice Thai Cookery School.

Siam Rice classroom.

Ingredients for each course were laid out beautifully.

Roger cooking.

Eron making Pad Thai.

We each make our own chill paste… from scratch!

Roger preparing Drunken Noodles.

A quick taste-test.

Each student chose (from a list) and prepared six dishes… and then got to eat them! Between the two of us, we got to try out twelve distinctly different Thai courses. At the end, the school even threw in a quick lesson in Thai decorative vegetable carving. It was one long hard day of eating, I have to say.

The school dropped us off at a local shopping mall after the class; we had to pick up a few things before heading north in the morning.

After a well-deserved siesta, we went in search of… dinner, of course. Since we spent most of an entire day eating our way through a Thai restaurant menu, we settled on something a little less exotic. We found ourselves at the U.N. Irish Pub (http://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g293917-d942127-Reviews-U_N_Irish_Pub-Chiang_Mai.html), a fav of the local ex-pat community located just around the corner from our guesthouse.

Then it was time for a quick cigar and it was off to bed; it’s going to be an early morning start.