I just realised that I’ve not posted about my Cambodian trip I did earlier this year in February from the 4th to 11th where I visited Siem Reap and Battambang, the second largest city in Cambodia. (Yes, I also have my incomplete travel posts on Scotland in 2012 and US road trip in 2011. It’s impossible to keep up.)
Warning: The posts will have a lot of photos. Travelling alone allows me to take photos without feeling like I’m making someone bored.
I’ve posted plenty of photos in my Cambodia 2014 gallery and I’ll start here with a general overview of Siem Reap town, some roadside sightings, the local markets and interesting foods I tasted along the way.
In general, I’m unimpressed by Cambodian cuisine, but the local snacks are worth trying. Perhaps it’s the tourist taste buds that have been accommodated for in the restaurants of Siem Reap. But I did not fare much better in Battambang where I stayed for a night. But more about food later.
The town of Siem Reap itself is quite dislikeable as it’s really just more or less for the tourist.
There are plenty of spas where you can be kneaded by hand or have your feet nibbled on by fish. The Cambodian massage is, for a lack of proper terminology, soft. It relieves for only a short while. But it’s cheap enough to keep going back again and again, I guess. I didn’t, as I only tried it on my last day before my flight out.
Then there are the night markets. They’re everywhere, selling the same kind of stuff. T-shirts, overpriced spices, postcards. There is the Art Market across the Siem Reap river, which features Cambodian sculptures and rather stiff Cambodian paintings. But art is a matter of taste, I suppose. Then of course there is Pub Street, where it’s again, tourist central. Since I’m generally disinterested in such things, I avoided it.
Perhaps the best thing about Siem Reap town itself for me, was finding the local ice cream seller. The durian ice cream was fantastic.
In Singapore, the bread of choice is a soft sweet bread. I actually do not like the one served in Singapore and always select the cone, or take the sliced ice cream between wafers.
In contrast, the one used in Cambodia is a baguette. This is much better. Texture-wise, the baguette holds up to melting ice cream and in the mouth, it doesn’t become one soggy mass stuck in between teeth. But as with all baguettes, you need a good set of teeth and a strong jaw. (Which I should blog about my trip to Paris. A post that will probably take even longer to come, if ever.)
Phare, a local circus – not the American kind, but the French kind – is quite interesting. Like what an undeveloped underfunded Cirque du Soleil might be. It’s a non-profit setup that educates vulnerable children. One aspect of their education is an arts school teaching animation, performing arts and so on. Once they graduate, they become performers at Phare.
Out of Siem Reap town, I found things a bit more interesting.
I took plenty of risks with the stomach when I sampled freshwater snails sold by the roadside. Yes, it’s seasoned on the outside, peppered with a lot of dust from traffic and I sucked it all up.
Because the stalls are exposed along the road, the clams are warm from the sun.
Another risk I took was eating Cambodian noodles from a bicycle vendor. That means no washing facilities whatsoever. She washed the bowls in re-used water. But Cambodian noodles are so good. It’s served at room temperature. There are two gravies used. One is a yellow coconut gravy, the other is a sweeter red gravy with shrimp and peanuts. There are loads of vegetables and herbs in it. You can see the photos in the gallery: Here, here and here.
Of fruit, I tried the milk fruit. Either eaten when green or slightly riper when it’s purple, the sap of the fruit is milky. The texture is like a custard apple. The seed is of the colour and size of that of a chiku. And it is ever so mildly sweet.
The watermelons are small. No larger than 10cm diameter across but are flavourful.
I was unimpressed by Cambodian BBQ and fish amok.
I tried the fish amok a couple of times at different places and I found the egg and coconut gravy just too watered down for my liking. Sometimes the fish was not as fresh as it could’ve been.
The Cambodian barbecue is half steamboat, half hotplate. You get a plate of lard. You oil the hotplate dome. The moat around it is a soup stock. I really only enjoyed one pork marinated in a red sauce. The rest didn’t catch my fancy.
It was at the local markets and along the roadside that I most enjoyed the food I ate. And they tended to be places away from Siem Reap.
The local markets are an experience. Outside, you’ll find fresh fruit, further in sundries, fresh meats and seafood, cooked food and right in the centre, silver and gold. That’s right, jewellery.
At the local market, you can get everything – electronics, snacks, personal items, a hair cut, pedicure. You name it, there’s nothing you wouldn’t find there.
Along the way, I saw Kralan sold, but it wasn’t till Battambang that I sampled some as I was too full. Kralan is the equivalent of Lemang in Malaysia: Glutinous rice cooked in tubes of bamboo. Unlike Lemang, Kralan is sweet. There is also black beans and grated coconut mixed in the rice.
The blackened outer bark of the bamboo is stripped away before being sold along the roadside. You can tear the bark apart and use it as a makeshift spoon.
Another snack of glutinous rice and whole banana wrapped in banana leaf and barbecued over coals. And they grill it slowly and long enough so that all the flavour of banana leaf has permeated through the rice. Yummy!
There is one more snack that is available in Singapore that is done exceptionally well in Siem Reap and Battambang. It is the humble goreng pisang. But the humble fruit fritter is truly out of this world. Pictured here, the goreng pisang is flattened (as seen here) and then dipped in a batter that has black sesame seeds that is both crisp and slightly chewy.
I tried this at three markets: The largest in Siem Reap, called Psar Leu, the one a 10-minute walk from my hotel, called Psar Kraoum and the one in Srah Srang area. Nothing came close to the one sold by this lady seller at the Srah Srang market. If you use Chrome, read my post on useful extensions and get the map off the photo. Believe me when I saw I will fly again to Siem Reap to find this woman and her goreng pisang. It is also at this same Srah Srang market, where the Cambodian noodles were better tasting that the one sold by the lady on the bicycle.
There are two other reasons I’d re-visit Siem Reap again.
One is this lovely red pau made with red dragon fruit. It lends a slightly sweet taste to the steamed bun.
The filling is not great, but I would just eat the bun again. This place is just before Banteay Srei if you’re coming from Siem Reap.
I think we Chinese should re-invent the longevity birthday pau with this dough.
The other is, believe it or not…
Let’s break it down and look at the details…
I was prepared to hate it. Overcome with guilt like eating dog meat. And the first time I tried it in Battambang, it didn’t taste all that good with just salt, pepper and lime. But, with the garlic and chilli, all sweet and sour, this really made for a tasty treat.
I ordered one from this lady. It was so good, I had another. Two eggs, and I was stuffed.
A colleague tried balut in the Philippines. But he didn’t seem to like it.
It was creamy, which I didn’t expect, because the pong tia koon, as it is called in Cambodia, is supposed to be even more mature with baby duck bones and all. I didn’t have to crunch on any bones, although there was something in the egg that was hard and chewy. But overall, it was tasty!