Anyone can cook, but only the fearless can be great.

How does this relate to the world of pies?

Watching the movie Ratatouille one night in Bangkok (song in there somewhere) Duang had a Eureka moment.  When Anton Ego tastes the meal and flashes back to his childhood, she finally got what I had been telling her all these years.  That being, we are in the nostalgia business, making our core stock as traditional as possible to bring about such an effect.

I want people to eat our pies and be whisked away to football stadiums, winters market places, school bus trips and days fishing whilst skiving school.  Keeping it simple but trying always to extract more flavour from the basic traditional ingredients, through better technique rather than enhancers is what keeps me awake at night, and chained to the kitchen most of the day.  It's this traditional taste that works,  not adding Maggi sauce, nam pla,  MSG, paprika, german smoked ham to pork pies etc. etc.  and now the wife sees this, it's game on this year.

As Duang is not keen to slave over a hot stove all day making food she cannot understand and rarely eats, it has been hard to really get her fired up about Steak and Kidney, sausage rolls and pork pies.  As we think Asians all look alike, they think our food all tastes alike.... namely bland. For us to spend hours shopping just for that right cut of fresh meat, tinkering, stirring adding a smidgen of salt is a complete waste of time, as it is still falang food..... still bland.

It has been hard to inspire her and get the quality ever higher and to raise the level of service in our coffee shop to... lets say dreadful!  That would be an improvement most days. So, Tony liked the movie as it had a mouse in it and he knew the Thai word  for mouse and kept saying it, so I decided to use it as a training aid.

There has been an improvement this year after watching Ratatouille 30-40 times so I am quiet pleased with that.  It's back to basics on the old favourites, and leave the cooking with flare and pioneering work (adding chllies mainly) to the Thai Fusion range. Lots of improvements to flavour and texture can be brought about just by trying harder and keeping focused.

With Thai subtitles to guide them through the movie, some of it stuck and we are now almost going places with the (alleged) coffee shop. I pointed out how in the movie everybody knew their job and work station and didn't sit around eating rotten fish until somebody shouted at them to work.  The waiters didn't sit round watching Thai soaps, Talog,  Hit Station, Ying gab Ying, Fan TV etc.  in the restaurant leaving the customers to seek them out, find their own cutlery and menus. Must have seemed sureal to her!

I am in Bangkok again this week on my own as it's high season in Khao Lak and we are just trying to juggle with business until it quietens down and Um comes back.  I am hoping that this training video will see the shop in Khao Lak running smoothly in my absence.  The air will certainly be a bit less blue with me gone, but will the customers enjoy the experience!

Quick introduction to three people in my life here in Khao Lak and my fine motorbike. We have helmets, but the only time they wear them is if they see the Police setting up a check point, or if they are caught on the wrong side of the checkpoint.... twice this month already.

Duang, Tony and Umm  Truly Fearless.  

What happens at a Police checkpoint is that everybody without a licence or helmet, stops 100m short of it, U-turns and goes the other way or sits at the side of the road waiting for the Police to go away.  I usually get the call and have to then find a mate with a car, drive through the cordon, find the girls in the enormous throng of illegal bike riders, who are by now settled down eating drinking and smoking,   teach them a few choice Anglo Saxon and Yorkshire expressions and take the bike back.  They have to go in the car as they are completely illegal and not fit to be on an exercise bike, let alone the main Phetkasem Highway.

The really funny thing about this spectacle is the group of illegals is almost in shouting distance of the Police check point.  It's a stale mate, the Police don't think they could catch many of them if they chased them and in any case would lose face and look un-cool chasing this horde of rapscallions.  It's a good old fashioned stand off and the icing on the cake is that when the Police pack up (it's a mobile check point) they have to drive away through one of these groups, who are by now getting on their bikes and setting off again.

It is nice when we get back to the shop though,  as they are usually very sheepish and I give them lots of grim menial tasks to help them shed their guilt.