Food Glorious Food - September Travel Link-Up

This month the travel link up topic is all about food! Anyone who knows me knows that I love food and wont back down from unusual foods. 

Being Coeliac I do miss out on some yummy foods (no Krispy Kremes here) but last year I travelled to Cambodia and was able to try so much of the local cuisine there. From the Spider wine to the tarantulas, Cambodia was delicious!

I did want to write about the time I ate cricket - but I am not savvy enough to get the video from my Facebook onto my blog, so instead I thought I would touch on my cooking experience in Siem Reap.

At The Corner on Pub Street, 3 of us from my Intrepid tour group, were set up with our own cooking stations for our 4 course meal.

We went with the chef to the local market for some fresh ingredients and our first course we attempted was a Banana Flower Salad with chicken.

At first, the taste was a bit peculiar, but I started to enjoy it and of course ate most of it except the leaf.. and the mint. 

Our next course Sam Lor Koh Koo which is similar to a vegetarian curry poured over steamed rice.

The main course was Steamed Fish Amok in Banana Leaf. I am not a fish eater so was able to substitute the fish with chicken. Unfortunately we didn't get to try our hand and forming the banana leaf bowl as they were pre made.

To finish off, we made Banana sago in coconut milk for dessert, which was superb. 

We booked the cooking class through our Intrepid tour for around US$20. It was held at The Corner Bar and Restaurant on Pub Street in Siem Reap. 

Recipes below. 

                         

 

How to link up your post:

Just pop your post up over the first week of the month (the 1st - 7th September), add it to the link up widget - found on either Angie's, Jessi's, Emma's or on our lovely co-host Tanja at Red Phone Box Travels - from the 1st of the month.

There are no rules – basically all we ask is that you check out some of the other cool bloggers that are involved in that months travel link up; make a few comments here and there and tweet a few of the posts out that you think they will love. It’s a great way to meet some new travel bloggers and share some blogging joy!

The Travel Link Up is open to all bloggers as long as the post is relevant.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

Cambodia - Choeung Ek and S-21

I had heard of Pol Pot before visiting Cambodia, but only in a general sense. I had no idea of the extent of the atrocities that he and his Khmer Regime committed.

3 kilometres from the capital of Phnom Penh lies the killing fields of Choeung Ek.

Over a million people were murdered, men and women, old and young, Khmer, Viet Cong and foreign.

There are 129 mass graves in the former orchard.

The bodies that have been exhumed have been placed in a Buddhist Stupa on the site to commemorate those that have died and also in the hope that one day DNA testing can be undertaken.

Mothers were made to watch as the Khmer Rouge cadres smashed the heads of their babies against the trunk of a tree and then were raped before having their throats cut with a palm stem or bashed with an iron bar.

Afterwards, both mother and baby were buried in a mass grave close to the Killing Tree, naked.

Nearly all of those that were murdered at Choeung Ek were prisoners detained in Security Prison 21, also known as Toul Sleng.

S-21 was a detention centre in the heart of Phnom Penh. 

Barbed wire around 3 storey buildings to stop suicides

Prisoners tied upside down. When they lost consciousness, they would be dipped in stagnant water 

The rules of the prison

Individual cell. 





There were 7 known survivors of S-21, two of who now stay at the museum in an effort to tell the new generation the atrocities that they survived.

Chum Mey, survived 12 days of torture, including being electrocuted and having his big toe nail ripped out.

Today, tour guides will not answer specific questions about those in power during the regime in public as a lot of those involved in the Khmer government are still, or have family members, involved in government today.

* I visited Choeung Ek and S-21 as part of my Cambodia Discovery tour with Intrepid Travel.  Both sites can be visited by tuktuk from Phnom Penh.