Tamarind in the media
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Feature and recipes in Vogue Entertaining and Travel (Australia), October/November 2007"For those interested in genuine Luang Prabang cuisine, a meal at Tamarind offers an excellent primer. Run by Melburnian Caroline Gaylard and her Laotian partner Joy Ngeuamboupha, a one-time novice monk and brilliant cook, Tamarind is a cafe-style establishment where the emphasis is on authentic fare served in a way that makes it accessible to the complete Lao-food neophyte. Conde Nast Traveler magazine, October 2006"...Laos's ancient royal city and former capital also lays claim to its own spice-rich cuisine. Notable traditional dishes like pork sausage and beef stew have been given a professional polish at the many excellent new restaurants that have recently cropped up in atmospheric restored houses on Sakkalin Road. Tamarind, the best of the lot, is just of Sakkalin in Ban Wat Nong. Try one of the Lao family-style meals." Lifestyle + Travel magazine, Sept-Oct 2006"Lao cuisine reaches the zenith of its creativity in LP, where a crop of new restaurants are resuscitating traditional Lao food with professional twists...My favourite new local restaurant here is Tamarind, which specialises in assemblies of dishes such as Traditional Lao Family meal: stew, grilled meat or fish, chilli sauce and sticky rice." Bangkok Airways inflight magazine (Fah Thai)Cheap chic: Tamarind Link: Fah Thai magazine SmartTravelAsia.com review"Tamarind, meanwhile (opposite Wat Nong) doubles up as a lovely, original gift shop combining Lao snacks and tasting platters with recipes, tableware, herbs and seeds all for sale. Best visit at lunch though, for it closes at 6pm." Link: Smart Travel Asia Chowhound.com forum"I recommend Tamarind. They offer lots of really interesting inexpensive dishes and are happy to explain as you go. We tried jujube-fruit drinks and stuffed lemongrass and the next day tried an Adventurous Gourmet platter." >>"I second the recommendation. It's a great place to try things out as it's all explained. Also, they have some nice and unusual things." Link: Chowhound I'veBeenThere.co.uk
"The best place to try real Lao food: you get platters of interesting things to try. Fish barbecue Lao style is great fun and they had lovely gifts of food. Super friendly, not expensive and great drinks! Only open daytimes but worth a visit. It's opposite a temple called Wat Nong, lovely location actually, we listened to chanting monks while we ate." Link: Been There Travelpod.com blog"We then went to a fantastic restaurant, Tamarind, opened actually by an Aussie now living in Laos. It is apparently some of the most honest Laotian food in Luang Prabang, available in a restaurant. What makes it typical are the ingredients (lots of fresh herbs and spices), the dishes (actually more like dips), the sticky rice, and how it is eaten.
So what you do is take a small amount of sticky rice into your fingers, then make a little ball out of it, and then dip it into one of the sauces. YUM! What could be better, you get to play with your food and eat delicious Lao dips!! One was smoked eggplant, another cilantro and other greens (my favorite), and the other a tomato base. They were great. The other typical dish we got, which we had actually also had in the market were these spring roll type things. We were given a few different fillings to put into lettuce leaves and roll right up and eat. Also delicious! Needless to say we completely disagree with the Lonely Planet's assertion that Laos food is just really unexciting (hello! did they even go to Luang Prabang?)I think we were most impressed with the food in Luang Prabang of any place we had been thus far. Really, sticky rice is where it's at." Link: Travelpod Travbuddy.com blog"All the way towards the end of the peninsula where the Mekong and Nam Khan Rivers meet, we found The Tamarind restaurant, a place we had read about. It is run by an Aussie expat, Caroline who used to work for Travelfish. She and her partner are trying to prepare and serve real local Luang Prabang food instead of the typical tourist food served elsewhere. Lunch was really good and was a small platter of local delicacies such as Luang Prabang sausages, a spicy jaeow Chili paste, dried buffalo and preserved bamboo shoots and pickled vegetables. Cindy had grilled lemongrass stuffed with pork. Tamarind also does some custom dinners with advance notice including an "Adventurous meal" that includes some of the less known Laotian delicacies that can be tailored to suit your palate. I asked her if she ate some of the weirder ones like larvae to which she grimaced and said "No way." I might have trouble convincing Cindy on this one. Caroline was a wealth of Information and has helped us figure out our itinerary." Link: Travbuddy BallofDirt.com blog"The food here is delicious and we found a restauant called Tamarind Cafe where the owner is Australian with a Laos chef. The place is all about trying traditional Laos food and we sampled a lot of it, including buffalo jerky which was unusually sweet - yummy" Link: Ball of Dirt Blogspot.com"One of the highlights of our gourmand treats was a visit to a new restaurant called Tamarind - ok I dragged Andy there twice. The owner, a former Australian tour guide, showed us the proper way to eat sticky rice and eat the local delicacies - no utensils and always use your right hand. I was contemplating donning a saffron robe and joining the young monks at the wat across the street - until I remembered that they didn't get to eat at Tamarind." Link: Blogspot RealTravel.com blog"That afternoon we had arranged to go for a traditional Laos meal - we had previously gone for an Ice Coffee in this lovely little place called Tamarind which is opposite one of the Vat's (Temples). It is run by an Australian woman called Caroline and her partner. We got chatting about food (there's a surprise!) and she told us that she wants to introduce real Laos food to Western people - not the simplified Laos food that Lao people think we want to eat.
The 4 of us had steamed fish stuffed with herbs and lemongrass wrapped in Banana Leaves and served with a selection of green leaves, fresh veggies, noodles, chilli sauce and peanuts. The idea is basically to make a wrap using the green leaves (lettuce leaf, beetle nut leaf etc) and filling it with fish, veggies, noodles, chillies and sauce etc. Its quite a messy meal but it was just delicious. We finished off with purple sticky rice and tamarind sauce just as the sun was setting. Yummy." Link: RealTravel Tamarind visitors' book
Eija Lindon-Saffioti
Karin, Singapore
Carl Saffioti
Anjuli & Rick Johannessen, Hong Kong
Winston Tan, Singapore |
