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Karen Coates
Karen Coates
Former Gourmet Asia correspondent. Freelance journalist and media trainer. Author of Cambodia Now: Life in the Wake of War and co-author of Pacific Lady: the First Woman to Sail Solo across the World's Largest Ocean.
By Karen Coates on March 10, 2010
It was 1998 when Jerry first visited the 7 January Bread Co., named for the day the Vietnamese invaded Phnom Penh and ousted the Khmer Rouge. The factory is tucked in a big building, blackened with the soot of continuous fire. Young men hustled through the blazing heat of the giant ovens that cooked the [...]
Posted in Food | Tagged baguette, Cambodian bread, Khmer bread, Phnom Penh
By Karen Coates on March 7, 2010
Sokheng is 16. She grew up in Prey Veng province but left home to work in a bread factory, cooking meals for 20 or 30 sweaty, hungry young men who make the little baguettes sold everywhere on Phnom Penh’s streets. She tends the charcoal fires in a dark nook beside the blazing ovens that inspire [...]
Posted in Food | Tagged household chores, International Women's Day, women's work
By Karen Coates on March 4, 2010
Speaking of Wisconsin, and beer food, I’m really surprised my fellow Cheeseheads have not picked up on this: wafer-thin fried cheese, Yunnan style. See—it’s all crispy and bubbly, dipped in salt (and a teensy bit of sugar). Read more.
Posted in Food | Tagged beer food, cheese, Wisconsin, Yunnan cheese
By Karen Coates on March 1, 2010
Today, a new partnership begins. From now on, you will find more of my ramblings on the Food Page of The Faster Times. I’ll be writing twice a month about Food Culture and linking back here with additional information and photos. Remember all those tasty Asian ways with peanuts I mentioned a few weeks ago? [...]
Posted in Food | Tagged Angkor Peanuts, beer nuts, Cambodia, The Faster Times
By Karen Coates on February 24, 2010
It feels worlds away and ages ago, those crisp wintry days (and nights) we spent in Wisconsin shortly after Christmas. Jerry and I traveled north from my parents’ place to Wausau, to meet Jim, and to explore the world of Hmong cooking in America. Then south again, to Milwaukee, to taste the Hmong flavors found [...]
Posted in Food, Travel
By Karen Coates on February 23, 2010
This is the last week to catch an extraordinary Reyum exhibit, Measurements in Khmer Society. It takes you through history, through the market and rice field, through sunrise and sunset, and everything between, to explain every little way in which Khmer people have measured the important stuff of life. The French introduced the meter in [...]
Posted in Food, Travel | Tagged Cambodia, Khmer measurements, Reyum
By Karen Coates on February 18, 2010
One night, the lights go out in Battambang, and we are presented with the prospect of candlelight dining. This is a throwback to years past, when generators rumbled through the dark and electricity flickered on and off. We planned a patio dinner anyway; a few flames in the breeze would add ambiance to the meal. [...]
Posted in Food, Travel | Tagged Battambang, Cambodia, grilled chicken, grilled pork
By Karen Coates on February 10, 2010
Cambodia drives me to drink. Picture: riverfront sunsets with amber rays, light grazing across cocktail-hour boats and the saffron folds of a monk’s robe. Warm breeze, jasmine air. Pedicabs and pushcarts, buzzing mopeds, rumbling trucks. Kids selling postcards and photocopied books, and a seat at the sidewalk where I can watch it all (this can [...]
Posted in Food, Travel | Tagged beer snacks, Cambodia, Peanuts
By Karen Coates on February 7, 2010
We did something the other day that we hadn’t done in ages: we became tourists for a day. Just as the morning sun cast its butter-colored rays across Siem Reap, we caught a tuk-tuk to the temples. With one-day passes in our pockets, we joined the throngs at Angkor (my, how things have changed!). More.
Posted in Food, Travel | Tagged Angkor, Angkor Wat, Bayon, Cambodia
By Karen Coates on February 4, 2010
So you’re a young Khmer guy in the big town of Siem Reap, and you’re out for dinner—alone. But your honey is on the phone, and your grin gives that fact away. You chat and chat with that grin real wide until the fried rice comes to the table. More.
Posted in Food | Tagged Cambodia, fried rice, Siem Reap