Beef Lok Lak (by G)

Phnom Phen was a bit of an eyeopener for me when I arrived yesterday evening. It turned out to be much livelier than I'd imagined. Walking around deciding what to eat caused me a bit of anxiety because the choices are limitless. French, Indian, Japanese, Mexican, KFC... whatever you want.  I nearly caved and went to the 'Mexican and Khmer Food' restaurant to have tortillas - I'm really glad I didn't.

In the end I went to a purely Khmer restaurant - though I later heard the owner say that he was in the process of coming up with a French/Khmer menu.  The Lok Lak looked very appealing when it came out - I regret not taking a better photo. I also regret not photographing the rice, which had been molded into the shape of a Cambodia - or perhaps a whale...

The beef was tender and meaty and the sauce tomatoey, salty and a little bit sweet. It came with a small saucer of thin, savory pepper sauce which added a nice kick.  A very charming waitress had earlier told me that her Aunt had taken her to Thailand when she was younger and they had been surprised how spicy the food was - I told her I liked spicy food, which I think maybe she had conveyed to the kitchen because I got a second saucer of pepper sauce midway through the meal.

I was not in much of a drinking mood last night and had had my fill at 3 so when I got the bill I was surprised when another beer arrived. 'Hmmmm, I don't really want another beer', I said. 'But it's 2 for 1 happy hour', She said.  I choked it down and then suddenly I was in a drinking mood because when I got back to my Japanese hotel I drank another 6 beers and (shudder) Sake.

*** A nice food story the waitress told me about her trip to Thailand. She and her aunt went to a restaurant and, as they could not read the menu, ordered at random.  When the food came they were perplexed and alarmed to find that there was no meat.  The Aunt asked someone if there had been some sort of mistake in the kitchen and was shocked to hear that none of the meals had meat - it was a vegetarian restaurant... can you believe it, none of the meals had meat...