Inside Chef Vina’s masterclass on getting Thai food right

Before the wok heated up, we had a quick chat with Chef Vina and asked her everything. She is the Royal Thai Embassy’s guest chef, has cooked for presidents and royal banquets, and knows Thai cuisine in India inside out. As part of The Authentic Thai Culinary Journey with Chef Vina, guests could choose between a seven-course Thai tasting menu or a Thai masterclass & buffet dinner, we opted for the latter.

By the sea in Pondicherry, we learnt the art of authentic Thai cooking

On how Indian diners have changed, she is genuinely optimistic. Thai food used to get heavily adapted for the Indian palate, she says, too much fish sauce, too much salt, not enough herbs, the balance that defines authentic Thai cooking completely lost in translation. But things are shifting. More Indians are travelling to Thailand now and coming back knowing what the food is actually supposed to taste like. One of the biggest misconceptions she wants to clear up: not everything in Thai cooking has fish sauce in it. There are light soy sauces, thin soy sauces, a whole range of other options. The fish sauce assumption, she says, has kept a lot of people away from a cuisine that can very easily accommodate them.

On balance, she is almost philosophical. Thai food is not about any one flavour winning. Everything should be present and nothing should dominate: not the lemon, not the salt, not the sweet. The balance is the point. The herbs, kaffir lime, lemongrass, Thai basil, galangal, are what give Thai cooking its particular identity, and she is delighted to report that most of them are now available in Indian markets without much searching. She also wants Indian diners to know about khao soi, the northern Thai noodle dish that she rarely sees on menus here.

Her favourite dish to cook and to eat every day is pad krapow. Chicken pad krapow, specifically. She explains, “In Thailand, if you don’t know what to eat, you order pad krapow. Same like here, if you don’t know what to eat, you order biriyani.”

Then the masterclass, it was held right next to the beach at The Promenade in Pondicherry. The sun was still out when we arrived and the breeze was doing its job. The pantry was assembled on the tables with a care that immediately told you this was not going to be a casual demonstration. Two participants per station. Supporting chefs at each one to help when things went sideways.

Chef Vina cooked first while everyone watched, asked questions, and tasted raw ingredients. Then we tried it ourselves. We made a raw papaya salad, learning to balance the sourness of the tamarind against the heat of the chilli and the sweetness that rounds everything out. Then a Thai tamarind prawns, and then the Chicken pad krapow.

What made it more than a cooking class was the conversation that kept breaking out during the demonstrations. As Chef Vina described kitchen practices in Thailand, what is available in Bangkok markets, the participants responded with how the same things work in Chennai, in Indian kitchens, in their own homes. Two food cultures finding their overlaps in real time, standing over a hot pan next to the ocean.

Although the buffet awaited us, all the tasting, tweaking, and sneaking bites along the way had left us quite full, and we had to summon some serious willpower to make room for it.

Thai Tasting Menu: Rs 2,995 + . On September 11. From 7 pm. Thai Masterclass and Buffet Dinner: Rs 1,995 +. On September 12. 5 pm onwards. At The Promenade, Puducherry.