Cambodian food or their skills?

I come from a country with very few signature dishes but IMHO Cambodia has a few

Zyzz wrote: ↑Sat Mar 30, 2024 7:14 pm Sorry but cambodian food is just horrible... and it gets me very sick. Wife doesnt cook very good...her mother cooks worse. I usually only cook my own food from a supermarket not from the street or ill eat out at non cambodian food restaurants. She always wonders why i barely eat the food she makes.but eat everything i buy outside very fast.

Its funny. Anything she eats i think is disgusting but anything very good and normal to me shes not interested in at all. Usually if its weird or disgusting looking she will be eating it. She looks at burgers like thats weird.

I think your mother in law and you are probably from the same generation, we call them "the farmer only eats what he knows". Thats why you (think) you get sick from her food and she looks weird to yours. Its between the ears, especially for persons over a certain age (would say +65 ??), do the test blind and pretty sure you will like more then you ever did !! I remember 15 years ago my ex saw me eating in france a raw steak-tartare, she almost vomited (she is colombian) and made fotos to send to her family that she lives together with a kannibal who eats raw meat. Its similar in Cambodia, try to eat steak tartare in a french restaurant with a Khmer girl, samesame reaction !! Its because they are learned from childtime, if its not well done, its full of bad beasties . . .
Its all between the ears, i love Khmer food and never was sick from it (not more then from western food), ofcourse after a 24-pack of Anchor you never know !!

Kammekor wrote: ↑Sat Mar 30, 2024 8:49 pm Cambodian food or their skills?

I come from a country with very few signature dishes but IMHO Cambodia has a few

Somewhere along the way I got hooked on Lok Lak as my go-to recovery breakfast after a late night out.
And now I get a hankering for it any old morning.
It's one of the dishes I miss most when I'm outside Cambodia.
You can get it elsewhere, but it's not the same (so many little variables like ingredients, freshness, recipe etc...)

newkidontheblock wrote: ↑Sat Mar 30, 2024 9:22 pm

Zyzz wrote:Sorry but cambodian food is just horrible... and it gets me very sick. Wife doesnt cook very good...her mother cooks worse. I usually only cook my own food from a supermarket not from the street or ill eat out at non cambodian food restaurants. She always wonders why i barely eat the food she makes.but eat everything i buy outside very fast.

Its funny. Anything she eats i think is disgusting but anything very good and normal to me shes not interested in at all. Usually if its weird or disgusting looking she will be eating it. She looks at burgers like thats weird.

Maybe it’s a mindset thing?

Missus was stressed yesterday and wanted to eat at Floyd’s. Had half a dozen oysters, coconut crusted shrimp with chili sauce, fried flounder with dirty rice topped with crawfish tails. She ate it all up.



I had freshly fried grasshoppers a few weeks ago. Lightly seasoned, legs and wings removed. Smelled great, tasted even better. Like crunchy fried (fill in blank) - chips, pig skins, etc.

Did you know there is a Crawdad farm in Takeo? When I lived in Houston, we often went to backyard Crawdad boils. Have not had Crawdad in many moons. Gotta find out where this farm is located and do a Southern style Crawdad boil. #suckthehead

I have found this Khmer dish, Samlor Korko, to be quite impressive.

According to wikipedia, "Samlor kako (Khmer: សម្លកកូរ, lit. 'stirring soup', pronounced [sɑmlɑː kɑːkou]) or Cambodian ratatouille is a traditional Cambodian soup considered one of Cambodia's national dishes. Samlar kako consists of green kroeung, prahok, roasted ground rice, catfish, pork or chicken, vegetables, fruits and herbs."

It is amazing that this whole thread consists of only negative responses to the food with only 2 exceptions. I really do ask myself, why people that have settled down here (I'm not talking about tourists or NGO) are not willing to adopt the local way of life. Just replace bread and potatoes with rice in your head (and of course to make sure, that your cook is not applying the extra spoon of sugar and MSG), then you can have cheap food with indeed great taste. But I guess changing habits is not suitable for everyone and it is preferred to spend a fortune on food and lifestyle stuff, just to have it like back at home. So why not stay back at home in the first place?

ressl wrote: ↑Fri Apr 05, 2024 6:07 am It is amazing that this whole thread consists of only negative responses to the food with only 2 exceptions. I really do ask myself, why people that have settled down here (I'm not talking about tourists or NGO) are not willing to adopt the local way of life. Just replace bread and potatoes with rice in your head (and of course to make sure, that your cook is not applying the extra spoon of sugar and MSG), then you can have cheap food with indeed great taste. But I guess changing habits is not suitable for everyone and it is preferred to spend a fortune on food and lifestyle stuff, just to have it like back at home. So why not stay back at home in the first place?

I think it's just human nature to stick with food you grew up with and your taste buds know it. I have met people (East Asians) who find foreign food difficult to enjoy. I grew up in Houston and the San Francisco Bay Area ... both full of international communities and their food. As a kid, my parents introduced us kids to all sorts of different international foods. When I left USA for the first time in 1989 (as a Marine) ... I got stationed in Okinawa. Wow ... this was the start of a culinary adventure that keeps getting better and better ... but my all-time favorite is still Northern Mexico, specifically Baja Norte ... nothing beats a good fish taco in my book!