Thai Sweets: Khao Niew Tu Rien

I’ve posted about sticky rice with mango, perhaps the most famous of all Thai sweets, but let me now introduce you to sticky rice with durian, khao niew tu rien. This stuff is two turn tables and a microphone. F’realz.

Soupy sweet durian coconut sauce over sticky rice. This is the classic khao niew tu rien, and while it’s completely delicious, I often find it too sweet for my taste.

Here’s how you’ll usually find it sold—in two separate baggies—one for the sauce and one for the sweet sticky rice. As you can see, I’m able to find it for 20 baht here in Chanthaburi (durian capital of Thailand) but elsewhere you’ll likely pay anywhere from 30–50 baht.

Just some of the goodies on offer at my favorite durian stall in a talat (market) in Chanthaburi. The picture on the left shows my preferred durian and sticky rice combo: no sauce, just a soft pod of durian and a little heap of sweet sticky rice.

Here’s a little bowl with my requested topping of crunchy, mildly salty fried yellow mung beans. These are often served with sticky rice and mango, not durian, but I sometimes enjoy the textural contrast and find the salty mung beans a pleasing counterpart to an often too-sweet khao niew tu rien.

Though I don’t usually go for the sauce, this was a pretty delicious combo. Fresh durian in addition to the classic khao niew tu rien.

 

Before.

After.

 

Ready for consumption. Trust me when I say this little bowl of goodness kept me satiated for a full seven hours. Which is why I actually don’t eat khao niew tu rien very often; it sits like a brick in my stomach. The most divine, delicious, obsession-inducing brick ever.

No Elephants and Other Oddities

I want to share a few odds and ends, things which, despite my unruffleable feathers, still strike me as unique.

This is the sign at the local village market. No elephants allowed!

I… have no words. The graphic and text are pretty equally disturbing.

Why all the durian hate? Surely durian is not as offensive as smoking! This little sign was in a taxi, along with a graphic depiction of a couple having sex. So: no sex, no alcohol, no smoking, and no durians.

Chanthaburi World Durian Festival

I came back to Southeast Asia just in time for durian season and the timing was no coincidence. I arrived in Bangkok, jet-lagged and tired, at six in the morning. By two in the afternoon, I was wandering the streets of the Chanthaburi World Durian Festival.

I tried to temper my expectations, but they were absurdly high. World. Durian. Festival. I likely would have been disappointed by anything short of a free 24-hour tasting booth with my name on it.

So when I saw the festival was a modestly sized street fair with only a few booths devoted to durian, I was disappointed. That said, it is hard for someone as obsessed with durian as I am to be wholly disappointed when at least 20% of the vendors have stacks and piles of my favorite spiked fruit.

It would be a bit more accurate to call this a fruit festival. Chanthaburi is a famous fruit-producing province in Thailand, and the bounty is especially impressive in summer. We walked by many booths overflowing with mangosteens, durians, rambutans, snakefruit, pineapples, jackfruits, and more. In addition, there were stalls selling street food of a wider scope than usual (though there was no sticky rice with durian, which surprised and disappointed me anew). The festival seemed more of an excuse to bring the family, have a walk around the man-made lake with the kiddies, and sample the snacks from the street vendors.

There was a parade and a giant stage.

The sign above the cosmic backdrop says Amazing Thailand World Durian Festival Chanthaburi 2011

And floats decorated elaborately with fruit.

Trust me, you want a closer view of this.

Check out those rabbits made from durians, cucumbers, mini eggplants, and chili peppers. Also, get a load of the chili pepper mustache on the turtle!

There were prizes awarded to the best durians in several categories and breeds.

Everywhere you could see statues of durians, pictures of durians, and even two kids dressed up as durians.

But I was hoping for more. I was hoping for a booth comparing and contrasting the different breeds of durian so I could begin to get an idea of which my favorite were. I thought it might have been nice to have durian in every conceivable permutation—ice cream, pastries, chips, preserved and dried, jams, candies. Maybe some hands-on booths which would allow you to create something—durian with sticky rice, for example. How about an informational booth in which you could learn about the process of growing and harvesting durian? I'd like to know more factoids about durian production in Chanthaburi, too. I know that a higher percentage of land in Chanthaburi is devoted to growing durian than anywhere else in the world, but I'd like to learn more. Maybe it could be possible to book a tour with a local orchard through the festival, then go visit that orchard later during the week, while there, sampling different varieties and seeing how durians are grown.

All the same, there was a lot of durian, and that is guaranteed to put a smile on my face. Here are a few highlights:

Watching durian chips being made. Turns out, it’s basically the same process as potato chips. They take underripe (and thus firm) durian, slice it on a mandoline, then fry it up in batches.

I sampled organically grown durian.

Met a kind seller who gave us all the free durian we could eat, even opening and gifting us a whole three-kilo fruit to share.

But perhaps the biggest success of the afternoon was that I finally got a chance to learn about and taste different varieties of durian: golden pillow, golden button, long stem, gibbon. I’ll write up a separate post comparing these varieties soon.

So of course it was a fun afternoon; it just wasn’t the durian gluttonfest I had anticipated.

The Chanthaburi World Durian Festival is held every year at the beginning of durian season, usually in May.

Grammar note: I apologize for the vacillation. I’m not sure whether durian is a countable or uncountable noun and therefore treated it incoherently as either and both depending on my whim in each sentence :)

When the Durians Fall Down, the Sarongs Go Up

I get self-conscious every time I write about durian. You see, if I wrote about durian as often as I think about it, I’d have to rename this blog Durian Vagabond: Vagabonding in Pursuit of Durian.

I can’t help it though. To me, durian is more than a fruit in the way that to others, wine is more than a drink. Durian has an unmatched depth of flavor, each cultivar completely unique, each fruit unique. Is that a hint of mint? An aftertaste of onions? The brightness of vinegar highlighting a creamy almond custard? And the texture. Oh lordy, the texture. Soft, melting, rich, luscious, sexy. Yes, sexy. There’s a saying in Malaysia and Indonesia: when the durians fall down the sarongs go up. I can’t actually attest to that, but I can say that eating durian gives me a natural kind of high. From the first bite, warmth spreads through my body as a smile takes over my face. Though I would prefer to attribute its happiness-giving-qualities to magic, apparently durian contains tryptophan, a natural antidepressant also found in chocolate.

My friend here, Nutthavan, is often my partner in durian-related highjinks. She loves a perfectly soft and ripe durian as much as I and regales me with stories of the durian of her youth. She grew up in Trang, in southern Thailand, at a time when the ginormous and overly sweet Mon Thong (Golden Pillow) durian was not as prevalent as it is today. The durians then were smaller and less fleshy, but more intensely flavored. And they were allowed to ripen fully on the tree. You wouldn’t think to eat a durian until the tree had released it and it had fallen to the ground with a thud as if to say, “I’m ready. Come eat me! Enjoy!” Eating durian was (and still is) a social activity. Open a few durians and the smell will advertise their presence. Family and friends gather round, grinning with each taste as the magic (er, tryptophan) takes over.

Soft durian and sweet sticky rice accompanied by a durian-infused coconut milk sauce

Durian is widely known to be a heating fruit and is often eaten with the mangosteen, a cooling fruit, to maintain balance. Nutthavan likes to tell me that when she eats durian she doesn’t need a blanket at night. I always chuckle and nod, but what I don’t tell her is that this is Thailand—I never need a blanket at night. After all, durian season follows on the still-hot heels of the hottest season, as if it is Nature’s apology for all the misery She put us through during those sticky, sweltering, sun-drenched days. And with the first luscious bite of durian, all is forgiven.

Durian Mooncakes. Sau Rieng Banh Pia Chay

I’ve mentioned before that Vietnam was one of my favorite countries to eat in. Not only was vegan food easy to find, but it was also cheap, healthy, and popular with locals. And though I loved pho, banh xeo, bun cha gio, banh bao, bun hue, cao lau, and sua dau nanh, my very favorite food in all of Vietnam was undoubtedly sau rieng banh pia chay, or vegan durian-filled mooncakes.

Food in Vietnam, like most non-Western countries, is stubbornly regional. This means that a dish that is a specialty of one city in Vietnam will likely only be found in that city, and so it is with sau rieng banh pia. These mooncakes are local to Soc Trang in southern Vietnam, the Mekong Delta region. They are so stubbornly regional, that I struggled to find them again even in any other city in the Mekong Delta. The first time I encountered them was in a VVR (Vietnamese vegetarian restaurant) in Soc Trang after an acquaintance pointed them out as a local specialty. It only took one bite for me to become hooked.

I already knew of my undying love for durian, but fresh durian is a different beast from preserved, so I wasn’t sure what to expect with these banh pia. The pastry outside is flaky and mild-tasting so it doesn’t compete with the flavorful filling. Its role seems to be to provide a pleasant and light texture. The filling is a dense paste of green beans (yes, that’s the translation. I suspect they are just the inner peas themselves that have been cooked and mashed. Remember, in this part of the world, beans are just as often used in desserts as in savory dishes.) mixed with durian and sugar. The green peas themselves are not noticeable; they provide a subtle backdrop for the more intense flavor of the sweet and creamy durian.

How much do I love sau rieng banh pia chay? Enough that when I find myself in or near Vietnam, I will certainly be making a special trip to the Mekong Delta just for these mooncakes.

Durian. In January. In Bulgaria.

My love for and obsession with durian is no secret. Let me share with you my excitement after one of the friends I was traveling with returned from a short trip to China with an extra special present for me.

29/01/2011

Krushevo, Bulgaria

Well, well, well journal. You'll never believe what happened yesterday. I think only caps lock can truly express my feelings on this matter. DANIEL CAME BACK FROM CHINA AND GUESS WHAT HE BROUGHT ME?! HE BROUGHT ME DURIAN! DURIAN ALL THE WAY FROM CHINA! CAN YOU BELIEVE IT! I'M GOING TO EAT DURIAN IN BULGARIA IN JANUARY! LIFE! AM I RIGHT?!

He brought it back for me in a vacuum seal and had spent hours over the span of a few days searching and searching for my durian. Amazing. This may push him over the top into the best gift giver I have ever met. First the headphones, which I really did need, and now DURIAN! DURIAN IN BULGARIA IN JANUARY!

31/01/2011

This morning I ate the aforementioned durian for breakfast. Oh, it was a glorious morning—a morning that started with durian can only be glorious, no? Though I had hoped to help Lily, Yan, and Tracy [Lily and Yan were my workaway hosts and Tracy, along with Daniel was one of my traveling companions] all try their first taste of my favorite fruit, the timing hadn't worked out, so only Tracy was around to try durian for her first time that morning. Daniel seemed convinced she would throw up even after smelling the fruit, but I thought that was preposterous. Tracy didn't like jackfruit, though, so I didn't expect that she would be a durianphile. But we were both wrong.

Tracy took her first bite and as she ate it, she looked thoughtful. “It’s better than jackfruit,” she declared as soon as she had processed the experience. “I think I like it,” she remarked after having a bit more time to mull everything over. And soon she was saying, “This is delicious!” as I clapped my hands in joy. With every bite, her devotion became more intense, her understanding of my obsession became more profound. It was such a delight for me to have someone to share my durian love with. And Tracy really did begin to share that love.

We spoke of its taste—a bright, almost bubbly, fermented hit of acid first, followed by a burst of sweetness, then a rich, creamy finish and potent, garlicky aftertaste. And Tracy spoke the idea I had often expressed of comparing durian, in its complexity and variety, to wine. I told her of the World Durian Festival I would likely be attending in Chanthaburi, Thailand in May, of all-you-can-eat durian buffets in Malaysia where you get a chance to try several distinct varieties of durian side-by-side, of the vegan coconut milk and durian ice cream I had found in Bangkok, and of my favorite of all Thai desserts—sticky rice (not with mango!) with durian. Perfection! Sweet coconut sticky rice topped with ripe durian and a salted thick coconut cream and sprinkled with crunchy fried yellow mung beans for a wonderful textural touch. Perfection!

Though there were only two pods of durian, I was more than happy, nay, I was thrilled to share it with someone who could appreciate the fruit (the king of fruit) like I could. What a pleasure to watch Tracy become increasingly addicted, fall increasingly in love with durian. How wonderful now to have someone to obsess over it with! Even minutes after taking her first bite, she began talking of going to southeast Asia next, almost purely for durian.

It was a beautiful morning. I could smell the durian on my fingers and could taste it each time I burped. But more precious than all was the experience of sharing something I love with someone and watching her begin to love it as well.

Waxing Poetical About Durian

How can I even begin to give durian its propers? Let me just say this: If I were to die tomorrow I would want nothing but the sweet, custardy flesh of a durian as my last meal in this body. No equivocation. No ifs, ands, or buts. Durian would be my death-row meal.

With a baby durian at a fruit orchard in southern Vietnam.

Okay, boring stuff first. Yes, it has a pungent odor. Yes, it is banned from many hotels and public transport. I, however, love the smell. The stronger the better.

I always tell people who are trying durian for the first time to not think of it as a fruit. It is too rich, too intensely flavored. Think of it as a sweet, almond- and garlic-flavored custard. But every durian is different, has a different flavor profile, so just as one can be a connoisseur of wine, so is it possible to be a durian connoisseur. But I have heard that durian doesn't ship well (though the Thai are developing a variety of durian which can stand up to long-distance transport, but naturally this results in a less delicate, less flavorful fruit), so it is only really possible to be a connoisseur in the appropriate climate.

I remember very clearly a moment in Battambang, Cambodia during the hottest months of the year when I suddenly realized, when it really struck me, I hadn't been dry in weeks. Weeks. Every time I showered, I began to sweat before the fresh water even had a chance to dry. For weeks. Only two things made the heat (and no chance of an air-conditioned refuge) somewhat bearable: the mango tree in the backyard and the fact that it was durian season. Ah, durian season! Durians were plentiful, extra-special delicious, and cheap! During the off season, durians ran about 8000 riel ($2.00) per kilo, but in season, I was finding them regularly for 3000 riel ($0.75) per kilo, sometimes less. Because we had a few durian haters living the in house, I never brought my spoils inside, instead splitting them open (an easy task once you know the trick) and eating them on the table outside. There were many days when all I ate for dinner was the creamy flesh of a ripe durian.

I've heard from Thai and Malaysian friends that the preference for durian varies in each country. The Thai tend to prefer their durian firmer, less ripe, and less pungent, while Malaysians like a very soft and ripe durian. I fall into the latter camp, which, counter intuitively, makes Thailand the perfect place to buy durian as the riper, stinkier fruits sell for less because they are less popular.

Durian is known in southeast Asia as the king of fruit, and mangosteen as the queen. Both fruits come into season at the same time, during the hottest months of April and May, and both are prized for their tastiness (understatement!). Another reason they are considered the king and queen is because durian is known to be a heating food, one that you should not eat too much of lest you aggravate your pitta (I'm taking some liberties here of course, because pitta is a dosha from the ayurvedic tradition and durian is considered heating according to Chinese medicinal tradition), while mangosteen is considered cooling and has the opposite effect. Therefore, you will suffer no negative consequences if you eat durian and mangosteen together.