Talk:Cambodian cuisine

Khmer-style curries in the cuisine of Southern Vietnam?

Hi and thank you for your sources, Otomo Ajah! While curries are undoubtedly Indian in their ultimate origin, is really more likely that the Southern Vietnamese adopted all of them from a few thousand recent Indian migrants in the 19th century when the neighboring Khmers, more than a million some of whom were incorporated in Vietnam in the same century and brought a number of other dishes to the cuisine of Southern Vietnam (bún nước lèo, bún mắm, canh xiêm lo, cốm dẹp, bánh cống, ọm chiếl), had been cooking very similar coconut-based curries from at least the 15th century and already introduced them in neighboring Thailand in the 15th century (Penny Van Esterik (2008). Food Culture in Southeast Asia, page 12)? Am I missing something? There clearly seems to be differing opinions among culinary authors and historians. As for the variation of Vietnamese curries, I don't dispute that just about any protein can be put in the curry base, but chicken curries is what almost exclusively came up when Googling "Vietnamese curries", so it seems to be the most popular one by far. –Turaids (talk) 10:23, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

Oh, according to what I learned, curry only began to be popular in southern Vietnam after the French colonialists colonized Vietnam and with that came the arrival of Indian immigrants to the region southern Vietnam. And I find it unlikely that there were more than a million Khmers in Vietnam in the 19th century, since in 1876 Cambodia's population was only 890,000 Otomo Ajah (talk) 15:48, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

Would you mind sharing any sources on that? There are recent scientific studies that curries were already being prepared at least 2000 years ago in the Hindu-Khmer Funan of what used to be lower Cambodia, but now is modern-day southern Vietnam. Did they stop making curries at some point in between until the Indians reintroduced them in the 19th century once the region became part of Vietnam? Very much sounds like an anachronism to me. I couldn't find any other Khmer Krom numbers than the 2019 one, so you're right that in 19th century it was probably much less than that though. –Turaids (talk) 18:19, 11 November 2023 (UTC)

"By the late nineteenth century the dish was more familiar to the French in Europe than it was to ordinary Vietnamese and Chinese. Imagined as neither French nor Vietnamese, curry allowed French people to maintain that they did not eat the same food as the populations they had colonized." (Erica J. Peters (2012)). Appetites and Aspirations in Vietnam - page 162. I think that if curry was popular in southern Vietnam before the French arrived, then curry certainly would not be chosen by the French to eat in their daily menu in Vietnam Otomo Ajah (talk) 06:43, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

As I've shown, there is not only archeological evidence that curries were already being prepared in modern-day Southern Vietnam at least 2000 years ago, but also Vietnamese historian Hong Lien Vu writing in her 2016 book "Rice and Baguette: A History of Food in Vietnam" that:

• "Along with the movement south, many Việt settlers came to stay in the newly acquired land. They were traders, soldiers and followers of the founder of the Nguyễn dynasty, Lord Nguyễn Ánh (later Emperor Gia Long), who was fighting to wrest the throne from his rivals in the north. The new Việt settlers soon acquired culinary habits and dishes from the local Chams and Khmers, most notably the use of spices and various curries."

• "Central and southern Vietnamese food acquired a richer and spicier taste, owing to influence from India and the Khmer kingdom. Curry, for example, was strictly a southern phenomenon in Vietnam until at least the sixteenth century."

• "By 1779 the entire Mekong Delta had become Vietnamese territory through a series of wars and land cession. (...) Curries were another addition to the southern Vietnamese table during this period. With influences from India and Cambodia, the cuisines of central Vietnam and the Mekong Delta have a stronger taste, since they involve spices such as cardamom, cinnamon, star anise, clove, ginger, turmeric and ground coriander. Coconut milk and coconut cream were added liberally to many dishes. Most Cham and Khmer people in central and southern Vietnam were either Muslims or Hindus, so their food was strictly dictated by their religion. As a result, fish, goat and chicken were more popular than pork and beef. Unlike the people in the north of Vietnam, they ate a good deal of curry in a style similar to that of Thailand or Malaysia, with plenty of coconut milk.

The other Vietnamese source specifically about the history of curries in Vietnam acknowledges both the 19th century French colonial connection between the Indian port city of Pondicherry and Vietnamese Saigon and the 6,000 Indian immigrants mentioned in some of quotes from the sources you provided, yet still concludes that:

• "Similar to Cham influence, much of the curry eaten in Southern Vietnam has been affected by Khmer curries – also an extension of ancient Indian culture."

Me writing that Vietnamese chicken curry is a "Khmer-influenced dish" doesn't imply that Vietnamese curries weren't influenced by Chams as well and later also directly by the Indians themselves, nor does it imply that the addition of chicken to the curry is the Khmer influence, although the third quote does attribute the higher popularity of chicken along with fish and goat in dishes of Southern Vietnam to the religious beliefs of native Chams and Khmers. Overlooking all this complexity and nuance of century-long culinary interactions, because of a notion that the French couldn't have possibly eaten something they "imagined" as Vietnamese (which it wasn't) doesn't sound very convincing to me, I'm sorry. –Turaids (talk) 01:02, 16 November 2023 (UTC)

Laotian influence on Cambodian cuisine

@Pierrevang3: seeing how you created the article about the Khmer Lao people a few days ago, I was hoping you might have seen some more information or insight about the Laotian influence on Cambodian cuisine. This is the only thing I could find, but it doesn't specify, which "past Lao migrations" and how exactly they "affected and inspired" the Cambodian cuisine. My guess would be that green papaya salad and, possibly, larb was something that the Laotians brought to Cambodia, but that's just my own guess without any sources that back it up. Thank you in advance! –Turaids (talk) 22:38, 25 January 2024 (UTC)

Hi @Turaids, it's nice to hear from you!

To be honest I haven't read anything about Lao food in Cambodia (except for the fact that there is a recipe called "Laotian chicken soup" in the royal Khmer cookbook, which consists essentially of boiled chicken with prahok, maybe originally padek?), so everything I will say is entirely based on my experience.

I would say the source stating that Lao food influenced Cambodian food is a bit far fetched, as a lot of Khmers I have encountered often deemed Lao food as hard to eat.

That being said, I would definitely say that there is a Lao influence nowadays in the Cambodian papaya salad as a lot of people use now what they call "teuk prahok", which is not prahok but a more liquidy product derived from it and that resembles the Lao Padek. In the past I don't recall seeing anyone using that.

Larb is definitely something brought from the Lao and in Stung Treng province it is one of the regional iconic dishes. The Larb there is quintessentially Lao, as it uses a lot of "foreign" ingredients such as bile, or duck blood, which is often the case in Laos and not observed anywhere else in Cambodia. Fish larb is also something unique to that region and that resembles Lao food. There is a specific fish called Trey Pa Si Hi ត្រីប៉ាសេអ៊ី which is very famous and said to be delicious, I suspect the name to derive from the Lao language as Pa means fish in Lao.

I definitely encountered people eating and I myself have eaten Keng Nor Mai in Stung Treng under the name "Somlor Tumpaing Lao" (Lao bamboo shoot soup) as well as something called "Teuk Kreung Lao" but unfortunately I don't know if there is any literature about it as so little has been done to document the customs of the Khmer Lao minority. There is also a dish called Pa Khem ប៉ាខឹម which I believe is Lao and Kuy Teav Lao has been trendy on social media over the past few years. Overall I would say that apart from Larb (without the bile and blood) and papaya salad, the other Lao dishes are mostly only eaten by Khmer Lao people.

What I find interesting, but that's only my own speculation, is that the "Khmer Loeu" food look a lot like Lao food, maybe due to both communities living together in Northeastern Cambodia? Use of bile and raw blood, dried buffalo meat as well as the consumption of glutinous rice and very thick soup all points towards a Lao influence. Chanang ចាណាង is one Khmer Loeu dish that has got popular over the past few years and it includes buffalo skin which is an essential ingredient in Lao cuisine (Jaew bong, Or lam) and not found anywhere else in Cambodia. Pierrevang3 (talk) 00:01, 26 January 2024 (UTC)

That's very interesting, thank you, Pierrevang3! This article talks about how Khmers were the ones to introduce fermented fish pastes to Laotians (and Thais), so I can only wonder what makes the chicken-prahok soup "Laotian". The Elephant Walk Cookbook does mention how in the northern part of Cambodia "[b]amboo shoots, the mainstay of the Lao diet, appear more frequently in a variety of dishes", but doesn't say anything else. And then there's this book that simply states that "flavour principles" of Cambodian food have "little in common" with Lao food, so just bits and pieces of information. I guess I'll have to wait until there's more research on this topic. In the meanwhile, can I ask for your help in photographing Cambodian dishes (assuming you're in Cambodia)? Some months ago I wrote articles about samlor prahal or the same chanang only to realize we have no photos of them in Commons, but photos of any Cambodian dish with or without photos on Commons would be valuable. Unfortunately, I live in a city where there is only one Cambodian restaurant, which, I know, is more than most cities. –Turaids (talk) 13:40, 28 January 2024 (UTC)

Sure! When I have the opportunity, I'll make sure to upload some photos. Pierrevang3 (talk) 13:13, 31 January 2024 (UTC)