* Eating 52 Countries In 52 Weeks - Week 23 - MYANMAR

When you eat so much good food so often, you run out of quality words to describe the level of culinary delight you are experiencing. So when I tell you that the Burmese food was well worth the day trip we endured to Pasadena on the day it was 102 degrees Fahrenheit, and the last 3 miles of the drive took us an hour and a half because of the USA and Mexico soccer match at the Rose Bowl AND that it was the one weekend out of the year when JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratories) open their doors to public, I'm sure it will give you an idea how fantastic the food was.

We ordered so many dishes from the menu, the lady that was taking our order kept saying "that should be enough" while we tried to get one more dish in. We told her we were not intending to eat everything right there but would be taking some home with us and would not be wasting the food she made earlier in the day in her kitchen.

We ordered Tea Leaf Salad made with pickled tea leaves, grains and colorful vegetables.

Fried Samusas filled with vegetables served with red hot sauce

Vegetable Noodle Salad that came with crisps made with chickpeas

 Mont hin Ga - a fish soup that had a lot more than fish

Fried Shrimp

Chicken Potato Curry

Since we ordered more than half the menu she also brought some Burmese falafels she made that morning with chickpeas.

Since Burmese tradition is to bring out all the food to the table at once, our overflowing table looked like this: 

We ordered Tamarind Juice and traditional Burmese hot tea to help wash all these wonderful food down.

When we were done eating, it looked like we hadn't made even a small dent in the food we started with. While she packed the remaining food for us at the table, we told her about our food adventure and she was very excited to hear that her restaurant was the 23rd on our list. She told us she had been in the U.S.A. for ten years and the restaurant's name Yoma was the name of a mountain range in Myanmar.

Finally she proudly offered her Coconut Jelly dessert that looked like tiny icicles and tasted like nothing else we ever had before. So subtly flavored and refreshing!

Since our internet searches did not return any equivalent phrases for Bon Apetit, we asked her what they would say in Burmese. My efforts in writing down what she was saying was in vain but her translation was "Enjoy your meal". When we got up to leave she cheerfully waved us off and asked us to visit again just like she would with her house-guests.

စားကောင်းပါစေ (Enjoy your meal in Burmese)