Cook-It-Yourself

For some reason around here its kind of a popular thing for you to have to cook your own food ... at a restaurant. No, its not a Seinfeld episode where people make their own pizza pie. In these places you cook you own steak, seafood, or chicken.

We found one such place all the travel books talk about and tried it out lately. Forgive the photo quality as they are snaps from Angie's new phone.

After you secure a table in this popular joint, you head to the meat cooler and pick out your favorite raw meat on a stick. They had pork, tofu, fish, hotdogs, shrimp, and more.

After you have your raw meat (20 cents per skewer), you head back to the table and wait for your stuff to start boiling.

Your "stuff" is a spicy peanut sauce that is dropped into a hole in the middle of your table. After it starts boiling, you put you sticks in and wait. If you are obviously new and confused looking, as we were, someone comes by and says, "Cook that one for 1 minute. That one for two minutes, and those for 3-5 minutes." Then they walk away.
Every few minutes a girl came by with a huge ladle and stirred all the peanuty goodness off the bottom of our pot. As you can see here, the pot hangs over a gas burner that has its own LPG tank.
Craig stirring the pot ... as usual.
Finally ready to cook! This shrimp, possibly of the jumbo variety, was ready to go in the pot. Just a couple of minutes later he came out all pink and delicious!
Sound like fun? Make sure you request it as part of your trip when you come see us!!