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Published on February 18, 2008

Science pours from Nathalie Arbefeuille as she explains how the bulb of gas in a cream whipper adds to the smoothness. She's preparing a basil espuma to lather on a fish, using a new technique invented by a Spanish chef, and relaying the wisdom to students in Bangkok.

Arbefeuille is in town promoting her French-English cookbook "Cuisine Passion", and has taken the opportunity to meet up with old friends - she used to live here - and give them a cooking lesson.

Using no pre-cooked ingredients, she first whips up pan-fried garoupa and tomato chutney with galangal, asparagus and parma ham basil espuma. That's followed by pan-fried scallops on a morel ragout. For dessert, there's a "Big Mac raspberry sweet pepper sorbet chocolate chantilly".

Arbefeuille also explains where to find the freshest and most reasonably priced imported ingredients in Bangkok.

This isn't information you'll find in her cookbook, since it's not a map for finding the individual ingredients in Thailand and Malaysia, where the book is being released. But it certainly has enough tips for every recipe that readers can re-create the dishes without her by their side.

Lots of people have difficulty following recipes, she says, and then they decide they just weren't born to cook, "but some cookbooks don't explain everything - and that discourages the readers!"

Arbefeuille's offering compiles her own family recipes, some recalled from childhood memories - including three dishes cooked by her grandmothers: snails millefeuille in short sauce with dried tomatoes, small stuffed cabbages and square doughnuts.

Arbefeuille has modernised these recipes, either in the presentation, with sauces of her own design or by adding more herbs to match current tastes. The cabbages served to her in her childhood in a simple family pot now come on a large, white ceramic plate.

The author and chef was preparing dinner for the family by age 12. She filled in on Tuesday nights when her mother was late home from work. And she's never been to the chef's academy.

"Those who go to cooking schools often become attached to traditional cooking and the recipes handed down over generations at the institutions," says Arbefeuille. But this approach doesn't work with younger people, who are now seeking out fusion food and Asian flare.

Nor did Arbefeuille pursue a cooking career. She joined an advertising agency in Paris, where there happened to be a well-appointed pantry for the staff.

"I started thinking that I'd have been happy working in such a beautiful kitchen."

The chance came when she moved to Asia with her husband 10 years ago. She spent 18 months in Kuala Lumpur and six years in Bangkok before returning to the Malaysian capital just over two years ago.

In Asia she was encouraged to conduct cooking classes for friends, and in a year she had more than 100 students and was catering parties.

Arbefeuille spends each summer at her friend's restaurant in Paris. They compare notes on what they've discovered on their travels in Europe and Asia.

"That's how I keep updated with the latest cooking trends," she says.

"Cuisine Passion" is available in Bangkok at Alliance Francaise on Sathorn Tai Road and the Vanilla Garden restaurant on Ekkamai Soi 12.

Sirinya Wattanasukchai

The Nation