Full-Day Organic Farm Thai Cooking Class – 8 Dish Categories
A full day on a working organic farm 45 minutes from Chiang Mai: market tour, herb harvesting and eight dish categories including curry paste, salad, dessert and a Thai herbal drink.
- Duration
- Full day (08:00–16:00)
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Max group
- 20 pax
This is the most complete cooking day in our Chiang Mai range. Eight hours, eight dish categories and a working organic farm in the countryside about forty-five minutes from the Old City — far enough that the noise stops and the view becomes rice fields, herb beds and fruit trees. If someone in your group cooks seriously, or you simply want the whole Thai repertoire rather than a taster, book this one.
You are collected between 08:00 and 08:30 and stop at a local fresh market on the drive out. Your instructor walks you round the stalls and unpicks the Thai pantry: galangal, lemongrass, kaffir lime, holy basil, the chilli hierarchy, palm sugar, tamarind, shrimp paste and the fermented backbone of the cuisine. At the farm you take a basket into the garden, taste as you go and harvest the herbs and vegetables you will actually be cooking with — the recipes come from a chef certified by the Chiang Mai Center for Skill Development, so the technique behind them is properly grounded.
The kitchen day covers eight categories: curry paste, curry, stir-fry, soup, salad, dessert, spring rolls and a Thai herbal drink. You have your own station and you cook every dish yourself. Highlights along the way — pounding a khao soi or massaman paste from raw spices, rolling and frying your own spring rolls, learning why a proper som tum is bruised rather than mixed, and finishing with sticky rice and mango or pumpkin in coconut milk. Anything you cannot eat is boxed for you to take back to your hotel, and a step-by-step recipe e-book plus an online photo album follow afterwards.
You are back in town by around 16:00, which leaves the evening free. Non-cooking companions can join the whole day, including the meal, for a 500 THB visitor charge.
- The full Thai repertoire: eight dish categories in one day
- Working organic farm about 45 minutes from the Old City
- Guided fresh-market tour on the way out
- Harvest your own herbs and vegetables from the garden
- Pound curry paste from raw spices in a granite mortar
- Make your own Thai herbal drink — rarely taught elsewhere
- Individual cooking station; you cook every dish yourself
- Every dish available vegetarian or vegan, spicy or mild
- Take home whatever you cannot finish, plus a recipe e-book and photo album
What's included
- ✓ Return hotel transfer within a 3 km radius of the Chiang Mai Old City
- ✓ Guided visit to a local fresh market
- ✓ Guided tour of the organic farm and herb tasting from the garden
- ✓ All ingredients for the class
- ✓ Your own individual cooking station
- ✓ English-speaking cooking instructor
- ✓ Step-by-step recipe e-book
- ✓ Drinking water, coffee and tea
- ✓ Everything you cook — eat on site or take it away
- ✓ Online photo album after the class
- Hotel pick-up beyond the 3 km radius of the Old City (ask us for a quote)
- Alcoholic drinks
- Non-cooking companions (visitor charge applies)
- Gratuities
- Travel insurance
- 08:00
Hotel pick-up
Collected from your hotel between 08:00 and 08:30 (within 3 km of the Old City).
- 08:45
Fresh market tour
A guided walk through a local market: herbs, curry pastes, produce, noodles, rices and the ingredients you will use today, with buying and substitution tips.
- 09:30
Drive to the organic farm
About 45 minutes into the countryside to the school's own organic farm.
- 10:15
Farm tour and harvest
Walk the garden with your instructor. Taste herbs off the plant and pick the lemongrass, galangal, basil, chillies and vegetables for your own menu.
- 11:00
Curry paste and spring rolls
Pound your chosen paste — green, red, panaeng, massaman or khao soi — then roll and fry your own spring rolls, the dish everyone cooks.
- 12:00
Soup, stir-fry and salad
Three dishes at your own station: a soup, a wok dish and a Thai salad, eaten as each one is finished.
- 13:30
Curry and main meal
Turn your paste into a finished curry and sit down to the full spread.
- 14:30
Dessert and herbal drink
Sticky rice with mango, banana or pumpkin in coconut milk, plus your own Thai herbal drink.
- 15:15
Boxing up, photos, e-book
Leftovers boxed, group photos taken for the online album, recipe e-book confirmed.
- 16:00
Return transfer
Dropped back at your hotel around 16:00.
Yes. Every dish on the menu can be prepared vegetarian or vegan — tofu and vegetables replace the chicken, prawn and pork, and the fish sauce and shrimp paste are swapped for soy-based alternatives. Tell us when you book so the kitchen can shop accordingly, and mention any allergy (nuts and shellfish are the usual ones) again to your instructor on the day.
You choose. The menu is organised into categories and you pick one dish from each, so nobody at the same table has to cook the same lunch. You can also decide how hot each dish is — Thai-hot, mild or no chilli at all.
Return transfer is included for hotels within a 3 km radius of the Chiang Mai Old City. The farm is about 45 minutes away in the countryside, with a short stop at a local market on the way out.
The full day covers eight categories instead of five: it adds a Thai salad, a dessert and a Thai herbal drink to the curry paste, curry, stir-fry, soup and spring rolls of the shorter class, and gives you more time in the garden and at the market.
Light, comfortable clothes you do not mind getting a little splashed, and closed shoes rather than flip-flops — you will be standing at a wok and walking through a market and a garden. Aprons are provided. Long hair is easier tied back.
Yes — that is one of the nicest details of this school. Everything you cook is yours, boxed up if you would rather eat it later at your hotel.
Yes, and Thai cooking classes are one of the best family activities in Chiang Mai. Younger children usually share a station with a parent rather than working a hot wok alone. Tell us the ages when you book so we can arrange the right set-up.