FLIGHT OF THE PHOENIX: Mae Kampong Village & Cooking Class

View of Mae Kampong Village below

Today took us out of the city and into the hills.

Our first stop was a small coffee plantation in Doi Saket, at Thepsadej. None of us realised Thailand even had a coffee industry, but it does - modest, niche, and largely focused on Arabica grown in the cooler northern highlands. It’s small-scale and increasingly challenging.

The owner walked us through his farm in gentle, broken English, explaining the realities of the business. Rising costs, limited domestic production, and beans often imported from Laos and Cambodia to meet demand. And, in his words, a new generation of coffee drinkers who “know everything already.” We understood exactly what he meant. That was my brother Michael and the whole of Melbourne.

It was a simple experience, short and unpolished, but quietly lovely. A budget version of our coffee experience in Colombia, perhaps, but sincere. He pulled two espressos for us using different beans. Our daily caffeine booster which was complimentary. Yes.

A little makeshift coffee education/cafe in the mountain

Getting our caffeine fix

1 shot each

Exploring the farm

These are the fermented coffee beans

Parts of the process are still old school labour, others highly modernised like the uber expensive roaster

A quick visit to the nearby Mae kampong waterfall before lunch

Lunch followed at a local restaurant overlooking Mae Kampong village, which we’d visit shortly after. Once again, lunch and drinks were included in the tour cost, and once again, the food was genuinely good.

We tried kai grata, a northern Thai breakfast-style dish where eggs are cooked directly in a small pan with sausage and minced pork, and a tom yum made with minced meat instead of seafood. Simple, warming, and exactly what you want in the hills. You can predict areas with high volume of tourist based on the number of people trying to take shots for their socials...

From there, we continued on to Mae Kampong. Mae Kampong is a small mountain village known for its cooler climate, traditional wooden houses, and community-based tourism. Historically, the village relied on tea and fermented leaf production, before tourism gradually became its mainstay. These days, it’s popular, especially with Thai weekenders, and Western investment is increasingly visible.

Yes, it’s touristy. But it’s still pretty. Still walkable. Still interesting enough. We skipped the small chapel set in the stream and instead wandered gently downhill through the village, taking it in without overcommitting. You don’t need long here. A stroll is enough.

This was where the instagrammers sat with their fancy drinks

The view

We chose to sit somewhere sensible where we could eat our food on a proper table

kai grata

Khao soi

Tom yum with mince pork

Our fancy drinks. Butterfly pea flower with lime, Thai milk tea

Mae Kampong Village

This seemed to be the shot that everyone was lining up for...so we did it as well. Don't ask why we stood like that

Another crowd favourite photo op

Looks almost like Nakasendo Thai style

Coconut ice-cream

Lara had hers with shaved ice

I went for Hong Kong waffle

Kai pam. Grilled egg in banana leaf, a Northern Thailand dish

Miang kham

Our guide delivered us back to Chiang Mai with just enough time for a short rest before our evening cooking class. And this is where things went slightly sideways.

Pickup was scheduled for 4:30pm. By 5:00pm, nobody had arrived. We contacted the agency, who responded immediately and apologised profusely on behalf of the cooking school. Traffic, they said. Then we saw our steed: our a/c minivan had become… an open-air truck. Not what we had been promised, but at that point we preferred forward motion over principle, so we climbed aboard.

On arrival, we discovered the real issue. An earlier cooking class at another location had run late, and our instructor was still en route. To the agency’s credit, they reacted quickly, arranging a proper van and driver for our return and lodging a formal complaint with the cooking school.

Here’s the twist...What was meant to be a shared class for twelve people ended up being completely private. And it was excellent.

We each chose three dishes to cook, with mango sticky rice as the universally agreed dessert. Everything was made from scratch using fresh ingredients, and somewhere between chopping, pounding, and stirring, we surprised ourselves. The food was actually… good. Very good.

True to their word, our usual driver was waiting at the end of the class and whisked us back to the hotel efficiently and drama-free. All’s well that ends well. Especially when it ends with dessert.

Day 7 – Coffee in the Hills and a Cooking Class Plot Twist