Win a handmade mortar and pestle from Thailand in our KROK Mortar and Pestle Giveaway and you’ll receive a timeless traditional kitchen tool with a groundbreaking cork base, handcrafted in small batches by village artisans over three days. All you have to do is tell us what you’ll make in your KROK. Best answer wins this beautiful pestle and mortar.
To win a handmade mortar and pestle from Thailand in our KROK mortar and pestle giveaway, all you need to do is tell us what you will make in your KROK mortar and pestle if you win one. The good people at KROK will choose the winner, then your KROK will be made by a master craftsman in Ang Sila village in Chonburi, Thailand, and the exquisite pestle and mortar will be shipped to you, wherever you are in the world.
A modern take on an ancient cooking tool, the handcrafted KROK is the best mortar and pestle we’ve used and we have a collection of mortar and pestles that we use regularly. The workmanship is superior, the smooth surface a real delight to hold, and it’s lightweight thanks to the KROK’s groundbreaking cork base, which grips to the kitchen counter.
We adore objects handmade by artisans just as they’ve always been made, but we love the KROK not only because it’s beautifully crafted. We love that the good people at KROK are on a mission to preserve the ancient tradition of artisanal mortar and pestle-making by inspiring more home cooks around the world to use a pestle and mortar in their everyday cooking.
I’ll tell you more about the KROK and our giveaway below. If you’re not a fan of entering contests, please consider buying a KROK for yourself or a loved-one to help protect this artisanal craft and the livelihood of the artisans. The retail cost of the KROK mortar and pestle is US$95.
By purchasing a KROK, you’re not only helping to preserve the artisanal tradition of handcrafting mortar and pestles, but you will also be contributing to our own project, aimed at documenting the culinary traditions of Cambodia. As we adore the KROK so much, we joined their affiliate programme, which means that for every KROK you buy via links on this page and elsewhere on our site, we earn a 10% commission.
All of our KROK commissions will go into a fund to finance our final road trips to finish our Cambodian cookbook and culinary history research, interviews and photography. It will pay for us to hire a driver and vehicle, pay our translator and fixer, pay fees to the cooks we’re interviewing, whose recipes we’re documenting, pay for ingredients, and cover expenses.
Buying a KROK is a way to help us finish this epic book project, as well as support the artisans creating these timeless kitchen utensils. Now let’s tell you how to win a handmade mortar and pestle in our KROK Giveaway.
Win a Handmade Mortar and Pestle from Thailand – KROK Giveaway
Before I share more about how to win a handmade mortar and pestle from Thailand in our KROK mortar and pestle giveaway, I wanted to tell you a bit more about the KROK and how you can use the ancient wonder that is the mortar and pestle.
Many Uses of the Mortar and Pestle
We regularly use a mortar and pestle in our Siem Reap kitchen to pound the fresh herb and spice pastes for countless Southeast Asian curries, that make the herbaceous gravy ladled onto the fresh noodles of Cambodia’s beloved nom banh chok and form the basis of the sumptuous fish amok.
So we were delighted to not only be gifted one of these beautiful mortar and pestles, but also to be given a handcrafted KROK to give away to a Grantourismo reader.
We probably use a mortar and pestle at least once a day or every couple of days, as we use it for everything from pounding chillies and spices into chilli flakes and ground spice blends to making condiments and dressings, as well as pastes.
In fact, we use a mortar and pestle far more than we use our blender. We don’t even own a food processor!
More Reasons to Use a Mortar and Pestle
Apart from it being so easy to use and easy to clean, the process of rhythmically pounding the pestle upon mortar is also very meditative.
The sound of our neighbours pounding pastes early every morning here in Siem Reap is one of the sounds I’ll most miss when we leave. Aside from that, there’s the wonderful perfume of fresh herbs, spices and other aromatics that will waft from the bowl of your mortar and pestle.
Herb and spice pastes made in a mortar and pestle, and as a consequence, the curries, soups and stews made from those pastes, taste far more delicious than those made in a food processor.
Plus, you’ll also be giving your arms a good workout!
Now let me tell you more about the KROK and how to win a handmade mortar and pestle from Thailand in our KROK mortar and pestle giveaway.
What’s So Special About the KROK
Handmade in Chonburi’s Ang Sila village by local craftsmen from generations-old artisanal families, the KROK mortar and pestle is probably the only mortar and pestle that will eventually return home with us to Australia – not only because it’s so beautifully made, but because it’s so lightweight. Well, lightweight compared to other mortar and pestle sets.
If you own one of the rough-hewn dark-grey granite mortar and pestle sets that are sold across Southeast Asia, you’ll know how very heavy they are – and it’s long been thought that they need to be that weighty, as it would be frustrating if they moved each time you pounded ingredients in the bowl.
But the KROK, while still solid, weighs half as much due to its smaller body and its pioneering cork base. Yet the bowl is just as deep as those hefty mortars and pestle, which are 8cm deep or a little over 3 inches deep, while the diameter at the top of the bowl is 13cm or just over 5 inches, compared to 14cm or around 5.5 inches wide.
That inventive use of a cork base beneath the granite bowl makes the KROK look a lot smaller, even though it isn’t, yet makes it so much more lightweight. It’s so light I’d actually pack it in my carry-on if we were going to be holidaying in a villa where we planned to cook a lot, something that would be impossible with the big old mortar and pestle we used almost daily until the KROK arrived.
The cork base also grips well to the kitchen counter-top or bench, keeping the mortar nice and steady while you use the pestle to pound your pastes. The cork also doesn’t scratch the surface, eliminating the need to place a cotton tea towel beneath it as we have to do with the old mortar and pestle, which has an uneven base.
And the KROK just looks so lovely on a kitchen counter-top, doesn’t it? Now let’s tell you how to win this beautiful mortar and pestle handmade in Thailand.
How to Win a Handmade Mortar and Pestle from Thailand in our KROK Giveaway
Now let me tell you how to win a handmade mortar and pestle from Thailand in this KROK Mortar and Pestle Giveaway. There are just 2 easy steps:
- subscribe to our mailing list at the end of this post (note: if you’re already a subscriber, no need to sign up again);
- tell us what you will make in your KROK mortar and pestle if you win one in the Comments section, below.
That’s it. Super easy. No more rules. Anyone can enter. And the KROK will be shipped to you wherever you are in the world.
Use as few or as many words to describe what you’ll make in your KROK mortar and pestle if you win one, anything from a sentence to a paragraph, or more, or less. Write a haiku if you like, or share a recipe. Anything goes.
Our KROK Giveaway will be open until 5pm Friday 8 September 2023*.
The lovely people at KROK will then choose the winner. We’ll notify you by the email address you provide and we’ll announce the winner in mid-September in our Grantourismo newsletter (the one you’re signing up for) and here on this page.
The people at KROK will then place your order and ship you your beautiful mortar and pestle after it’s been made by the Ang Sila artisans. We also have some surprise prizes for runner-ups.
How to Buy a Handmade KROK Mortar and Pestle
If you’d like to buy a KROK mortar and pestle you can click through to our affiliate partner link to do so. The retail price is US$95 and we’ll earn a 10% commission, which we will put toward a fund to support the work we still have left to do on our epic Cambodian cookbook and culinary history.
If you’re like us and you don’t really need another pestle and mortar, please share the link to this post with friends who you think might love a KROK.
If you’d still like to support the work we do on Grantourismo or support our epic Cambodian cuisine history and cookbook, you could make a one-off donation or pledge on Patreon.
If you’d like more information about the KROK mortar and pestle, there’s loads of information on the KROK website, including a video of the mortar and pestles being made by the artisans in Chonburi.
*Note: we extended the deadline to early September as we had Covid in June-July and weren’t online enough to able to promote the giveaway.
I would use my krok to make different types of Isaan jaew in as it looks perfect to help me achieve a nice smooth texture for my chilli, lemongrass, and shallot base before I add in my pla ra and other ingredients – I especially like the dried fish jaew
Nikki, my mouth is watering! And the KROK is the perfect size for making jaew. Good luck!
That beautiful KROK would stay proudly on my kitchen bench alongside my Kitchen Aid. And while I know it’s Thai, I can’t help but think that this is perfect for making Italian pesto!
Hi Alicia, I intend to make a basil pesto in it myself – as soon as I can find some Italian basil. Good luck!
As soon as I get my KROK, I’ll be making a batch of my favourite Northern Thai dip, Nam Prik Ong (pork and tomato relish). Ever since I first had it in Chiang Mai, I’ve been addicted to it, but most mortar and pestle sets are too big and heavy for me to use and a bit of an overkill to make a dip…
Hi Karen, ooh, we LOVE nam prik ong! We have a recipe for it, too. You can use the search box to find it. Good luck!
my culinary journey with Thai food has started recently and I have been making the raw papaya salad ever since at least twice a week. But since I have very small mortar and pestle now I lightly pound everything separately. would love to miss and mash all the ingredients in one mortar so that the flavours mingle each other from the word go.
Hi Gautam, like you, I adore papaya salads. we have wonderful papaya salads here in Cambodia too (please try some of our recipes). I use a really big heavy wooden mortar and pestle for pounding salads, but if you’re making a salad for one, you might be able to do it in the KROK. I’ll try it and let you know. Best of luck!
That’s easy. I’d make the paste for the Saraman Curry recipe on Grantourismo that elicited a suite of marriage proposals when I made it for the first time in Luxembourg. The French were a tougher audience for it I have to say. Have to try it out in Ireland next.
Well maybe you need to move back to Luxembourg? ;) Obviously they have better taste there – in food and beautiful talented Irish writer-photographer-cooks! :) Good luck and thanks for entering, Nicky!
I would make a wild garlic and hazelnut pesto with the last of the wild garlic leaves that I have picked by a river bank here in the UK . I normally use a food processor for this but a Krok would mean that it had a better texture.
Hi Kate, oh that sounds heavenly. Yes, it will have a wonderful texture, but will also be more aromatic. Thank you for your entry! Best of luck!
There’s something about a mortar and pestle. The first one I can remember is a wooden one that my grandfather sent us. We still use it but only to ground nuts. If I won the Thai Krok I would use it to make either taramosalata (caviar dip) cos home made has no bearing on what is sold in a plastic container bearing that name. That and guacamole are two dips that need to be hand made. No fancy electric gadgetry can do it is as well as a stone mortar and pestle.
Hi Sofia, oh how wonderful that you use your grandfather’s mortar and pestle. I definitely agree that a traditional mortar and pestle does it better, and it really doesn’t need to take all that much longer. Whenever I use our blender, I reckon it takes longer to clean the thing properly than it does to make something in a mortar and pestle, which is far easier to clean. Thanks for your entry! Good luck!
I would use this lovely krok to make, among many other things, the Thai Magic Paste of corriander, garlic and white pepper. I use this paste a lot even putting some in my khao tom. Appreciate so much your newletters and especially your recipes.
Hi Larry, oh that sounds delish! Thai curry pastes, and Cambodian curry pastes, are some of our favourite things to make in the KROK too. Thank you so much for the kind words – they’re a great motivation! The June bout of Covid and post-Covid fatigue hit me hard, so I’ve been very unproductive. Hope to start getting the newsletters out more regularly now. Good luck with the giveaway!
Hi, Lara, well that COVID did a number on both my partner and me as well. After avoiding it for almost 3 years, we contracted it during our trip to India and Nepal. I actually think India was the culprit. I am retired and live in Pattaya, Thailand just a stone’s throw away from you guys. We loved our pre-Covid trip to Siam Reap and of course the food there. I’ve also been to Ang Sila so have a special connection with and understanding of their kroks. The one that I have already is heavy and will scratch my counter surface if I’m not careful. Please, please keep up your travels and sharing so many great recipes. I try to save all of them on my computer as I’m an avid collector of recipes – especially South and Southeast Asian ones. Abrazos.
Hi Larry, we’re practically neighbours! ;) An Australian friend is the executive chef at a big hotel there, think it’s a tall 5-star on the beachfront from his photos of Instagram – his name is Dennis Leslie, but I can’t remember which hotel it is. We need to get to your part of Thailand actually. Keen to do some food research between there and the Cambodian border as there’s a lot of Khmer history there. Also keen to visit the artisans at Ang Sila – so lovely you’ve been there, and to Siem Reap. Pleased you enjoyed it. I’m so sorry to hear you got hit by Covid too. We actually had it early in 2020, caught from a friend of a friend passing through, but came down with it in June after being coughed on by an Indian tourist in a supermarket here, so must be the same variant – it’s a nasty one from the research I’ve done.
We hope to resume our travels soon, but in the meantime we will continue to share lots of recipes from here and places we’ve been and loved. So love hearing that you appreciate them and save them. Hopefully you cook them?! And hugs from Cambodia!
Hola Laura, I will make a big batch of chimichurri if I win a krok. I am half Argentine and really missing the steaks from my ancestral home which come with bowls of home-made chimichurri. I remember visiting my grandma and when she made it the whole kitchen could smell of the perfume of fresh parsley and garlic. It tastes much better than made with a food processor.
Hola Camila! Perfecto! Brilliant idea. I must admit I never thought to do chimchurri in a mortar and pestle, but we can’t get great beef here, so there’s that. We are also missing the fantastic steaks from Argentina. We had so many places we loved to go in Buenos Aires, especially in San Telmo. Good luck! Mucha suerte!
I would definitely be making the perfect Thai dish for a mortar and pestle . your Som tam salad from your archives. It’s the one dish I truely miss once back home in Australia. That and a good Thai pork laab too. https://grantourismotravels.com/thai-som-tam-recipe-green-papaya-salad/
Now that’s what we love to hear! Thanks for your entry, Sandra! Good luck!
I’d use the krok to make my granny’s famous chilli garlic paste. Right now I use a blender and she shakes her head with disapproval. I want to see her face when she visits to find me pounding her paste in my kitchen with the krok!!!
Hi Esther, love it! Thank you for that image! Sounds like a perfect use of the KROK. Best of luck!
I make a lot of European food and I love making things from scratch so I’d use this beautiful mortar and pestle to make things like aioli, tapenade and pesto. And if I don’t win one I will definitely be buying one. I’ve cooked a lot of your recipes and they always turn out perfectly. Appreciate what you do here.
Hi Olivia, lovely to see you enter! And they’re all such great ideas. Good luck!
Lara, I would pound spices to make spice blends with my Krok. I have many of mummy’s masala recipes I jotted down when I was home in Bombay for the holidays. Now I’m back at university I’m so eager to make them as I get terribly homesick and they will take me right back home again.
Hi Priya, that is a great idea! We use our’s to pound dried spices also. It’s a perfect size. They seem to get lost in a our granite mortar and sort of blend into the big wooden mortar, whereas the KROK is just the right size and colour. Good luck!
Hi Lara, love your blog so much!!! I would make an olive tapenade from my mother’s birthplace in Southern France. Right now I use a blender here in Paris but my grandmother always said it is best made by hand just like Italian pesto.
Hi Colette, merci! Thank you for the kind words. Tapenade sounds perfect! I think anything is better pounded by hand than blended, to be honest. Plus it gives the arms a better workout. Wish you luck!
I hope to use my krok to make homemade hummus. I’m Lebanese American and I use a blender but my heritage is Lebanese and Syrian. Mom tells me my great grandmas would both use a mortar and pestle to do everything, make hummus, muhamarra, muttabal, everything. I only make hummus now as I’m so busy but this would be a great motivation to make more food by hand and explore more of my culinary heritage, which I feel I’m losing here.
Hi Miriam, thank you so much for your entry. How lucky you are having that heritage! You’ve got me craving food from the Levant now. I miss it so much! Best of luck!
I’d make a Malay style sambal with my krok. Never made a sambal. Always buy them. Good excuse to start! If I don’t win one will definitely be buying one of those beauties.
Hey Nick, that sounds like a great plan. Good luck and thanks for your entry!