Author Archives: Bangkok Glutton

I apologize to the person who reads these posts, because I haven’t been writing them lately. I have been busy on a project that is exceedingly difficult, mainly because the system they make us load our content into makes me want to shoot myself in the face. So I thought I would take a break from painstakingly inputting the latitude and longitude of every place I’ve ever mentioned to write a little ditty after reading a street food proposal paper that my friend sent me.

It rubbed me the wrong way, probably because, once again, it proposes to turn Bangkok into Singapore without making Bangkok as rich as Singapore. According to a quick Google search, the average monthly salary of a Singaporean is around US$5000. The average salary of a Bangkokian is between US$770-1,500. Now, I am one of those trash Asians™ that cannot do math, but I do know that those numbers are not the same (I am Asian so I can make this joke.)

The mention of authenticity in cuisine is also jarring to me. When people start to talk about “authenticity” in a policy paper about street food, it always puts me on alert that they may use it as a cudgel to portray other (cheaper, “lower-class”) food as “inauthentic”. Chef Num of Samuay & Sons (a chef I personally admire) once told me that authenticity was a Western concept, and I totally agree with him. I’d go one step further and say that it is a trap. Authenticity was born when Western people started eating other countries’ food and then wanted to gatekeep other Western people from pretending that they knew about said food. Because Thais are good at adopting everything, they adopted this idea, and now have started using it on themselves. Unfortunately, authenticity as performed on a cuisine like Thailand’s promotes a hegemonic ideal of what Thai food is supposed to be — an ideal that is typically Central Thai and upper-middle-class to upper-class. Because Thai food was invented in royal kitchens, “authentic” Thai food becomes whatever is associated with the aristocracy or people adjacent to the aristocracy. The mere fact that an “authentic” recipe can be looked up in an ancient cookbook means that it’s an aristocratic recipe, because those were the only people who could read and write. Guess what kind of food that leaves out?

The idea of Thai food as something learned at the knees of Thai grandmothers is sweet — it’s true lots of Thais passed on their recipes orally — but ultimately it’s not a shared experience for everyone. To suggest that (inadvertently?) cuts out all sorts of people’s experiences with Thai food. As for me, my one grandmother never cooked for me. and my other only knew how to cook French food. I am clearly a trash Thai™.

When considering the merits of street food — how many times can I say this — IT’S NOT REALLY ABOUT THE FOOD. It’s about granting access to cheap food for everyone, and for everyone to get a chance to make money. It’s not about “glorifying it at the expense of everything else.” If I were to eat pad Thai made by Chef Bo at bo.lan (another chef I personally admire), she would no doubt make it with the best-quality Chanthaburi noodles, with artisanal fish sauce, hand-squeezed tamarind pulp and the best possible prawns Thailand has to offer. It would be way better than what I can get on the street. But it would also be way more expensive. The fact that price and accessibility is constantly left out of these debates is disingenuous at best. Vendors use what they can afford, and the fact that so many of them come up with good food on a daily basis is a freaking miracle.

All of which is to say … I may sound like I’m wearing a tin foil hat and raving about a secret push to impose Central Thai ideas of Thai-ness over the rest of the country. That the Thai grandmother thing is a way to gauge other people’s class, and to dismiss them accordingly. I could be turning full Mel Gibson in a couple of years, jumping out at people in parking garages, screaming “Your grandmother sucks at cooking!” (something that my friend Dylan prints on his tote bags).

Another conspiracy? That a popular street food dish, Sukhothai noodles, didn’t come from Sukhothai, and were either created at Sukhothai Palace (in Bangkok) or invented as a way to draw tourists to the city. Alas, when I emailed Chef McDang about this, he wrote me back:  “Chow, I doubt that it is true.  [My aunt at Sukhothai Palace] raised me and we never had Sukhothai noodles any time during tea time or anything.  I am so tired that everyone wants Thai food to be Royal Thai cuisine.  Normal regular Thai food which is so varied, interesting and delicious is so much better.”

Regardless of how Sukhothai noodles were created, the last time I went there, they were everywhere. And they are delicious. Alas, I don’t have them in Bangkok as often as I used to, after Somsong Pochana moved (I still haven’t gone to the new — like 10 years ago — location). So my friend Andrew adapted a recipe that I sent him to help me with my cookbook (yes, even Trash Thais™ are writing cookbooks. The state of the world today!). It’s really good, so here it is:

Andy’s Sukhothai Noodles

This is for 2 bowls.

• 150g ground pork (75g / bowl)
• for meat: 2 tsp fish sauce
• for meat:1/2 tsp sugar
• for meat:1/2 tsp white pepper
• 400ml water
• 400ml chicken stock
• 200g noodles (100g / bowl) 
• 15g green beans / long beans – blanched
• 1/2 lime
• 15g chopped peanuts
• 1 green onion stalk
• 3g cilantro leaves

GARNISHES – AMOUNTS PER SINGLE SERVE BOWL

• 2-4 tsp chili paste to taste – i did 3 tsp
• 1/2-1 tsp fish sauce to taste (didn’t use)
• 1/2-1 tsp sugar to taste (didn’t use)
• 1-3 tsp crispy fried garlic to taste – i did 2
• 1/2-2 tsp chili flakes to taste – i did 1 (but threw on a couple dried chilies for looks)

First, cook your noodles (rice noodles preferably but egg noodles also work) in accordance with package instructions. Season the meat with the above ingredients. Put water/chicken stock to boil and add meat. Boil until cooked through, skimming scum off the surface. Once the noodles and pork are done, you’re ready to assemble your bowls: noodles, broth, squeeze of lime, peanuts, beans, green onions and cilantro. Because this is Thai-style, you customize the bowl to your own flavor preferences: sugar, chili flakes, fish sauce, crispy garlic, chili paste. As an aside, another conspiracy theory I have is that the Thai attitude to noodles (I season my own way) is their attitude to everything, including driving laws.

Andy’s notes:

1. I seasoned the pork out of habit – so it doesn’t dry out and better slightly bouncy texture. Also for fun I shaped some of the pork into coins. 
2. I used half chicken stock but actually if you want this to be super simple it can just be water but will definitely need seasoning for each bowl before serving (which is what they do in the OR some salt for the broth.
3. Probably can cut the amount of pork – maybe people get bored eating 75g of ground pork (though stock won’t taste as good)
4. I used sticky (wet) pad thai noodles so if people use dry (more likely) the weight should come down to maybe 75g per bowl. 
5. The namprik pao I have in my fridge doesn’t have much oil (like most of the more commercial ones). But actually I think oily ones are nicer for this because it’s easier to mix into the soup and also droplets of oil look nice.
6. I used big seedless lime (which probably is similar to what people outside of thailand wll use)
7. Becuse I seasoned the meat & used chicken stock I didn’t need fish sauce or sugar at the end

(Photo by Andrew Hiransomboon)

Someone had the idea to do a coast-to-coast walk across northern England, from the tiny town of St. Bees on the west coast to the tiny town of Robin Hood’s Bay on the east. Along the way, there would be other tiny towns, comprising a total of 190-or-so miles over 12 days. The original person to undertake this walk was Alfred Wainwright, an illustrator who also wrote a series of guidebooks, presumably all about walking. I didn’t know who Alfred Wainwright was. I only knew that it sounded like I’d be traveling from pub to pub, eating lots of English food along the way and magically shedding pounds like I had nearly 15 years ago on the Camino.

It turns out, English food is not like Spanish food, and 15-years-ago-me is not the menopausal me of today: coarsened, stumpy, and prone to weight gain at the whiff of a carb. I did not lose weight, but gained it. But at least I also possibly permanently messed up my ankle! At the very beginning of the walk, full of hope, my friends would sing a song I presume came from the “Hobbit” trilogy, because they thought I looked like one from the back (and probably the front). “Chawadee Baggins,” they would call me, and I was fine with it. Later, with all of my injuries, the Hobbit became “the Hobblit”, my walk more of a hesitant lurch. I did not like to be called “Chawadee Baggins” after that.

The food didn’t help. This is something I didn’t know but kind of wish I knew at the time: pub menus are all pretty much the same. There will be a lasagne, for some reason, and a curry of the week, because of course. There will be a steak and ale pie, and fish and chips. There will be a soup, and if it is “fancy”, a chicken caesar salad. And then, if you are east of the Pennines, there will be fried chicken “parmo” in a sandwich or not, with garlic mayonnaise on the side, obviously. Everything comes with fries, including the fries.

I tired of this menu by the third day. This, coupled with a fall I took on a rainy day (because of course) on top of a hill leading down to an abandoned slate mine in the Lake District, made me despair of my choices. I admit to taking to drink, finishing and leaving empty mini bottles of whisky from a trip to Scotland the week before in a string of B&B rooms across the country. Yet my friends and family soldiered on, even as I took my “break days”, no matter how tired or angry it made them. I couldn’t understand why they would do this; had they made some sort of vow to the tour company? Was there a magical dwarf who would spirit away their firstborn if they rested?

Some B&Bs were kind, even if the surroundings were humble. Some places were not. I remember nearing the very end of the trip and staying in an inn that reminded me of the “Master of the House” inn in “Les Miserables”. By the time we reached Robin Hood’s Bay, I had done half of the walk, presumably to keep my pregnant friend Trude company (but really she was keeping me company). I saw the jubilation on other people’s faces who had finished and thought to myself, “So that’s why.”

By the time I returned to Thailand. I was ready to rest for good. Unfortunately, there was a thing called “work” that I had to do. So a day after I arrived from Manchester, I flew to Champion to do some research for a guidebook. There were hikes in my future, but, in typical fashion, I was hoping my friend Andrew would do them without me.

It turned out that neither of us did much hiking. But we did drink a lot of beer, and ate a lot of food (I am noticing a pattern). One of our favorite discoveries was a recommendation from the owner of Chumphon Cabana Resort, Khun Varisorn, who said the kitchen at this other resort had really fresh seafood and very few people. This seemed like a wonderful and unlikely combination to me.

It was called Lung Rom Resort, and it was the sort of place that we would never have found on our own. While approaching the restaurant, I’ll admit we felt some trepidation, and it made me think of the sinking feeling you get after 8 hours of hiking across rolling English hills to a dilapidated inn on a hillside smelling of cat pee. But Khun Varisorn did not steer us wrong.

Our garrulous host, Lung Rom himself, recommended the hoy waan (sea snails), muk dat diew (sun-dried squid), and a grilled fresh mullet. We didn’t feel very hungry, so we agreed and sat down to what we thought would be a quick lunch. The snails were meaty and fresh, and the plastic bits at the end thoughtfully plucked. The seafood dipping sauce was obviously handmade and full of flavor. This was not pureed leek soup made from water and a can of beans upended on bread. It was something else.

The “muk dat diew” was not the dish that I knew of, anywhere else in the country. There, the squid is dried to concentrate the flavor, and it’s accompanied by a Sriracha sauce. Here, this may possibly be what has happened, but the chef has then dipped the squid in a rice flour, fried it to make it crispy, and plopped it on a plate amongst similarly crispy basil leaves, chilies and garlic. Think “calamari”, but way way better. It is a revelation, and a dish I’ve never eaten anywhere else.

The fish, a whole mullet which took 20 minutes because it had to be grilled over charcoal, was as fresh as anyone could make it, and while most places would make do with the using seafood dipping sauce again, Lung Rom brought us a thick tamarind sauce with chilies and fresh shallots. “Put lots of it on the meat,” he advised, and we did.

If we had regrets after our meal, it was that we did not have enough space to sample the whole menu. But if you were to find yourself in Chumphon with an empty stomach and a hankering for seafood, you could do much worse than going to Lung Rom for lunch. Take it from the Hobblit.

Memory is a tricky thing. I can tell you the names of all of Taylor Swift’s boyfriends, but I don’t remember if I wrote this post before; I could have sworn I did. If I have, sorry, but I’ve turned into one of those old women who repeats themselves over and over again, with you nodding your head and saying, yes, you told me that already. If not, then, well, that’s a first, at least in a while.

I had an Aunt Ton who is buried in the same cemetery as my Jiao Yai, whom I’ve mentioned before. Even though we are on different branches of the family tree, she would host me every time I was in Chiang Mai, and serve this delicious clear soup made tangy with pickled garlic juice. I think she enjoyed the fact that I could be so easily pleased. Me, being me, never got the recipe from her, or her cook. And then she passed away, and the recipe was lost forever.

So what was left for me to do, besides try to replicate it? (After all, I had a Northern Thai food chapter to fill out for our upcoming cookbook.) It was a clear soup, but too flavorful for gang jued. It didn’t smell like tom yum. And it didn’t have coconut milk like tom kha. It was either a tom kloang or a tom som, and because it had chicken wings in it, I opted for tom som, and substituted pickled garlic juice for the vinegar, adding tamarind and local tomatoes for extra acidity, just like they do in the North.

How did it go? It was absolutely delicious, if I say so myself. Of course, knowing Aunt Ton, she might have thought differently. But, as I said before, memory is a tricky thing, and my memory, for once, was ok with just playing along.

Jiao Ton’s Clear Chicken Wing Soup with Pickled Garlic

Serves 4

Prep time: 5 minutes                                      Cooking time: 30 minutes

• 1 lb (450 g) chicken wings
• Enough chicken stock (or hot water with a chicken bouillon cube) to cover the wings, about 2-4 cups (500-700 mL)
• 2 lemongrass bulbs, crushed
• 2 slices of galangal, crushed
• 4-8 makrut lime leaves
• 3-15 fresh chilies (goat or prik chee fah if your tolerance is low; jinda or bird’s eye if your tolerance is higher. If your spice level is very high, crush these chilies before using)
• 3-5 dried chilies (if your spice level is very high, chop these chilies before using)
• 8 cherry tomatoes
• 6-8 shallots, peeled
• 3 Tablespoons tamarind paste (macaam piek)
• 2-3 Tablespoons fish sauce
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3 Tablespoons pickled garlic juice
• 3 Tablespoons pickled garlic (optional)
• 1 bunch fresh cilantro and scallions, chopped (for garnish)

First, dry-roast your aromatics in a pan: lemongrass, galangal, lime leaves, fresh and dried chilies, and shallots. Once the chilies and shallots get a little char, and the aromas get pronounced, you can take it off the heat (around 5 minutes) and set aside.

In a stock pot large enough to carry the chicken wings, add chicken stock (or water with bouillon cube, if using) over medium heat. Allow to reach a shimmering surface-level simmer before adding the roasted aromatics for a classic Thai-style infusion. Turn the heat up to medium-high and leave alone for a bit (5 minutes) to allow the flavors to commingle. Add the tops of the scallions too if you have them, because why not? Once the broth reaches a rolling boil, add tamarind, fish sauce, and salt. Taste for seasoning. It should be salty, herbal and tart.

With a spider or tongs, scoop out (or pick out) the aromatics, leaving maybe a chili or two and all of the shallots. Add chicken wings and cherry tomatoes and leave the soup alone for a bit so that the meat can cook (about another 10 minutes). The chicken wings are cooked once the meat starts pulling back from the top of the joint (shoulder). Add pickled garlic juice and, if using, pickled garlic. Taste for seasoning and adjust with more fish sauce and/or tamarind paste if necessary.

Since this was a dish served at a “royal” table, we’re going to remove the bones from the wings. Pick out the chicken and allow to cool in a bowl for a bit. Once you can handle the wings, take the meat off the bones; you’ve done your job right if the meat just falls away (it’s OK if it doesn’t). Put the meat back into the soup and stir. Taste for seasoning again. It should be tart, salty and a little sweet from the pickled garlic and shallots. Leave to simmer for a few minutes (around 5).

Turn off the heat and add the fresh cilantro and scallion garnish. We like a luxurious blanket of herbs, but you can just do a polite little sprinkle. Serve as part of a delicious Northern Thai meal, just like Jiao Ton did.