Category Archives: Asia

by | 08/26/2010 · 3:36 pm

Two great food stalls

Beef noodles 'nam thok'-style at Nai Soi

There comes a time … when I actually have to talk about street food. Yes, I know. I know you actually want to hear about my day, and how my minders are making me eat cardboard for lunch, and how my life is a Jennifer Aniston movie if Jen put boot polish on her hair and gained 30 lbs. But I’m going to save all that good stuff for my widely anticipated TV movie screenplay for the Hallmark channel. All you get to read about are these two relatively undiscovered gems.

Emphasis on “relatively”. Because Nai Soi (100/2-3 T. Phra Arthit, 081-487-9359 or 086-982-9042) is well-known to any journalist who works for the Manager group or general traveler-in-the-know who makes Phra Arthit Road his or her base of operations. This Banglamphu standby is popular for its gorgeously amber-colored beef noodles — slightly chewy rice noodles bathed in a garnet-colored broth and tender, flimsy slices of freshly blanched beef. Unlike my other beef noodle favorite, Raan Anamai, the broth here is thickened with blood (known as nam thok, or “water falling”) and not crystal-clear; nonetheless, it doesn’t make it any less yummy.  OM NOM NOM NOM.

Making our beef noodles

Too bad I can’t eat there right now. Another place where I can’t eat is the incomparable Aisa Rot Dee (the beginning of Thanee Rd., 02-282-6378, 081-401-1326), purveyor of most things delicious and Thai-Muslim. Mounds of soft and fragrant yellow rice, perfumed with cumin, atop hunks of slightly charred barbecued chicken; bowls of aromatic beef noodles smelling slightly of star anise; comfortingly substantial oxtail chunks in a fiery broth; sweet-salty beef satay coated in coconut milk — the offerings here turn other Thai-Muslim eateries like the nearby Roti-Mataba into mere whispers of an afterthought. There is no way you would be able to leave this hole in the wall hungry.

Thai-Muslim yellow chicken

And I mean “hole in the wall”. The only suggestion that there is a bustling “restaurant” somewhere behind all the touristy knick-knack shops hawking fishermen’s pants and flip-flops is a sign on the sidewalk — in Thai — reading “Aisa rot dee” (Aisa good taste). In the narrow alleyway behind the sign, two forbidding faces manning a beef noodle stand, and as you approach the darkness, the hint of more. After passing the khao mok gai and tripping over two or three people on the way, the darkness becomes the light, and the alleyway opens into a substantial open-air courtyard, tables, chairs — even waiters.

Aisa is a leap of faith for a hungry Indiana Jones-type searching out answers in a culinary maze. Don’t let the darkness fool you.

(Photos by @SpecialKRB)

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Filed under Asia, Bangkok, beef, chicken, food, food stalls, noodles, restaurant, rice, Thai-Muslim, Thailand

by | 08/20/2010 · 5:19 pm

Attack of the Blahs

The blahiest blah that ever blahed

God, I hate the rainy season. You would think it would be a great relief after the endless stream of radioactivity passing for “sunshine” in Bangkok lately. Even worse, I’ve become THAT lady on the Skytrain, the one sweating into her just-showered hair who everyone wants to avoid. 

But no, the rains are no savior. They flood my driveway and ruin my mood. They are the “blahs”, in physical form. I don’t want to do anything. Of course, I am now busier than ever. 

All I want to do is hole up in my house, drink a barrel of wine, and cook. But sometimes I am compelled to venture outdoors to eat, even in this weather. And when the “blahs” hit the dinner table, then the day is ruined. Oh, the dramz.

You would think Charoenporn in Suan Luang market is safe as houses — in matters of the stomach, at least. Because it certainly doesn’t inspire that much confidence upon entering the shophouse. There is a mound  (actually it could be called in all fairness a “hill”) made entirely of garbage in the back of the room. This is supposed to be rubbish from the first Charoenporn in Chinatown, credited with being the first to serve pork satay in the entire kingdom and currently undergoing renovation. As temporary as it may be, the trash is stomach-churning, bringing to mind the crazed hoarders who go on “Oprah” and cry when someone tries to throw away their 20-year-old juicers.

There is the famous satay, grilled the traditional way over an open flame and moistened with coconut milk as the edges of the flesh char on the skewer. It is as you would expect, delicious, especially with the green crunch of a sweet-tart cucumber-shallot salsa, creamy peanut sauce, and comforting hunk of freshly grilled white bread. Cheap and potentially filling (if you eat enough of it), it is the Thai equivalent of a Gray’s Papaya hot dog.

The good stuff

Oh, but then there’s the rest, and here is where I come to my confession. It’s something you already know: we all have our blind spots, our personal “Waterloos”, if you will. For Jeffrey Steingarten, I hear it’s Indian desserts; for Sarah Palin, it appears to be logic (yes, I know what some of you who know me might say — pot, meet kettle). For my daughter, it’s brushing her teeth. And for me — aside from my obvious logic, and hygiene, issues — it’s thrown-together slop scraped together from satay leftovers and boiled greens and slapped haphazardly over a bowl of rice or rice vermicelli noodles.

Yes, these appalling creations have names. Meet khao phraram (pork, peanut sauce and blanched morning glory poured over rice and topped with roasted chili paste) and sen mee phra rak (rice noodles saddled with the same thing). It is, we are told, an exceedingly rare dish. This suggests something special, when the actual meaning is that few other people would be suckered into eating this dish. It is rare for a reason.

I am being mean.  My “fellow diners” believe that the dish has its merits — a surprisingly oomphy mix of the starchy and sweet. They say go to Charoenporn for this dish, which is in danger of becoming extinct, and enjoy a taste of Old Siam. But as nostalgic as I get for old recipes, next time I’ll give this one a miss. Blame it on the rain.

(Photos by @SpecialKRB)

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Filed under Asia, Bangkok, food, food stalls, noodles, pork, rice, Thailand

by | 08/15/2010 · 2:52 pm

Fish Porridge, Again

The old man looked at us under a thatch of eyebrow hair that would move Frida Kahlo to tears.

“Just so you know — the fish porridge here is at least 250 baht,” he warned my mom.

I know I’ve written about Sieng Gi, the khao thom pla shop in Yaowaraj, before, but I can’t help but love this place. Every visit there is like entering a land where ancient beings stalk the tiny storefront dining area, flinging delicious bowls of porridge onto the marble-topped tables and bellowing at each other. @SpecialKRB, who loathes this place with a passion, said it was like spending a night at the Chinatown chapter of the AARP. But I take a more benign view; it’s a place conducive to happy accidents. That night alone was worth seeing the look on my mom’s face. 

Sieng Gi has seen a lot of competitors rise up and subsequently fall by the wayside. Yet no one can touch this place. The broth is ever so much more more, rich with a fish flavored muchness. And the brown bean dipping sauce, its deeply concentrated flavor worth three bowlfuls of its lesser rivals’. That’s not even getting to the fresh dollops of pomfret, seabass or oyster, garnished with cubes of batheng  or sweet pork, tiny dried shrimp and deep-fried garlic. If you are inclined toward soupy seafood rice (and not everyone is), there is nothing better. 

Oyster porridge with strips of deep-fried tofu

So find a way to go here. That is, as long as you have 250 baht.

(Sieng Gi, Trok Ma Geng, behind Grand China Princess Hotel)

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Filed under Asia, Bangkok, Chinatown, fish, food, food stalls, rice porridge, seafood, Thai-Chinese