Category Archives: Thai-Chinese

by | 12/01/2011 · 2:56 pm

Stories we tell ourselves

Kai gata in Udon Thani

We all have our own little stories that we choose to believe, and this one is mine: We have Vietnam War-era American GIs to thank for two of the more beloved dishes in our culinary lexicon. One is a hastily-stirfried hodge-podge of sliced processed hotdog, ham, raisins, peas, and rice, lubricated with a generous dollop of ketchup and topped with a fried egg, sunnyside-up. This dish, a big ol’ smile on a plate, is generally known as “American fried rice” and can be found just about anywhere you can find a wok and a cook, and sometimes not even the cook. Just bring your two hands and a bottle of oil.

The other, because of its Vietnamese roots, is more prevalent in the Isaan region and known as “kai gata” (or “kai kata” or “kai gataa” or “kai kataa” … sometimes, you just have to close your eyes and point a finger and hope that it’s darn near close enough). Eggs are broken into a small metal pan and baked or cooked gently atop a grill, accompanied by sliced gun chieng (sweet Chinese sausage), veggies and  moo yaw (which, according to Chef McDang, was born as a Chinese cook’s approximation of European pate at the court of King Rama IV). And don’t forget the “bread” — usually a disarmingly sweet white bun, cleaved into two, buttered thickly and stuffed with ham, moo yaw and/or sausage. The story is that this dish was the closest an American GI could get to an American breakfast. What I see it as is 1960s-70s Asian-American fusion (just like me!): hearty and welcoming, pragmatic and resourceful, just what is needed sometimes to start what once threatened to be a deadly dull day.

Happily, you can find this dish in Bangkok. You just need to know where to look or, barring that, know who to pester. In my case, it’s my friend Winner, who knows the culinary ins-and-outs of Banglamphu like no one else. Gopi Hia Gai Gi (37 Siripong Rd., 02-621-0828. There is another one at the Wisut Kasat intersection), alongside stuff like Chinese-style flat stuffed noodles, dim sum and, uh, steak, serves up a mean kai gata, drizzled with minced pork and peas and, of course, accompanied by the mini white bread bun stuffed with moo yaw.  Best of all, it’s open from 7 am to 8:30 at night — a chance at kai gata at any time you think you might need to restart your day.

Banglumphu's version

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Filed under Asia, Bangkok, food, food stalls, Isaan, Thai-Chinese, Thailand

by | 11/03/2011 · 2:29 pm

Something Special

It should come as no surprise to anyone that I — like many of my fellow Bangkokians — am feeling a bit down. The kind of down that doesn’t bear talking about.

So why am I writing a blog post? To tell you the truth, I don’t really want to write a blog post. For something that is better done, funnier and far more likable, you should deffo check out writer/actress Mindy Kaling’s blog: http://theconcernsofmindykaling.com/, because we all need a little bit of inspiration now and then, and where better than from the author of “Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me?” (the answer is yes).

Do you want your inspiration to come from somewhere closer to home? I am nothing if not obliging. Let me do you a favor and direct you to another something special, http://mysousvidelife.wordpress.com/. Is she not adorabun? Someone get this woman a cooking show, stat! Another thing: despite being a “flood refugee”, she is still decorating Halloween cupcakes and figuring out fun things to do with all those shmackets of Ma-Ma noodles lurking in all our kitchen cabinets (no need to front, you know you have them too).

Are you still here? Geez. Well, if you’re not up for something fun and uplifting, I’m your girl. As one would naturally expect, the floods are taking their toll everywhere, including on the sidewalk. Many, many, many of my fave vendors are MIA: the buay loy guy on Mahachai Road; the khao kluk gapi (rice with shrimp paste) vendor in front of Baan Phra Arthit; the Hainanese chicken rice people in front of Great Shanghai; the chicken and bitter melon noodles guy behind Emporium; the Sukhothai noodle guy (why didn’t he call to tell me?) next to Klong Saen Saep; and the guay jab people across from Benjakiti Park. There are more, many more whose absences I have yet to discover and mourn.

 

Not available right now

These people spent their working lives making us happy; now they are gone, with nothing to mark their absence except maybe a shuttered storefront or, more disconcertingly, nothing at all. They have vanished into thin air.

Then there are the people who are stubbornly sticking it out. They deserve special plaudits, because they are idiots*. Riverside, prey to the fickle lords of high tide? Sign me up! Alongside the beef noodle folks at Nai Soi and the famously taciturn Roti-Mataba is Khao Na Gai Ha Yaek (085-124-5511, open 10-19.00). Just steps down Phra Arthit road from Roti-Mataba, this chicken-and-gravy on rice vendor is quietly packed most lunchtimes, but inspires none of the usual fanfare, which makes it very special indeed. Yes, there is the khao na gai (35 baht), as well as versions with gun chieng (sweet Chinese sausage, 40 baht) or runny fried egg (42 baht), or best of all, both (47 baht). There are also noodles topped with chicken gravy, deep-fried noodles with chicken gravy, and sticky rice with red pork. But the namesake dish is the best.

Wandering down the road at high noon, unable to find ANYTHING I once loved in a landscape that looked familiar but wasn’t, this plate of chicken gravy on rice crowned with torn fresh coriander, fried egg and sweet sticky sausage was a godsend, the best thing I had eaten in weeks. I forgot I wasn’t supposed to be hungry, and ate it all.

*Obviously, I don’t really think they are idiots.

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Filed under Asia, Bangkok, chicken, food, food stalls, rice, Thai-Chinese, Thailand

by | 06/02/2011 · 11:54 am

Golden Oldie

Soft oyster omelette, or aw suan, at New Kwong Meng

Getting old sucks. Granted, there are some people who rhapsodize about how it brings a new maturity, a deeper understanding of life, and some other useless blahbadiblah that no one really ever wants, but these people are usually young (and therefore stupid. I can say this because I am old, and jealous). Age announces itself in a series of sharpening steps: first, the twinges and inexplicable aches upon waking; the stuttering metabolism that thickens the waistline; the sudden urge to pee in the middle of the night; the inability to sleep beyond 7 in the morning; the face that suddenly, startlingly, turns into your Grandma’s one morning.

Before you know it, you are sitting over beers with another old fart, reminiscing over that one time Digger lost his satellite phone in the Khyber Pass and when Scoop got tipsy at lunch and threw tomatoes at the bureau chief. Who is this person? How did this happen? Where was I this whole time? These are questions that will never get any satisfying answers.

New Kwong Meng Restaurant (4-8 Padsai Road, or Yaowarat Soi 19; 02-224-2201, 02-224-2170, open 11-2, 5:30-9) is a whole five years older than me, but it seems to be wearing its middle age well, the bitch. Part of a string of excellent Teochew restaurants (I’m told most Chinese-Thais are Teochew, or Chaozhou) tucked into the Old Market side of Yaowarat Road, New Kwong Meng reminds our parents of the days when they were young and sprightly. This is probably why it is packed with, uh, our parents and all their friends. Young, hip and happening, this is not, but is that the point?

It is not when you are confronted with a soft, silky aw suan (soft oyster omelette) studded with succulently large oysters, a heartbreakingly tiny suckling pig enveloped in a crackly sheen, and slivers of finely sliced raw — is that sea bream? — strewn with sesame seeds and accompanied by a sweet soy dipping sauce.

Thai-Chinese "sashimi"

There is goat “ham”, festooned with white asparagus that looks suspiciously like it came out of a can, but a big favorite are what look like razor clams, sauteed with Chinese kale and shiitake mushrooms. Actually, they look like something else, but I’m not sure what that would be, really I’m not.

Clams, greens, mushrooms

And since every Chinese meal must end with some sort of starch, New Kwong Meng sends out a whopper: a delicately pan-fried sheaf of e mee (fried egg noodles), crispy outside and buttery within, topped with strips of ham and accompanied by a sour black vinegar Thais call “zisho”. This version is as good as the e mee anywhere in Bangkok.

New Kwong Meng's e-mee

I could go on, and talk about what we had for dessert, and how I drank too much strange Chinese whisky, and how we stumbled down the stairs into the night, where it wasn’t as hot as we expected it to be. There were wrong turns taken down winding Chinatown roads, and promises to not lose touch ever, and BFF presents exchanged that didn’t get opened. I could go further, but I’m tired, and late for my nap.

 

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Filed under Asia, Bangkok, Chinatown, Chinese, fish, food, noodles, seafood, Thai-Chinese, Thailand