Bangkok Glutton

Uni don, topped with 5 kinds of Japanese sea urchin

My first concert was the Ramones in Cleveland. I was 16 years old and I went with my friends Tanya, Jen, and Jen’s dad, who was not a Ramones fan. Tanya wore an old prom dress ironically. I, having never been asked to a dance, wore a black miniskirt and a camo t-shirt from Kmart. Since this was our first concert, Tanya and I tried to fight our way to the front of the stage in a vain attempt to catch Joey Ramone’s eye, only to be thwarted by a mosh pit that formed an impenetrable barrier to our groupie aspirations. I mention this because the Cleveland mosh pit was nothing in comparison to the throng awaiting us at Tsukiji market on the day before New Year’s Eve.

Tsukiji market was supposed to have left us by now, but hasn’t, because its new home is not quite ready. I also imagine the original architects of the scheme have, in a Brexit-like fit of remorse, lost enthusiasm for the move. In any case, Tsukiji is with us for a little while longer, a fact that both Japanese and tourist gourmets sought to take advantage of in the last gasp of 2016.

Have you ever been propelled forward without any help from your arms or legs? This was the feeling that day, like a salmon rushing inexorably upstream. Have you ever been hit on the back by an old lady wielding an umbrella? I can now say I have, twice. Old Japanese ladies, freed from the societal constraints of having to make nice for 60+ years, like nothing better than to aggressively tap on the small of your back with their umbrella handle when they feel you aren’t moving as briskly as you should. So why put yourself through this? The answer is obvious.

Sea urchin buffet, walkway-side

If you have the fortitude and patience to stick out the career mosh-pitters and Japanese grannies, a feast awaits you anywhere you choose to walk. We started our breakfast with a couple of rice bowls at a spot tucked into the second floor off the walkway — a spot just like many others peppering Tsukiji that offer a choice between three types of bluefin tuna or five kinds of domestic uni.

Indeed, uni has become kind of a big thing: next to the kanimiso (crab innards) stand, another vendor grilling fist-sized meaty scallops topped with dollops of the stuff, rendering the chewiness of the scallops almost negligible. Yet another, making up for its dearth of sea urchin by serving up freshly shucked Japanese oysters the length of one’s hand, with nothing to season them but hope and greed. More uni, simply sliced open and served on ice with a spoon. Somewhat improbably, soft wah-wah mochi (cloud-like rice cakes) dusted with powdered sugar, stuffed with cream and topped with a single giant white strawberry. And always a place set aside to eat all these things, because walking while eating in Japan is so gauche.

But if you hate the state fair-ness of it all, there is also the actual, bona fide sushi bar. Like Bangkok and its wok cooks, every neighborhood in Japan has one: the eatery that considers itself a step above the rest, with a chef that rivals Kyubey’s. You seat yourself in front of the chef and your banana leaf, take what they offer to give you, dampen any expectations of American-style spicy tuna rolls, and for God’s sake, don’t ask for salmon (unless they are these gorgeous almost-eggs):

A morsel of almost-ikura, on a bed of sushi rice

Sushi is supposed to be the main event here, but a lot of times, it feels almost like an afterthought, like the rice at the end of a meal in Shanghai. The real soldiers that fight your battle against hunger for you are the appetizers: usually sashimi and then a parade of grilled or fried whatsits and whatnots, whatever is in season, whatever will impress. This is how I manage to encounter something new on every trip: one year, live baby fish, in season for only two weeks out of the year as the snows from the Japanese Alps thaw. Two years ago, I had cod sperm sacs grilled on a slab of Himalayan sea salt, an experience I repeated this time with my daughter:

There were more oysters, fresh, and a steamed kinki (orange roughy) in a Chinese-style sauce, but the most memorable thing for me was the sea cucumber — the meat of which was sliced and served in a ponzu sauce (anything in ponzu is delicious), the guts of which were dropped into very hot sake and drunken like Jagermeister shots at a frat party. This was a personal first.

Sea cucumber in ponzu

This is all heavenly, of course, unless you don’t like sushi. If you are my 6-year-old son, you don’t like it very much at all.

NO SUSHI

Specialty of the house: egg noodles with broth on the side at  Buoy

I am supposed to be a writer, but it’s been a long time since I’ve really written. I no longer tell people that I do anything for a living, and I no longer think of writing as part of my identity. If I were to tell the truth about what it is that I do, a calling which gives my life real meaning, I would say that I watch television.

I watch a lot of TV. It’s like my job that I haven’t been paid for yet, but that I still do because someday I expect a check to show up in the mail. I am as rigorous about it as doctors who check in on their patients, or accountants who do stuff with numbers. Here’s my day: I wake up and watch CNN until I absolutely cannot bear it (about 45-50 minutes), then I switch to Ellen DeGeneres. I try to catch “Veep” and/or “Silicon Valley” if I can. Maybe some “Hoarders” or “Love at First Sight”. Then I take a lunch break, and then I watch the “Sopranos”. The rest of the day is devoted to Netflix. If it’s Monday or Tuesday, I can watch American football all day long and not have to change channels. It’s a pretty full schedule.

Sometimes, I go to the gym. It’s the only thing that consistently gets me out of the house. I have not one, but two personal trainers, both of whom are named Champ. One is “Big Champ” even though he is little, while the bigger one is “Even Bigger Champ” (just kidding. He’s “Little Champ.”) Both like to give me advice on where to eat, probably because it is the only thing I like to talk about while working out.

Some of their advice is terrible. I can say this because they like to make fun of me, and I only realize they are making fun of me after I have been humiliated. Like when they tell me that the “chicken at Lumpini Park is delicious.” Now let me give you some advice: don’t go to Lumpini Park and ask people about where to get good chicken. You aren’t going to end up with chicken (see: som tum at Hualumpong Station). Just take my word for it.

But because they are Thai, some real advice slips out occasionally. For a while now, everyone has been telling me about a killer bamee egg noodle place called “Hia Buoy” (or “Uncle Pickled Plum”, named after the owner, 10/2 Soi Polo, 081-629-5231). He offers a few soup noodle dishes like yen ta fo (pink seafood noodles), but the real standout is, of course, the egg noodles with pork and tom yum seasonings, silky and full of flavor. The servings are decently big (though not so big that I can’t eat two), and when I order hang (dry), as I am wont to do, I get a little bowl of aromatic pork broth on the side, because it’s the right thing to do. There was a time when Thais expected you to eat dry rice and noodles with a side of soup, you know, because it would help the rice kernels and noodle strands go down. Now when I go to a noodle stand and order hang, vendors usually don’t give me anything on the side, and I end up feeling like when I see a playlist of “Greatest Punk Songs of All Time” that includes Green Day and Blink 182 and then I make a face like:

I will never stop using this photo

Like, why not just go whole hog and include Avril Lavigne while you’re at it? Oh, Offspring, never mind. LOL Elvis Costello.

All the same, I will probably end up downloading it, because I have no standards or pride. Also, I need something to listen to while I’m on the road in Japan. I will be there for 3 weeks, sans television! Wish me luck.

Grilled chicken at Gong Thui Gai Yang Bang Than

My friend Noy brought my attention to an interview with Andy Ricker in Eater Los Angeles published earlier this month. It was thoughtful and interesting, and because it was mostly in Q&A format, wonderfully straightforward, allowing a glimpse not just into the U.S. Thai food scene, but into the restaurant business in general. It’s hard, y’all. Unless you are wildly lucky, it seems a lot like being on a restrictive diet for the rest of your life, only your body keeps trying to find ways to trick you into stuffing your mouth hole with more delicious fat. People who open successful restaurants over and over again aren’t flukes. As much as I like to eat and then complain about it afterwards, nothing I could ever do would match up to maintaining even one food outlet.

And even if your family has managed to successfully steer your street food eatery for nearly six decades, you may still find yourself facing an uncertain future. Gong Thui Gai Yang (Chula Soi 11, 086-166-2084) has served millions of Thais its delectably juicy grilled chicken for three generations, even sending over 3,000 boxes to the royal palace almost every month. The marinade is the usual Thai-style: crushed coriander root, garlic, two types of peppercorn, fish sauce and palm sugar, but the secret lies in the amounts — Gong Thui isn’t stingy, and they go through 60 kg of garlic a week (i.e. my weight, post-election). The chicken meat — split thighs, breasts, gizzards, livers, and best of all, butterflied chicken halves — is tied into bamboo “skewers”, placed over a low open flame and then fanned continuously for about 15 minutes until the meat is juicy and tender and the skin takes on the smoky scent of peppery barbecue. The finished product is intensely flavored and reminiscent of a chicken custard, absent the kind of tough fibers that find their way between your teeth and torment you while in polite company.

That’s not to mention the ubiquitous grilled papaya salad (som tum), pounded to order. Oh, and they also have grilled pork shoulder, cooked to a mahogany sheen in a soy sauce-based marinade. I haven’t gotten to that yet, but I’m sure it’s good, if the lines on weekend mornings are any indication.

Gong Thui’s fresh som tum

Unfortunately, like its neighbor Nakorn Pochana (and, incredibly, Joke Samyan, which, alongside Polo Fried Chicken and Chicken Rice Pratunam, is probably the most famous street food vendor in Bangkok), Gong Thui may find itself kicked out of its digs in three years’ time, as landlord Chulalongkorn University develops the area further. Progress is a fact of life, yet I have to say it saddens me, since much of this neighborhood’s street food scene has already been decimated over the past two years alone. Rush, rush to Samyan while you can.

And while you’re at it, stop by Raan Aharn Nuea Pa Porn (Chula Soi 50), where — wonder of wonders — she serves khao soy (curried Northern Thai noodles) with beef or chicken and kanom jeen nam ngiew (fermented rice noodles with Northern-style pork stew), along with a rotating roster of daily specials including sai oua (Northern Thai sausage, available Mondays), gang hang lay (Burmese pork belly curry) and the ever-elusive thum kanoon (pounded young jackfruit salad, both served on Tuesdays).

Pa Porn’s khao soy and kanom jeen with garnishes