Eating in Thailand

I think I have been neglecting writing about the eating aspect of my blog so this post is all about food in Thailand. There were actually many many years in my life that I said that I didn't like Thai food and it took me a while to jump on the Thai food bandwagon like everyone else in the US. I ate it once in 6th grade and got food poisoning driving home from Santa Cruz with my friend's family, which was obviously awkward and uncomfortable so I decided I didn't like Thai food after that. I tried Pad Thai a year or so later and still wasn't impressed (this was before I became an adventurous eater willing to try most things) so it wasn't until about a year ago that I realized I actually did like Thai food.

Food here is pretty awesome and sometimes I have to remind myself of that when I start getting a little ungrateful. However, it can be very hit or miss if you don't stick to the staples that you know. Also, in places like Suphanburi where there are basically zero foreign tourists, menus are in Thai script so you just have to say the dishes that you know in Thai and hope they can make them, which they usually can (the alternative is pointing at something random on the menu which hasn't turned out well for me in the past). It is amazing how you can walk up to a typical street restaurant that has metal or plastic tables and some plastic chairs for seating and the cook has a wok or two and a pot of rice and they can whip up an awesome curry, a soup, and some meat dish in 10 minutes. The first couple weeks we were here we ate a lot of fried rice with chicken since we didn't know any Thai and we would walk up, sit down, smile and shrug our shoulders in hopes that they would bring us food. Fortunately my Thai has improved since then and I can order a  few different things, ask for it to go, and tell them the level of spicy I want. These are some of my go to dishes when I can't read a menu:

Pad Ka Praew (basil and meat in a spicy sauce--Eric's fav)

Pad Thai (lime makes all the difference)

Green Curry (Geng Panang, but sometimes you say geng panang and get sting beans in red sauce, so definitely a hit or miss situation)

Pa Boo Fi Den (fried thai vegetable in yummy sauce, but it can be very spicy)

Chicken with Cashews (Gai Pad Met Mammua)

Pad See Yu (reminds my of Chinese Chow Fun so I love it)

When Wattana or one of the other teachers takes us out to lunch or dinner we actually get to try new things which is always awesome, but can get a little weird. Yesterday Wattana took us to a really cool restaurant on our way back from the visa office where we ate a soupy curry with whole little fish and lotus flower stems. It was pretty good, but very salty and very fishy.

As the lead rice exporter, Thailand has a ton of rice and it is almost worshiped here. For example, one of the translations for eating a meal is "gin khao," which directly translated means eat rice. Unfortunately, Suphanburi pretty much only has crappy short grain rice, which we eat a lot of at school. Whenever I eat long grain rice or wild rice (super rare) I get really excited about eating rice again. However, it can definitely get a bit repetitive. Pad see yu is always a great way to change things up when I am sick of rice and almost all restaurants make it, although they are rice noodles so really there's no avoiding rice here.

Now let's talk about Thai desserts and snacks. In general, Thais are very heavy handed and this goes for spicy, salty, and sweet. They love sweets, but as we found out on Christmas when we gave them peanut butter balls, they are not into rich sweets. Also, things on a stick are super popular. There are some delicious meats on a stick, but all too common are various types of gross hot dogs on a stick and fish balls on a stick. Here are some Thai desserts and snacks:

Weird little sweet things that I think are soy bean paste coated in a jelly type thing.

Ka Nome Crook (coconut milk cooked in an ebble skiver pan with green onions on top--SO GOOD and one of my favorite breakfasts)

Crepe with egg and banana inside and topped with slightly thickened condensed milk and sugar (The first time I got this the woman acted out for me how fat I was going to get)

Hot dogs, sausages, squid, chicken, pork, etc (choose wisely)

Nam Keng Sai (a bowl of crushed ice topped with a milky sweet sauce and you can add a variety of gummy type things, sweet potato, corn, and sticky rice)

I have to admit that I have started to miss western food and splurged on some peanut butter and nutella the other day. Cheese is close to non existent here and I am starting to miss it along with Mexican food which is completely non existent here. However, it just takes one amazing Thai meal to remind me that food is awesome here. I think I just get sick of food at school since it can often be cold and is so focused on the rice. Overall, Thai food is pretty tough to beat, but I still think Indian food is better as my true loyalty will always be to India. So now you know a tiny bit about eating in Thailand and I will try to incorporate more of my eating experiences in this blog, now go eat some cheese and dense cake for me!