Escape to Chiang Mai

I thought I would like to talk a bit more about food as it’s everywhere here and it’s hard to resist. Which might explain my expanded waistline on my return home. A friend recently posted;

If I was run over on the road and they had to draw around my body it would be a circle!! If I stay here much longer it will be.

The food here is exceptional. It’s the freshest vegetables and meat or fish. Everything is bought and cooked the same day. You buy fish and frogs still alive from the market. The chickens are almost clucking. Thais would not entertain food that has a long shelf life or isn’t mega fresh.

If you buy meals to take home from the market they are normally about 50p (20 baht) and are packed in a small plastic bag, very deftly closed by a rubber band. There is a huge choice in take-away food.

There are a couple of places we frequent in the village. Friendly, very simple, great food.

We also go out to street food markets of which there are many dotted around the city. There are ‘street food tours’ you can go on but we do our own. They have many vendors and plastic tables and chairs arranged behind them on the side of the road. Like a very, very cheap Altrincham market night out (and far more interesting).

Here are a few of the dishes we really enjoy;

Pad se u. Thick flat noodles stir fried with Chinese kale and chilli with chicken, pork or shrimp

Pad Thai. Rice noodles, bean sprouts, tofu, spring onion, peanut, egg with chicken, pork or shrimp

Pad Kepow Kai Dow. Minced chicken or pork stir fried with holy basil and chilli with a fried egg on top (optional). It’s spicy.

Khao Pad. Fried rice with vegetables and meat

Penang curry with vegetables, meat or fish

Khao soi (egg noodle, yellow curry, chicken) with crispy noodles on top.

They cook pork until it is mega crispy with the crackling on and then really spice it up, it’s incredibly spicy. It’s lovely.

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Khao Kha Moo. Succulent pork leg served over rice with sides of pickled mustard greens and a chilli garlic sauce. Found at the Chang Phuak night market and served by this lovely cowboy hatted woman. Yee Hah

With most rice dishes you get a bowl of clear broth on the side which is also delicious.

Then there are all the soups;

Tom yum goong (spicy shrimp soup)

Tom Kha Kai (chicken in coconut soup)

Som Tum (spicy papaya salad)

And a whole raft of noodle soups with pork balls and assorted meats and veggies.

In northern Thailand there are lots of different hotter dishes than in the south, and some quite different.

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There are Chiang Mai sausages, Sai Oua, which are hot and spicy, every one is different and mostly home made. They are too lumpy for my liking, but tasty. There are sausages with vermicelli inside. They are all a ring shape like a big Cumberland sausage. You buy them by weight and they are on every market. Some market stalls more popular than others

My favourite snacks wandering round the markets are curry puffs. Crispy, flaky, buttery pastry. It’s like a mini Cornish pastie filled with salted chicken, taro or peas. Yum. Chris likes the coconut little round things hot off the griddle, not sure what they are but are delicious. Very nice lady on Worrorot market who makes them.

There are many temptations including the roti woman, in our village, who does the loveliest roti filled with egg and banana and drizzled with forest honey chopped up into chunks. I have just had one and I’m still sticky…and I don’t really eat sweet things!!

There are lots of sweet things wrapped up in a leaf, it looks like a milky jelly wobbly thing!

If you do get fed up with rice and noodles there are lots of places for western food. A good breakfast can be had at the UN Irish bar or a place called sausage King just out of the city. They supply all the bacon and sausages for the hotels and some supermarkets. It is run by a guy called Robert from Bolton, who cures all his own bacon and makes the sausages.

You can get French, Italian and all styles of European food here as well as Korean, Japanese and all the other world foods. It is a food lovers heaven.

The fruit here is lovely. Sweet juicy oranges, strawberries, tamarind, dragon fruit, grapes, pomelo, guavas, papaya, mango, avocados all grown locally. I should eat only fruit and leave the curry puffs alone.

No wonder we’re getting fatter!!!

It is an endless culinary delight here, love it but need to run round a bit more. Feeling hungry just writing this……