Paul Burgess lets his taste buds do the talking in his ultimate round-up of THE BEST Thai food in Bangkok
Eating is a national obsession in Bangkok. Thais nibble all day, and in the evenings, the city slows down for the daily ritual of long dinners outdoors. Makeshift restaurants and food stalls sprout all over the city’s streets, usurping the pavements as groups of Thais settle on tables with bottles of whiskey and a bewildering array of dishes.
Indeed, most inhabitants in Bangkok eat out every day. A 2005 city survey found that 84 per cent of Bangkok’s inhabitants always eat out. With Thai cuisine rated among the best in the world, intense competition and the cultural importance attached to food, prices are kept extraordinarily low. It is easy to see why Bangkok’s greatest allure is its food.
Welcome to a food city. Here’s a guide on what to eat and where to find it.
street Food
The venerable food stalls with tables set out on the pavement are a quintessential Bangkok institution, spreading along the roadside all day
long and becoming denser at night. The most common dish you’ll encounter is noodle soup. Good and hearty, it comes with a variety of meats, seafood or wanton, and sometimes other more creative combinations.
Aside from the simple stalls, which only serve water for drinks, there are larger street eateries where you can have more substantial meals of different sauces and rice. These operate mostly after dark and serve a variety of drinks, including beer and whiskey.
The food – Thai popular dishes – is as good as you can find at indoor restaurants, yet are cheaper due to lower overhead costs. Clusters of these eateries can be found in the sois (alleys) off Silom Road, especially in Soi Convent and Samsen Road Soi 2 – the latter opens all night, a perfect choice if you want to find somewhere to eat after the oppressive nightly 2am curfew.
A more sophisticated incarnation of these streetside eateries are the open-garage-style eateries which have larger menus, with prices only marginally more expensive that their brethren on the streets.
Many of these are good options, although one that stands above the rest is Krua Aroy Aroy (Pan Road, Silom Road, tel +66 (081) 620-1399; open from 10am to 4pm) – a place renowned for its range of Thai curry soups and other rare delicacies such as a paste of pork, shrimp and salted egg.
Indoor Air-Conditioned restaurants
Thai traditional dishes, alongside some outlandish concoctions, can be found in the Thai-style indoor restaurants. This type of restaurant places value on affordability: simple décor, dishes only a trifle more expensive than open-garage restaurants, and yet offering that something extra in the form of air-conditioning and live bands that pump out loud Thai and Western pop music.
The food is consistently good; service is irreverent; and groups of Thais make an evening of dinner. One of the best of these restaurants is The Papaya (Soi Saladaeng 2 off Silom Road, tel +66 (0)2 235-8657; open from 11am to 11pm) – try their chicken fried with roasted chilli, bell pepper and cashew nuts; deep-fried prawn patties; and deep-fried wantons stuffed with laab-style pork.
Another great restaurant is Sky High (Rajdamnoen Klang, tel +66 (0)2 224-1947; open from 8am to 2am). Its dishes are infused with Chinese influences, such as stir-fried chicken with dried Chinese mushrooms and shredded crab meat; and a deep-fried whole squid stuffed with minced pork.
Royal Thai Cooking
“We have a different style of preparing food here,” says Vichit Mukura, chef of Sala Rim Naam at The Oriental hotel. “Many dishes we make are full of flavor but not spicy.”
It is loosely defined as Royal Thai Cuisine, a sub-genre of Thai food that is low in pungent ingredients, rather sweet, and packed with flavors that linger on the palate. Less than a dozen places feature this cuisine in Bangkok – and all of them are relatively expensive (expect to pay around 1,000 baht (USD28) per head, including drinks), although that includes the exquisite setting and impeccable service.
Sala Rim Naam (The Oriental hotel, Oriental Avenue, tel +66 (0)2 236-0400) does it in a traditionally faithful manner – expect many Thai curry soups and excellent condiments.
Another restaurant, which has become something of an institution, is the Blue Elephant (33 South Sathorn Road, tel +66 (0)2 673-9353). There are lots of memorable dishes to choose from – from the slightly sweet and tender dumplings stuffed with minced pork, or the fillet of sea-bass marinated in chilli, onion, garlic, basil, and red curry paste, and then grilled in a boat of bamboo – deep textures, slightly sweet, a whiff of smoky bamboo flavor.
Seafood on The River
A dozen restaurants scattered on the banks of the Chao Phraya River specialize in seafood and live entertainment, and eating at these places are protracted social occasions, as befits the romantic river setting.
The most upscale of these, Supatra River House (266 Soi Wat Rakhang, Arunamarin Road, tel +66 (0)2 411-0305), is a tourist-oriented venue complete with Thai traditional dances. Expect to pay 800 baht for a meal (USD22), including drinks, for original dishes such as seafood dumplings in a green curry soup or grilled prawns served with a tamarind sauce.
Up the river, Khinlom-Chom-Sa-Phan (Samsen Soi 3, tel +66 (0)2 628-8382/3, open from 11am to 1am) is more affordable, featuring live Thai bands and large portions that attract a mostly-Thai clientele.
There are all sorts of seafood dishes on the menu, with traditional fare such as seabass in a steamboat soup of tamarind leaves, chilli and lemon, alongside more inventive dishes like their various dips made from seafood and served with vegetable crudités, as well as the unforgettable soft-shelled crab in yellow curry sauce.
Artistic restaurants
Boutique-style restaurants are increasingly popular among young urban-cultured Thais. These are typically small spaces in restored old houses that feature rotating art exhibitions, tasteful music and small menus of classic dishes, some with a twist.
There is a concentration of them in Phra Athit Road – at least six in this short road alone, all whipping up stir-fries, soups and spicy yam salads. One of the best in Phra Athit Road is Bar Bali (tel +66 (0)2 629-0318; open from 6pm to midnight).
The Thai curry soups are particularly good, especially the red curry with duck, aubergines, green peppercorns, kaffir lime leaves, basil leaves, and coconut milk.
The nearby Comme (no telephone; same hours) is a larger place that features nightly live music – great dishes include the dried-salted fish in a spicy tamarind soup and the catfish salad (the fish is shredded, deep-fried, and then served on a bed of green mango and spicy-sweet sauce made from vinegar, sugar, and chilli).
Comme’s popularity has spawned a sister operation called Ta Ling (Soi Wang Lang, Arun Road, tel +66 (0)2 412-3993, open from 4pm to midnight, closed on Mondays). Set on the western bank of the river, it has the best décor and setting of all – tables on a riverfront terrace and minimal decor whose highlight is a few well-chosen sculptures and paintings
Thai fusion cusine
Some restaurants are now experimenting with Thai-based fusion cuisine. Instant popularity means that many more restaurants of this type will follow, but for the moment, it’s hard to find a table at the most famous of these places, called Pla Dib (which means “raw fish”).
At Pla Dib (Soi Areesamphan 7, tel +66 (0)2 279-8185), you’ll find all sorts of inventive food: sashimi-style raw fish served with Thai laab sauce (lemon, fish sauce, mint, and roasted rice); pizzas flavoured with dill instead of oregano; deep-fried strips of pork marinated in spices, and served with a chilli sauce made from soy sauce instead of lime juice.
Thai Wines fo r Spicy Food
In the last decade, half a dozen professional winemakers have sprouted up in Thailand, producing at least one million bottles of wine annually.
The wines are distinctly Thai — a characteristic that arises from the local ecological conditions. The character of Thai wine is fruity, light in body, low in tannins, and slightly sweet — traits that make it well suited for spicy food.
Unlike traditional Western wines, which can taste somewhat bitter and acidic with spicy food, Thai wines — particularly whites — are enhanced by the peppery and sweet extraneous vitality of Thai dishes. Even the Shiraz produced by the winemakers, for example, is less peppery than traditional Shiraz. Spicy food enhances its spicy bite.
Such compatibility with spicy food has led the winemakers to adopt the marketing motto: Thai-wines-for-spicy-food. It’s a winner in promotion, and some diners in Thai restaurants, especially outside of Thailand, are enticed enough by the concept to opt for a Thai wine.
Within the country, the wines are now available in nine out of 10 five-star hotels, as well as many upscale standalone restaurants, particularly in Bangkok (including Blue Elephant, Pla Dib, Supatra River House, and Sala Rim Naam). They are also available in supermarkets and top department stores.
Experimentation is ongoing, and Thai wines are getting better year after year — the wines are already competent, but they still have some way to go before they reach the quality of traditional wines grown in Europe and the more recent waves of wines from the New World.
Drunk independently, these Thai wines are rather flat, but they work better with spicy food than traditional non-Thai wines. Try them with your next spicy Thai meal.
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