Thailand - Food

For all of you foodies out there, I wanted to sum up our experiences with the food here. My apologies that the previous posts have been so light on culinary content, but it was my intent to put it all in one post.

After first arriving, we stuck to some foods we knew our stomachs would handle alright. Personally, I have an iron stomach, with the one exception being dairy products. Lucky for me, there is really no dairy here to speak of. Almost all of the milk is soy milk and there is not really any cheese, save for imported (read: expensive) stuff. This may sound terribly disheartening to us midwest folks, but its actually hard to think of fried rice or thai noodle dishes smothered in cheese. For some reason, it just doesn't seem like it would work. 

Anyways, our first couple meals were simple thai fried rice or fried noodles. The fried rice is actually super good, and way different from your run of the mill chinese restaurant stuff. It usually includes about half rice and half veggies plus meat, along with a lime wedge and cucumber slices on the side. Most often, a small condiment tray which has 4 glass jars filled with spicy thai chilies in oil, sugar (or palm sugar), a dark sauce (soy sauce but lighter in color), and ground chili powder. This is brought to you to season your dish to your liking. I am told that it is a common misconception that Thai cuisine does not include sugar, and you are somewhat laughed at if you omit any of the four toppings.

As we continued travelling, I was literally shocked at the variety of street food offerings. You can grab anything you could imagine, from fried dough balls (not quite donuts, but close) to fried chicken, noodle soup, delicious meats on a stick, you name it. Its relatively challenging to interact with these vendors, as I have yet to run across one who speaks any english at all. This has made street food a challenge for Christie, unless it is obviously vegetarian. That did not stop me from diving head first into the world of street cuisine :) A common sight in our trip is me standing in front of a vendor cart with my trusty Thai phrasebook trying to stammer out a legible order, with some Thai women laughing in the background. Even so, I have really really enjoyed the street food, and so has Christie when it has been chicken or meatless. Our favorite meal of the trip was Khao Soi - egg noodles in a spicy red curry broth topped with crunchy fried noodles - from a street vendor.

(we didn't take this photo - ours didn't turn out)

Another street vendor dish I enjoyed was fried chicken (just like home), with a wad of sticky rice and spicy chili dipping sauce.... I had this one for breakfast this morning. 

Some street vendors sell just small bites, like some we found in Chiang Mai on the sunday walking street. There we sampled some fried banana slices and some coconut and peanut mixtures wrapped in banana leaves and grilled. It was like the state fair, but Thai style and without all the huge sweaty people running around.

Speaking of breakfast, a lot of people asked us before the trip what Thai breakfast is like. Truthfully, I really didn't know at the time.  If you popped out of your guest house and looked around on the street, you might think a traditional thai breakfast is an energy drink and a cigarette based on the cab drivers habits.  Most of our mornings have been spent in a sit down restaurant, and they usually have a western style menu including eggs and bacon and such, although we stuck mainly to fruit and yogurt.  One morning we ordered mangos and sticky rice, thinking it was a breakfast food.  At other restaurants later in the trip we found this dish in the dessert menu, so apparently its not a breakfast item per se... But it was really good!  

Traditional Thai breakfast is a bowl of rice soup with either chicken or pork, and I had this one morning, but I was just not really in the mood for hot salty rice soup that early in the day.  Since so much food was available on the street all day long, it was not really necessary or even advantageous to eat a big breakfast, as it was somewhat overpriced compared to street food.

Some of you out there might be wondering what types of bizarre foods we encountered.  Southeast asia is notorious for eating things we might generally never consider consuming, and of course I had to try these :)  Fruits here are bizarre looking, but generally taste like, well, fruit.  We tried rambutan:

Mangosteen

Dragonfruit

Getting into the more bizarre, I tried some bugs one night at a market.  I was looking at them for a while, then after a couple beers I had the courage to order up a plate of silk worms and crickets.

The silk worms were actually surprisingly alright, and tasted mostly like salty fried crunchy bits.  Crickets however were a little too gross for me.  I felt like they were just a mess of legs and wings and didn't eat more than one of them.  The merchant was also selling HUGE cockroaches, but I didnt try any:

On the second half of our trip, we tried a lot of curries.  Red curry, green curry, yellow curry, masaman curry, you name it.  They were all really fantastic and mostly spicey.  In the past, I have been a bigger fan of less soupy indian style curries, but all of the thai ones we enjoyed were super good.  

As for snacks, there was no lack of variety available between street vendors and the old 7-11.  Chips came in some pretty wild flavors, including spicy soft shell crab, nori seaweed, and chili squid.  Christie enjoyed some chinese style filled buns, which are white dough buns filled with different things like pork or black bean paste.

Overall, we are really going to miss Thailand's delicious food.  Every time I was not really full, I ate again because I didn't want to miss any opportunity to try another dish.  Luckily, much of this can be recreated in our kitchen, but it is not as easy as popping out onto the street with a couple bucks in your pocket and grabbing a quick bite.  

Final Day in Bangkok

Today is our last day in Bangkok, with our flight leaving around midnight. This morning I ran around to take pictures of all the things I want to remember, and then rounded up Christie for some breakfast. Our original plan was to take a train to Ayutthaya, the previous capital of Thailand (then Siam). It was sacked by Burma in 1767 and reduced to ruins. Today the city is a tourist attraction and considered an important cultural history stop. When we made it to the train station, we snagged our tickets and sat out at the platform. We waited for the train to show up.... and then waited some more. By the time it was 45 minutes late even getting in to Bangkok, we decided it was going to be too late in the day to start an hour and a half train trip on the day we were flying out, so we returned our tickets and opened our trusty guidebook to find something else to do.

By this point, it was getting to be miserably hot, and we really just wanted to relax in a park. Since we were already at the train station, I pulled out a map to look for any public parks along Bangkok's subway line (more on transit later). We boarded the relatively new subway to Lumphini Park, which is a gorgeous oasis in the heart of the city and a great escape from the noise and hustle of the city traffic. Centered around a man-made lake, this park has lots of trees and paths to walk in the shade and recuperate some energy. Walking along the shore, we saw some gross looking fish in the lake, and as I went closer to the water, a massive lizard came swimming up and came on shore. At first I thought it was a small alligator because it was so damn huge.

From Thailiand - Last Day

After screwing around in the park, we got back on the subway to try to find something to eat, since the park food court was shut down apparently. Since this is the hot season, not a lot of tourists are around and consequently things are unexpectedly closed at times. For lunch we tried to hit up an indian place in a really really busy area of the city, but we couldn't find it. After walking and walking and walking, we just popped into a burrito place that had air conditioning and ate. I know what you are thinking, a burrito place in thailand, but this street was known for its international food and popularity with expats from around the world, so its not as crazy as it sounds. The food was mediocre, but the air conditioning was top-notch.

We then embarked on a quest to find the third book in the Eragon series, since Christie had finished book two on the trip. Books take quite a while to make their way over to asia apparently, because it was hard to find, despite dropping in the US last september. We popped on to Bangkok's skytrain, which is a really high elevated mass transit line, and took it to the Victory Monument. Somewhat comically, the Victory Monument commemorates a victory over French colonial troops which granted Thailand some territory which they were then forced to evacuate four years later during WWII. It is now seen as an embarrassment and symbol of a past militaristic regime by Thais, partly due to the Western design of the monument itself. It really looks like it does not belong here.

From Thailiand - Last Day

We snagged a taxi back to our guest house and I took some more photos, including one of our guest house in Bangkok (finally):

From Thailiand - Last Day

As the photo shows, there are plants EVERYWHERE here, even in relatively poor neighborhoods. This place was really super nice and very affordable at B650 (~$20) per night with air conditioning and in-room bathroom. All of the food we ate here was awesome as well.

We made our final packing preparations, and then went downstairs to drink a couple final Chiang beers and bid farewell to the friendly staff. Christie took a picture of me with my friend Yao, who I will not forget.

From Thailiand - Last Day

25 hours of flying ahead of us.... See you on the flip side!

Ang Thong National Marine Park

Today we set off on a speedboat to do some snorkeling and kayaking in Ang Thong National Marine Park, a collection of 42 small islands off the coast off the island we are staying on. We had only to walk about 50 feet down the beach to catch our boat, which was a 25 or 30 foot speedboat with twin 200 hp outboard motors. An hour of somewhat bouncy seas later, we arrived for snorkeling. Pulling up, you could see a couple other boats full of tourists already there, but it was a really beautiful and rather large reef so it was alright.

From Ang Thong National Park

We saw lots of really interesting coral formations, and quite a few fish. Christie headed in before me, and then I saw a small squid swimming super fast around. Aside from that, it was the usual tropical fish suspects: clownfish, angelfish, and parrotfish mostly.

Our guide took us to see a couple islands he thought looked like animals or other things, but its kind of like looking at clouds, everyone sees it their own way. Afterwards, we stopped at the headquarters of the park on the biggest island and went kayaking. It was pretty standard, not too terribly exciting because we were in a group of about 25 people and had a schedule to keep.

From Ang Thong National Park

We ate some lunch and then visited the emerald lagoon, which is an inland saltwater lagoon and it was really beautiful.

From Ang Thong National Park

Here is the full set:

Ko Samui - Island of paradise?

Last night we arrived in Ko Samui for the last leg of our journey. We were less than thrilled with the place after a long day of rough travelling involving buses and lots of waiting around in not so nice areas. Anyways, today we woke up to birds singing and some sun shining on the beach, and we feel a lot better. Our bungalow is about 35 steps from the beach, and our stinky clothes are in the laundry from packing them wet after the rainforest. Here are some pictures :)

Khao Sok National Park

Yesterday we left northern thailand to fly to the south for the rest of our trip. We arrived in Surat Thani and were picked up at the airport and headed to our guest house. The resort we booked is half a mile outside the national park and set in the jungle.

Immediately when we stepped out of the car, we knew this was going to be a great place. Friendly staff and a gorgeous garden set among forested mountains.... It is really nice here. We were shown to our room, which has an outdoor shower that you can see the forest and mountains from.

From Khao Sok

The room is a basic bungalow with lots of windows, and a nice big bed with a mosquito net over it (no screens). We had some fried noodles for lunch in the restaurant on site, and it was fantastic. After that, we took a tubing trip down the river this place is built on, and saw snakes, birds, and monkeys. On the way back we stopped at a temple to feed the monkeys a big bunch of bananas. They were so cute! The brave ones would come right up to you and then we handed them a half a banana and they scurried off up a tree with it. It was really fun for me, since I had never seen a monkey in the wild before. Christie saw tons of them in India, but this was my first time. Unfortunately, we forgot our waterproof camera bag so we couldn't bring the camera tubing or with to feed the monkeys. Sorry!!

After dinner we had a couple of drinks and chatted with some of the staff. This morning we woke up and it was really rainy (it is a rainforest in monsoon season after all). Not ones to be put off by a sprinkle, we struck out to hike in the park anyways. It was really beautiful inside, with tons of birds all around. About half an hour in to the hike, it really started to come down, and we both got soaked to the bone. We kept at it until we got too hungry and then turned back. After stripping off our wet clothes, we both found out we were basically covered in leeches. I had an extremely large one on my leg and it is still bleeding, 3 hours later.

From Khao Sok

We had some really tasty curry for lunch and a couple of mango lassi's. Yum!

From Khao Sok

Tomorrow we head to an island for some beach bumming... We can't wait to lay around in the sun :)

Chiang Mai photos

Temple Time!

This morning, we woke up and struck out for some thai breakfast. I was determined to have some mangos and sweet sticky rice, as I was told it is a great way to start the day. We found a place pretty quick with an english menu and the dish in question for around 2 dollars. When it came out, I was shocked at the size. It was at least two and a half large mangoes cut up and a helping of sticky rice with some sweetened coconut milk mixed in. I wish this was a scratch-and-taste blog, because then you could share in this delight. Really fresh mangoes (in season here too), and the rice was so good. Sticky rice is something I have to figure out how to do right at home. Its quite dry on its own, and you could literally make a snowball out of it and throw it, and not have any rice on your hands.

After breakfast, we walked a bit, but it was brutally hot today so we went back to the room to regroup and hydrate before striking out. Our goal for the day was to see a couple temples in the area, so first we made for Doi Suthep, a mountain just outside town. There is a temple up top that boasts gorgeous views over the entire Mae Ping valley that the city sits in. To get there, we took a shared sangthew (maybe wrong spelling), which is a pick-up truck with benches in the back that holds about 10 people (or 14 if they hang on the outside too). Its a cheap way to get around since you split the fare with everyone inside. They drive around town and honk the horn at people walking, and you wave if you want in. The driver pretty much makes up the route as he goes depending on where people are going. Its somewhat alarming to see thai people hopping on the back while its moving to catch a ride. Anyways, we rode up with a japanese dude who was on a trip around the world. I chatted him up pretty good, and we talked about his home, our home, and his plans (it was about a 20 minute ride). At the top of the mountain, we hopped out to see the temple and view the overlook. It was really busy, but very beautiful. You can check out the pictures at the end, where I will put the slideshow of the days photos.

After this, we hit up the trusty 7-11 for water and snacks. The heat was now full-on, with temperature around 100 degrees and sticky humidity. We hopped in a tuk-tuk to a forest temple in town, which was very peaceful. There were caves to explore and lots of monks around. Near the end of the walk, I started to feel extremely weak and shaky, mainly from not eating enough (hard to believe with this much great food around). Christie rescued me with a granola bar and a bottle of water, but the stray dogs wanted in on it too :) We walked over to a street food vendor and I just pointed around like an idiot and ended up with a nice bowl of noodles and meatballs (I think it was chinese-style). Also I snagged a lemongrass juice, which was very refreshing. Its so hot here that water starts to taste gross after noon, and you need something with salt and sugar in it to keep yourself going. My bowl of noodles was around 85 cents with the juice, not bad.

Now we will be heading to dinner at a fusion restaurant which is somewhat fancy.... We will report on it later. Cheers!

Chiang Mai!

Today we took a bus to Chiang Mai, one of the older cities in Northern Thailand. The bus was super nice, with free water and some snacks even. It was a 3 hour trip through the mountains, and I started to feel a little sick toward the end. I held it together though, and then we checked in to a beautiful guest house for the weekend. It has a nice big room with hot shower and an outdoor courtyard with misters to keep it cool. We ate some delicious thai food and poked around the oldest temple in the city, built in the 1200's. There were lots of stray dogs and cats running amok, and some monks feeding them. Here are the photos from the day:

Trekking in Chiang Rai

Today we got an early start to head out for a trek through the hills surrounding Chiang Rai. Many indigenous tribes maintain a subsistence based lifestyle in these hills. Yesterday we had booked a guide to help us navigate the area and we met him after breakfast.

Our driver dropped us off after a fairly harrowing drive through some less than ideal dirt roads. Here we set out with Tien, our friendly Thai guide who was all smiles. After a bit of hiking on the dirt road, we made our way to a Karen village. The Karen people are mostly Burmese refugees who have fled to northern Thailand. It was somewhat awkward walking through a basic village of huts and farms at first, but Tien spoke the language and the people were mostly smiling at us, which broke the ice a bit. It was amazing to see how the bamboo huts were constructed and the thatched roofs which need to be replaced every year.

From Thailand - Chiang Rai Trek

Livestock were running all around, including chickens, pigs, cows, and water buffalo. We walked fairly quickly through this village, as Christie and I were eager to get in some real hiking. We were not sure what to expect going into this trip, but we got more than we bargained for in terms of strenuous hiking. We estimate the temperature was close to 100 degrees and the sun was angry and beating down on us. Hiking across the exposed hillsides where rice and corn farms were being tilled and planted took its toll on us. Luckily we brought quite a bit of water along for the journey.

We passed some farmers and lots of rice paddies. Currently, it is the dry hot season in northern Thailand, and the rice is done and will be replanted in a month when the wet season begins. Along the fields, we saw small shade huts built for the farmers to take breaks and sometimes sleep in. After a couple hours of intense uphill hiking, we took a break in a Lahu village. Here most of the huts had solar panels outside of them for basic electricity to power one lamp or maybe a radio. These are provided by the government along with a battery so the lamps can be run at night. Here is us sitting in the shade with our guide:

From Thailand - Chiang Rai Trek

Tien assured us lunch would be soon so we got moving again. The next section of hike was through a bamboo jungle, with lots of wild ginger, bananas, rubber, galangal and teak. After we both felt like we might pass out from heat exhaustion, we made it to the Akha village we were stopping at for lunch. Inside the "Bamboo Bar" (read: a hut), we took a load off and grabbed some cold water. This village was close enough to civilization to have enough electricity for one refrigerator and a TV. Tien brought out a massive lunch which included fried chicken, spicy pork sausage with lemongrass and ginger, sticky rice, and chili oil and chili paste for dipping. We were starving so we dug right in.

From Thailand - Chiang Rai Trek

Everything was delicious, I especially liked the rice, which you balled up and dipped in the sauces.

After lunch, we hiked down to a nearby waterfall to cool off. We all swam underneath it and it was really refreshing. Our trek wrapped up with a trip to a hot spring, which was partially man-made and somewhat slimy inside, but I jumped in and relaxed after a full day of hard work.

Dinner on the river

Last night, we walked down the street from our guest house to find some dinner. We stopped in at a pretty looking restaurant on a dock on the Chao Phraya river which flows through central Bangkok. I ordered up a shrimp dish of some sort, Christie tried a chicken dish and we split a spicy eggplant salad. The eggplant salad was a very pungent and ... interesting flavor. My shrimp were basically whole shrimp with the legs cut off, but the heads and tails were on. These were the biggest shrimp I have ever seen in my life, literally massive. I was a bit surprised to see them whole, and I had to dismantle the tail from the head myself. They were served with some cashews and rice and overall were pretty good, flavor-wise... But I was a bit squeamish about the heads for some reason. Here is a photo of the view:

From Thailand

After dinner we headed back to the guest house to crack a couple beers and talk about the next day. We had booked a domestic flight to Chiang Rai earlier in the day so we had to decide where we wanted to stay. Our kind guest house operator called for us and handed me the phone once she verified they spoke english. We booked a room and relaxed and read about our potential activities up north. After a couple hours Christie headed up to bed and I stayed to chat with Yao, the guest house attendant. She taught me some thai and we talked about some cultural differences. Example: Brittney Spears video came on TV with a bunch of Thai girls dancing in bikinis, and they were very white-skinned. Yao explained that Thai women prefer to be as light-skinned as possible, as that is considered more beautiful. I got a little peckish after a while so she cooked me up some fried rice, which was delicious. We exhanged some more phrases before I headed up to bed.

Stay tuned for Chiang Rai.... Hill Tribe treks and border hikes.

Thailand Day 2: Finding our place

Today we woke up to a pretty quiet (and presumably hung over) Khaosan road. We got up early to take advantage of the free breakfast in our overpriced hotel. The buffet consisted of various curries and noodle dishes, along with some crappy looking eggs and bacon. After eating down our food, we checked out to find a more reasonable guest house to stay our second night in. Fortunately, we found an amazing place in a somewhat quiet (but still bustling) neighborhood. Our tuk-tuk (three-wheeled open taxi) motored us over there for about $3. This place is incredible, it has a super nice open air restuarant/lounge on the first floor and really friendly staff. We stashed our bags and took off to see the grand palace:

From Thailand

From Thailand

I hope to share some more photos soon, Thailand is so amazing (although swelteringly hot). My time is about up at the internet cafe, so I have to run, but we are really enjoying ourselves. Talk to you all soon!!

We have arrived!

26 hours and 9,000 miles after leaving home, we have landed in Bangkok. Tonight we took a taxi to a popular backpacker strip - Khaosan Road - and started our search for a place to sleep. It was around midnight when we finally arrived in the area, and the street was filled with drunk backpackers dodging motorcycles and taxis. Our glasses both immediately fogged up when we left the air-conditioned taxi from the extreme humidity. The sounds, sights and smells were a bit overwhelming for us two jet-lagged midwesterners. Street vendors cooking all manners of noodles and animals line the sidewalks and streets, and traffic is a zoo, to say the least.

Continuing our trek to sleep, we stopped in a guest house asking 800 baht (~$22), but it was a VERY basic room which seemed a bit dirty. We decided to continue looking and came across a bit nicer of a place going for 2,000 (~$60). It is actually reasonably nice inside.

I am currently enjoying an ice cold beer in the room, and it is past 2 AM and the party is still jumping outside. Tomorrow we look forward to trying some local food and seeing the city. Cheers!

Almost there!

We just landed in Tokyo for a 3 hour layover.... Even being in the airport brings back a lot of memories for us from our trip to Japan a few years ago. Our flight over was pretty awesome, I pretty much played video games on the in-seat computer and drank green tea the whole time. We got thermally scanned for swine flu upon arrival which was annoying and took quite a while.

Now we are sitting at an internet kiosk trying to book a room in bangkok for tonight, without much luck so far. More soon!

Coming Soon: Thailand

Almost time!  In 2 days we are leaving for Thailand, so I thought I should dust off the old blog.  It is unclear how often we will be able to post while we are there, but we have journals and plenty of camera space, so please be patient and you will get the whole story.  

We also added a link in the upper left to subscribe via email.  You can enter your address and have the posts emailed to you if you would prefer.