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Shu Mai

Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand – Jumping back again to my trip in Ubon…

Day trips on a motorbike can be journeys in themselves.   By the time you arrive home, the morning, almost hard to recall at this time, seems like it was ages ago.  My first full day in Ubon, I found myself first in an orchard of dragon fruit trees, where I got to see their blooms, the centers were a bouquet of yellow beads nestled against the inner skirt of long creamy-white petals, which tumbled from a crown of spiky petals, yellow with a reddish tinge at the edges.

An hour or so later, I found myself passing stands and stands selling salapao, the steamed Chinese buns, and shu mai out of wide metal steamer baskets around Phibun.  I hemmed and hawed, unsure of which would be the best stand to patronize, finally just stopping at one where the friendly owners packed up my purchases in a little plastic bag to hang from my motorbike bar.

The relief of settling on a purchase didn’t last long, I soon found myself being pulled over, along with nearly other rider, by the police.  I’ve had few, if any, interactions with the Thai police and all the stories I’ve heard about them have included bribes and sometimes trips to jail.  Needless to say, I was somewhat anxious about my status as a foreigner and one driving around on a motorbike at that.  I handed them my passport, tried to assume a respectful demeanor and then tried my best to understand whatever they were asking me in Thai.  It soon became clear that they were going to let me go so I asked for a breakfast recommendation.  The officer motioned to a place up the street and recommended the soup.  “Kuay tiew gai?” I asked.  He smiled at my pigeon Thai.  I gingerly restarted the motorbike trying my best not to run over either officer as I drove towards breakfast.

The rest of the day was like a dream.  I drove through the gong village.  I ended up at a wat on a mountain, there were no English signs and no mention of the sites in any of my books or maps, but it seemed to be a destination for Thai tourists who showed up to see the chedi and white temple, which was a shadow of the white temple I’d seen in Chiang Rai just a few short weeks ago.  For lunch, I stopped at Mae Nam Song Si (Two Color River) a terrible tourist idea, in Khong Jiam and had naem muu, a sour fermented pork sausage sliced and dressed with cilantro, chiles and fried peanuts.

Later I found myself driving around behind an abandoned building on rocky paths and then sitting by a small blue-green lake without a soul in sight.  Back on the bike and heading home, I passed through the gong village again, but this time I stopped to see the gongs up closer.  A woman came out.  “Is okay if I take pictures,” I asked.  She smiled and, producing a stick, began tapping each gong.  One sounded hollow, weak and muffled.  Another bellowed loud and clear.  Each had its own voice.   I was drawn to small one that sung clear and true; it would be perfect for my 1.5 year old nephew, whom I would see in a month or so.

Driving back was long and grey.  The sky was overcast and the rice paddies a duller green.  By the time I reached Ubon proper, I was tired, dirty and hungry.  Again I was unable to find the laab restaurant.  Not thinking clearly I did the silly thing and went to one of the restaurants on the water recommended in a book.  It was nearly empty.  I ordered laab and som tom, both unremarkable, and was too tired to finish a beer.  I headed home, the day’s activities already dim memories.

Geow Mangkorn (Dragon Fruit) Orchard

Dragon Fruit Blossoms

Salapao (Steamed Buns)

Kuay Tiew Gai (Chicken Noodle Soup)

Gong

Chedi

Naem Muu (Fermented Pork Sausage)

Overcast Rice Paddies in Ubon Ratchathani

Som Tom (Papaya Salad) & Laab Muu (Minced Pork Salad)

Michael Ginor, Ian Chalermkittichai & Todd English

Bangkok, Thailand – I won’t jump into the snarkiness that is reverberating through the digital space.  However, this post couldn’t be more timely unless I had actually gotten it together for the period of time when the Food Trip with Todd English episode on Thailand (Big Mango: Three Nights in Bangkok) was airing.  The picture above of Michael Ginor, Ian Chalermkittichai and Todd English was taken during a taping at Thip Samai for the episode.

If you’ve ever wondered how Anthony Bourdain eats without reservations and Ruth Reichl finds herself making ant-egg salads…well I probably can’t speak for all travel shows.  What I do know is that most shows have a dedicated team of producers who do some research online, reach out to tourism boards and try to make local contacts through those resources.  Once they’ve set up their contacts and sketched out brief itineraries, they’re on the road (or in the sky) for consecutive tapings that are then edited and portioned out over the course of a season.

For this episode, I joined Ian and his wife Sarah as Ian gave Todd and Michael the background on phad thai.  Just so you know, the first place we tried, one of my and Ian’s sous chef’s favorites, was on the corner of soi Ari and completely gone by the time the camera crew arrived at 10:30 p.m.  We ended up at Thailand’s most famous phad thai place on Maha Chai road.  It’s not my favorite, but admittedly the theatrics up front probably made for the best clips.

Sarah and I actually tried to sneak some phad kee mao (drunken noodles) at Raan Jay Fai down the street.  As it turned out, they needed us to be in the taping so we followed orders as silent actors.  As they rolled the film, we had to walk down the street with the guys pretending to have a light-hearted pre-phad thai conversation…and then back up and walk down again.  But we couldn’t sit down to eat just yet, first we had to look on with pretend great interest as Ian explained each ingredient for the dish and once seated wait with pretend patience for everyone’s commentary on the dish before digging in for real.  It was all done in the name of travel television and my fifteen seconds of fame.

Beht Sam

Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand – Last night my father called to tell me that a box of notebooks and shoes arrived at my parents’ house in Massachusetts.  I sent it from Bangkok over two months and its arrival was a reminder of things past and things left undone.  So, I’m picking up where I left off on my last travels.

I spent my first day in Ubon biking all over the countryside and then circling and circling around town looking for a nonexistent restaurant.  My search unfruitful, I stopped off elsewhere and ordered tom yum goong and beht sam, roast duck bathed in soy with green chiles, coriander and a chile sauce on the side.  (That’s coagulated blood in the upper left.)  The soup was lackluster, but the duck was delicious and more than I could eat anyway.  I headed home sated.

Suang Sawad
64 Palochai Road
Ubon Ratchathani, 3400
045 24 2256

Pear & Apricot Pastry Almondine

Brooklyn, New York – As some of you may have noticed that lately there have been some posts about last time this and last time that or that I haven’t posted in awhile.  I may be resisting the inevitable – putting up the pictures and little stories of my last few weeks in Thailand (those are coming soon).  After thirteen months in Southeast Asia, I’ve moved back to New York.  Friends and family have been asking how it feels to be back, if I’m sad to have left, if I miss it or regret it, and to be honest, it hasn’t sunk in yet.  I don’t think I’ve fully accepted that this isn’t another visit and that I won’t be slurping noodle soup in another week or two.  I’ve been wrapped up in eating bagels and burgers, making pasta and pies, and taking care of all the little details of moving back into Brooklyn through the haze of jetlag.  Perhaps the reason I don’t feel sad is confidence in the connection I’ve developed with the country.  This isn’t the end of fedification.com or of my relationship with Thailand; it’s just the close of one chapter.  Some friends barely acknowledged a goodbye.  “You’re more Thai than I am,” a Thai-American friend told me, “you’ll be back.”

Ubon Ratchathani, Thailand – I wanted to return to Isaan (Northeast Thailand) for one last time before leaving the country so I chose Ubon Ratchathani in Thailand’s far east at the corner of Laos and Cambodia for a short trip.  I took an overnight bus on the wonderfully strange Nakhon Chai Air seemingly so named for the features that mimic an actual plane: meals and beverages, individual TVs, reclining seats with a massage function and attendants in uniform, perfect makeup and hair.  It was nicer than the last plane I took to the U.S.

After getting in and settling in, I stopped in at Choikee for breakfast on my way to rent a motorbike.  It was open-front restaurant where middle-aged men leaned over unclean tables smoking and drinking tea.  They had an assortment of Western and Thai dishes, but I opted for Bah Kut Teh, the stewed pork with Chinese herbs, which turned out to be a fabulous chance choice.  Aromatic of star anise, the soup was presented rather elegantly for plain surroundings.  Enoki mushrooms, dusted with ground white pepper, fanned out across the napa cabbage-wrapped stewed pork and the whole arrangement was surrounded by a clear brown broth.  The broth was soy salty, herbaceous and spiced, the pork tender and flavorful and the vegetables crisp tender.

Once finished with breakfast and sorted out on my motorbike rental, I set off for Ban Pa Ou, a small weaving village north of Ubon.  Many of the villages around Ubon specialize in a craft, like weaving cotton or bronze gongs.  Similarly, parts of the road seem to specialize in one food. You’ll see the same item at stall after stall for one whole stretch and then there’s nothing for miles and miles and miles.

At first I thought it was a bit peculiar that a whole strip of road would be peppered with stands all selling the same thing – salapao (the Chinese steamed buns) or the same exact assortment of fruit (green plums, dragon fruit, rambutans).  It seemed that it would be easier to sell something if your stand was either differentiated from the other stands closeby or far enough away that there wouldn’t be competition.  But given that many of the villages all sell similar products, perhaps these roadside vendors don’t see it this way.  They’ve grown up in communities where everyone has prospered together doing the same thing.  In any case, I ended up buying a young coconut with its refreshing liquid and tender meat from the coconut stretch near Ban Pa Ou.  After sipping my fill, I set the coconut in its plastic bag on my handlebar, from which it whipped, dripping and drizzling coconut juice all over my leg for the entire ride home.

Sai Oua (Northern Thai Sausage)

Chiang Rai, Thailand – Rising and eating breakfast at bustling morning markets, trolling night markets and seeking out the small, out-of-the-way mom and pop shops and independent stands is, it goes without saying, a good way to eat the everyday foods of a place, but sometimes it helps to have an entry point.  In restaurants, though more expensive and sometimes muted in flavor, you can often get the Thai name and ingredients of what you’re eating (sometimes difficult to extract over a language barrier), get dishes unavailable at the markets and, yes, enjoy some air conditioning.

My last day in Chiang Rai, after a morning of motorbiking around temples and mountain roads, I sat down in Phu Lae, a simple restaurant specializing in northern Thai food, including a wide range of curries featuring lettuce, jackfruit, banana blossom and so forth.  I really like the sour northern curries that omit coconut milk so I opted for gaeng som pla (an orange curry with fish).  This one was sour, herbaceous and blow-your-head-off spicy, but so good I kept spooning up the broth until I felt quite high and then kept going.  (Some say chilies activate the release of endorphins; I believe them.)

Also, since it would be my last time in northern Thailand for a while, I ordered the special northen Thai sausage, sai oua, which is flavored with chilies, lemongrass, kaffir lime leaf, garlic, ginger, etc.  One of the advantages of getting it in a restaurant is that instead of getting it in a plastic bag with the stick, mine came sliced on a plate with bits of fresh chilies and galangal, which I scooped up with every bite of sausage letting the hot, raw flavors play off the fatty cooked sausage. Certainly not a new dish for me, but a new experience all the same and I felt no guilt for getting off the street.

Phu Lae Restaurant
612/6 Pahoyothin Road
Tel. 053 600 500

Gaeng Som (Sour Tamarind Curry with Fish)

Fermented Fried Pork with Chilies and Kaffir Lime Leaves

Chiang Rai, Thailand – “You eat local foods?” the woman at the hotel said with surprise when I returned from Chiang Rai’s fun night market with fermented fried pork with chilies and kaffir lime leaves, nahm phrig num (chile eggplant relish), khao niao (sticky rice), khao hang gai (wok fried chicken with local greens) and yam gob (northern curry with frog).  I did that night.

Chiang Rai Night Market

Mr Cow Drinks

Yam Gob (Northern Curry with Frog)

Nahm Phrig (Chili Relishes)

Chiang Rai Clocktower

Fried Root Vegetables

Chiang Rai, Thailand – My first experience with a motorbike was in Mae Hong Son less than a year ago.  It ended rather quickly with me teetering and twisting down the hill pulling all the wrong bars and simultaneously nearly crashing it into a car and driving into the lake while the bike shop girl ran down the hill after me as fast as she could.

After recovering from that humiliation, I’ve gotten much better at the whole turning and accelerating thing and when I got into Chiang Rai the first thing I did was rent a bike. It’s really the best way to see the countryside.  You set your own schedule, stop when you like and get an unobstructed view of the landscape.  Around Chiang Rai, I went around to the local sites, passing rice paddies and elephant camps, and weaving around mountain roads past tractors and cows with ropes trailing behind them.

Although the journey was half the pleasure, I was quite taken with the 70-meter Khun Korn waterfall, reached by a slippery ascent and descent (in flip flops) to the cooling pool, where the rush and crash of falling water created a windy blast and cool spray.  A contrast to this natural wonder was the surreal Wat Rong Khun or the White Temple, the bizarre creation of Thai artist Chalermchai Kositphipat that looks like the embodiment of Buddhism on acid.  Brilliantly white with intricate detailing, guarded by otherworldly figures and fronted by two pools of pleading hands, it is one of the most fantastical temples I’ve seen in Thailand.

There were an abundant number of stands selling mushrooms along the way and if I had a kitchen there that’s what I would have bought, but instead I settled for some freshly fried root vegetables (sweet potato and taro), popped in a plastic bag and hung on my handlebar, a terrible temptation even for a now more stable driver.

Motorbike

Chiang Rai Rice Paddies & Mountains

Fresh Northern Thai Mushrooms

The White Temple (Wat Rong Khun)

The White Temple (Wat Rong Khun) Complex

Chiang Rai Elephant Camp

Chiang Rai Elephant Camp

Chiang Rai Rice Paddies

Smer Jai Khao Soi Gai

Chiang Mai, Thailand – In between shopping at JJ market, the ever empty decor, art, antiques and clothing market just north of the old city, and perusing the galleries on Th Faham, I snuck in my requisite Chiang Mai khao soi at Smer Jai also on Th Faham.  It would be my last Chiang Mai khao soi (for awhile at least) so I wanted it to be a good one.  Smer Jai didn’t disappoint.

JJ Market

Baan Orapin on Th Faham

Fried Flowers Salad at Pun Pun

Chiang Mai, Thailand – On a quick trip to Chiang Mai, I ended up bumping into two friends from Bangkok in the cafe of the guesthouse I’d recommended to them (Elliebum).  Since half of the couple is vegetarian, the whole couple leans heavily that way. So I’ll call them the V’s.  Luckily they both eat fish, which makes eating out in Thailand a whole lot easier than full on jay, as vegetarianism or practically veganism is known of in Thailand.

Vegetarian restaurants seem to have proliferated around Chiang Mai, much more so than Bangkok, so I got a few recommendations for the V’s from my Chiang Mai friends.  The general consensus on vegetarian-friendly restaurants was on four places – Blue Diamond, a small, homey Thai and western restaurant and vegan bakery off of Moon Muang; Pun Pun, an organic Thai restaurant behind Wat Suan Dok; Khun Churn, a charming vegetarian Thai restaurant set in a garden in Nimanhaemin, and Whole Earth, an atmospheric Thai and Indian restaurant located in a teak house surrounded by a quiet garden near the night bazaar.

The V’s tried Khun Churn the night before I arrived and found it good, but lacking the characteristic intensity they’d come to expect from Thai food and it sounded like they were slightly disappointed by the place.  So for lunch we stopped in Pun Pun, after a rambling wander around Wat Suan Dok, one of Chiang Mai’s lovelier temples.

Pun Pun turned out to be a vegetarian dream.  It had a good-sized menu of interesting choices, including some originals and traditionally meat-based dishes, like massaman curry and khao soi, as well as a full list of refreshing herbal juices and shakes, like banana-sesame and passion-fruit and papaya with lime andhoney.   Our meal was composed of an unusually thick khao soi, a delightful fried flowers salad with fresh corn kernels, bits of herbs and a sesame dressing, a tasty green curry with roti and a banana blossom salad.   Stuffed and satisfied, I think the V’s forgot about their previous night’s dinner.

We had wanted to try Blue Diamond for our next dinner, but their early closing time meant that we would have to rush from our massage so we opted for Whole Earth, the only restaurant my Chiang Mai friends hadn’t tried.  Located near the Chiang Mai Plaza Hotel near the night market, we had little trouble finding it before pulling up a to a beautiful, quiet garden.   The restaurant was housed on the glowing upper floor of a teak house.  Unfortunately, after a pleasant walk up to the balcony and a nice exchange with the staff, things took a turn for the worse.

We were handed three menus – one had pictures of the food, a second had prices and a third had drinks.   It was an annoying and unwieldy affair and to top it off the menu selection was rather uninspiring.  We pored over the menu, reviewing green curry, green curry, phad thai, phad thai before Miss V made the brilliant suggestion that we stop struggling to find something, pay for our beer and go elsewhere.

We hopped in a tuk tuk and headed off for the only nice restaurant I could think of off the top of my head – Hong Tauw Inn – decidedly not vegetarian, but it would certainly have good options.  Hong Tauw is a charming little place specializing in northern Thai cuisine on Nimanhaemin near soi 1.  The wooden wall are mint-green and decorated with an array of old-time clocks and other antiques.  As soon as we sat down, we all breathed a sigh of relief to be out of Whole Earth’s tourist trap clutches and in a more sincere setting.  As it turned out, Hong Tauw offers any of their set menus vegetarian, but we had plenty to choose from a la carte and even trouble narrowing down our choices to a final order.

We ordered a pomelo salad (yum som-o), a standard dish, but theirs was sublime, perfectly balanced acid and sweetness with juicier than normal pomelo segments.  I insisted on the chu chi pla, two fried whole fish dressed with a “dry” red curry.  The tender fish had crispy skin was covered in a sweet-spicy red curry enlivened with heady julienned kaffir lime leaves.   Hong Tauw has a whole section on nahm phrig, the spicy chile relishes, and we opted for nahm phrig num, the roasted eggplant relish, served with an array of northern appetizers – blanched cabbage, long beans, and greens, crispy pork skin and lanna sausage (small rewards for my going vegetarian for half a day).   We also got another spicy chile relish with ginger and served with tiny blanched mushrooms.  Each dish was truly, simply delicious.   It would be easy to compose a fully vegetarian meal at Hong Tauw if one was so inclined.  In the end, our last meal didn’t test out the best of Chiang Mai’s vegetarian restaurants, but our semi-vegetarian affair had something for everyone and we were happy enough to enjoy each other’s company and share good food in a lovely little restaurant.

Pun Pun Restaurant
Wat Suan Dok Temple, Suthep Road (between the Suan Dok Gate and Chiang Mai University)
+66-081-470-1461
Open 8am – 7pm, closed Wednesday

Khun Churn
Nimmanhemin Soi 15
+66-081-881-3032
Open daily 9:30am-2:30pm, 5pm-8pm

Blue Diamond
Moom Muang Soi 9
+66-053-217120
Open 7.30am-10.30pm, closed Sunday

The Whole Earth
88 Sri Don Chai Road (at Changklan Road)
+66-053-282-463
Open daily 11am-10pm

A more comprehensive listing of vegetarian-friendly restaurants can be found here.