Thai Flavours
The unique and exotic flavours of Thai cuisine are always a highlight
of any visit to the Kingdom and Phuket, with its very high standard
of living, attracts some of the best restaurateurs to its sandy
shores. You'll find the best of the best Thai food here in 'The
Pearl of the Andaman', and not always in the most expensive places.
Sometimes the finest meals can be had for pocket change at one of
the many street vendors located all over the island.
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There are four flavours in Thai cooking: sweet, sour, salty and
creamy. To these add as much spice as you can stand and you have
the basic parts of the Thai food equation. Combining these flavours
and balancing them against one another is the secret to making outstanding
Thai food. Of course, everyone's taste is a little different so
various condiments are provided so you can flavour your food to
your liking. Most Thai restaurants will provide you with dishes
of Nam Pla (salty sauce made from fish), Prik On (spicy
crushed red chilis), sugar and sour vinegar with chilis. Soy sauce
is another popular condiment that is commonly provided.
In general Thai food consists of meat and/or vegetables and sauce
served over rice. Of course there are hundreds of variations on
this theme, ranging from simple Pat Pak Ruam (stir fried
vegetables in oyster sauce) to the rich and flavourful Gai Pat
Med Muang (stir fried chicken with cashew nuts). There are also
plenty of noodle dishes as well as the basic but satisfying fried
rice. With so much variety you could eat Thai food every meal for
a month and never have the same thing twice.
Thai Dishes
All Thai food starts with rice. It's the basic ingredient and the
main source of nutrition for Thai people. Most Thai dishes are best
enjoyed when spooned over a steaming plate of jasmine rice (Kaao)
but there are other varieties of rice such as brown rice and sticky
rice. Sometimes rice itself is the main dish; there are countless
variations on fried rice from chicken fried rice to fried rice with
curry paste to American fried rice (just like Mama used to make).
Noodle dishes are also popular Thai foods, including the well-known
Pat Thai, stir fried noodles with egg, tofu and bean sprouts
and flavoured with peanut oil and lime juice. Big noodles are use
to make two other favourite noodle dishes: Pat Sii-Yew and
Pat Kii Mao. Pat Sii-Yew is fried noodles with soy
sauce, egg, Chinese kale and meat, while Pat Kii Mao ('Drunken
Noodles') is a spicy mixture of vegetables and peppers over fried
noodles.
Many of the most delicious Thai dishes are stir fries. Take one
wok, add oil, heat up, add your ingredients and voila! You have
a quick and simple meal that's also tasty and healthy. Moo Tort
Gra Tiem Prink Thai (fried pork with garlic and pepper) is popular
(if a bit hard to remember), Gai Pat Ka Prow (stir fried
chicken with chilli and basil) has a nice little kick to it and
Neua Pat Man Hoy (stir fried beef with oyster sauce) is always
a winner. It's a good idea to learn the Thai names of a few of your
favourites so you can order if you find yourself in a restaurant
lacking an English menu.
Thailand is also known for its variety of flavourful curries, most
of which use coconut milk as a base, resulting in dishes that are
creamier and spicier than many Indian curries. If spice isn't your
thing than try Gaeng Kiao Waan, a sweet green curry or Gaeng
Massaman, a mild curry with potatoes and peanuts. If, on the
other hand, you like your food scorching try Gaeng Pet, a
red curry that literally means 'Spicy Curry'. Also popular is Gaeng
Pa-naeng, which is less soupy than most Thai curries but has
a fantastic flavour.
Thai Regional Cuisine
Khao Soi from Chiang Mai |
There are four regions of Thailand, each with its own distinctive
style of cuisine. The North, which includes Chiang
Mai, Chiang Rai and the Mae Hong Son area, is influenced by
southern Chinese and Burmese foods. The northern signature dish,
Khao Soi, is a perfect example of this, with its more pungent
and less creamy flavour that is the result of a more restrained
use of coconut milk.
The Northeast, also known as Issan, is a rural and simple area
where development has come much slower than it has to the rest of
Thailand. Issan food is also simpler, largely consisting of barbeque,
various spicy salads and sticky or glutinous rice, known as Kaao
Niao. Issan may be the butt of plenty of jokes from its more
sophisticated cousins but Issan food is popular all over Thailand,
with good reason. The Central region, with Bangkok at its heart,
produces the 'default' Thai cuisine that is usually the most well-known
outside the country. A sub-set of central food is Royal Cuisine,
which is a lighter, more refined version of central Thai cooking.
The dishes are elaborately constructed affairs, fit for royalty,
and are as much works of art as they are delicious meals.
Southern Thai Favourites
Phuket lies in the southern region, the 'handle' of the 'golden
axe' that Thailand is said to resemble. In the south the culinary
influence has primarily come from the Muslim population, many of
whom immigrated here from the Indian subcontinent, with others coming
out of Malaysia and Indonesia. This influence is most readily visible
in dishes like Gaeng Massaman which is a mild curry whose
strong turmeric flavour betrays its Indian origin.
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Another dish that has made its way to Phuket from the subcontinent
is Roti, a pan fried Muslim bread that has become a popular
street food snack all over Thailand. The sweet roti so adored
all over Thailand is readily available in Phuket, but here you can
also find Roti Mustaba, which is stuffed with a mixture of
chicken and vegetables and eaten with a curry dipping sauce. Worth
checking out is Kaoo Moek, which is a brightly coloured rice
dish seasoned with turmeric and dried spices. Often served with
fried or grilled chicken or pork, this is a very popular lunch dish
with southern Thais. The other most recognizable example of the
Muslim influence on southern Thai cuisine is chicken Satay,
an Indonesian dish which is seasoned with turmeric, barbequed and
served with a peanut sauce for dipping.
Seafood and Other Southern Specialties
As one would expect, seafood features more prominently in southern
Thai food than other regional cuisines and there are a variety of
excellent fish and prawn dishes that hail from the southern region.
Fried prawns with tamarind sauce (Goong Ma-kaam) is an especially
popular dish with a wonderful sweet and savoury flavour. Fried fish
smothered in a sweet and sour chilli sauce is another perennial
favourite. Tom Kha is a delicious soup made from coconut
milk, galangal, lemon grass and lime juice. Tom Kha is equally
delicious with fish, prawns or chicken.
Aside from the Muslim dishes, most southern curries tend to be
blisteringly hot, especially Gaeng Som, a broth based curry
that gets its name from its deep orange colour - caused by the mixture
of red chilis and yellow turmeric. This is a sour fish curry that,
lacking coconut milk to temper the spice, is not for the faint of
heart. Among Phuket's non-Muslim dishes, the most well known is
Kanom Jeen, thin, spaghetti-like noodles made from rice and
fashioned into bite sized skeins. Kanom Jeen is served with
a variety of different dipping sauces such as the coconut milk and
chilli mix Naam Prik. |
