thai restaurants Archives - Joy's Thai Food Recipe Blog in Thailand

Epicurious or Epi-spurious? Is Peruvian the New Thai Food?

Do the Peruvians use Fava Beans? I'll bet not! Epicurious or spurious? — Do the Peruvians use Fava Beans like Thais do? I bet not!

What a joke. At least I thought it was until I read the article at the source. The clueless folks at Epicurious.com, no, I didn’t know who they were either before they started making a lame name for themselves… came up with the idea that Peruvian food is somehow the next best thing over Thai food.

First of all, one has to ask – how many South American employees they have working at this place? I’ve had Peruvian food. I liked some of it. Is it going to replace the amazing range of tastes found in Thai food? Not a chance. I think that nothing can possibly approach the variety and deliciousness of Thai food, not even Indian food – which happens to be my second favorite food. Jamaican food has some amazing dishes but I’d call that a 3rd to Indian food. I’d not even place Peruvian food in the Top 50.

So, apparently this Epispurious releases an annual list of their culinary trend predictions. Listen to what they say and be amazed…

Peruvian is the new Thai: You thought Peruvian cuisine was all about seviche, maybe? Guess again: Peru boasts culinary influences from Spanish, Basque, African, Cantonese, Japanese, Italian, French, and British immigrants. Pisco Sour, anyone?

Unfortunately I don’t have access to any Peruvian food here in Thailand. You know why that is? There aren’t any Peruvian restaurants here.

It can’t possibly compete with international tourists other favored cuisines. I think Epicurious is trying to make news for themselves. They’d best do it by sticking to the basics. Thai food is the most delicious food the world has ever known. Thai food has consistently been the top rated food over the last decade since the world’s introduction to it.

I know back in Florida we have no less than 15 Thai restaurants within a 20 mile radius of Tampa. I know because I would regularly eat Thai food a couple times a week before moving to Thailand. Are Floridians going to turn their noses up at Thai food and head the SUV’s to a Peruvian restaurant instead? Nah. IS THERE a Peruvian restaurant in your city? No, there isn’t. You’ll likely need to move to LA or New York where these clowns are likely located to find any Peruvian restaurants. The employees of this silly company probably won’t be eating there either.

Thai food is #1 from now until some new civilization is found that combines Thai, Indian, Hawaiian, and Jamaican foods.

Think that day is just around the corner? Nah, me neither!

(guest post written by big mouth, with tongue in cheek – Vern)

Southern Thailand Farewell Lunch on the Bay

One of our friends, Oi, is leaving in a couple of days to return home to her native town – Trang, and we wanted to take her to lunch somewhere special in southern Thailand. Joy decided we should go to Kanabnam floating restaurant on the bay, set among the mangrove trees in a Muslim village on the water.

We set out at 11:00am, arriving at the pier to take the boat at 11:20am. We boarded the boat – me, Joy, Grandma, Oi, and baby girl.

Once there they gave us a show of the fish they had in nets in the middle of the floating restaurant. They had very large cobia fish, grouper, some reef fish and even some large puffer fish. The puffer fish are extremely toxic to eat if prepared wrong, you can die within 90 minutes after eating one. I don’t think they were on the menu at the restaurant, and we didn’t ask.

We ordered:

yum talay – spicy seafood salad
fried shrimp with sweet sauce
kow padt gai – fried rice with chicken
spicy fish soup – which wasn’t very spicy, but pretty tasty – the fish was very fresh
fried snakehead fish
rice – of course!

We had a good time! Though it was hot that day, there was a cool breeze blowing because we are really quite far out in the mangroves – and the open ocean is only a few minutes away.

If you are visiting Thailand, you really should eat a meal or two on a floating restaurant – it is one of the nice experiences of Thailand that many countries don’t have. We have floating restaurants on most big rivers, and even on the Gulf of Thailand as you see here.

Thai food is good food – come to Thailand and try some!

Eating at Outdoor Thai Food Restaurant

In Thailand of course!

Nice atmosphere can be found at many Thai restaurants that would cost a lot of money to find in the USA or elsewhere.

It was a special night out for, what else? Thai food!

We rode around town and looked for a place we hadn’t eaten at yet. Then I remembered a place on a hill within a kilometer of where we live. We pulled up to the large open-air pavilion which I thought was “it”. When we were looking for a place to sit down Joy noticed a very large area filled with bamboo huts down by some small ponds. JACKPOT!

We walked down the hill. There were only two other groups eating and it was very quiet. The mosquitoes were at “level insanity” so we asked them to light “the coil” and that brought an end to the skeeters.

Fried rice with squid, morning glory with garlic, fried rice with everything (Joys)

We ordered kow padt Pla Meuk (fried rice with squid) for me and Joy ordered kow pad nam prig long reu-uh (fried rice with special made chili sauce, dried shrimp, side veggies, salted egg, and fried chicken. No, Joy wasn’t eating for 2 or 3, it didn’t amount to more than my fried rice in volume. Then, we got my favorite for a vegetable – Pad pak boong – stir fried morning glory with chilis and garlic. YUM.

We topped it off with Pepsi and a bucket of ice.

We chose one of the bamboo huts without chairs – it’s just a sit on the raised floor type hut. We could see the mosquitoes easier that way and it’s easier for Joy to have a nap after dinner too. Isn’t she the cutest…? HA! She doesn’t know I put this photo on here – she’ll make me take it down if she sees it – so enjoy while you can.

A really cozy place. The food was quite good too.

Thai food is really the best food on the planet. Thai food in Thailand? Well, I don’t have to tell you – is amazing. I’ve lived on it for four years straight now -with only the occasional pizza from in town because it’s so prohibitively expensive! This whole meal, with ambience was just 185 baht – about $5 USD. That’s expensive considering how much dinner usually costs – just 75-80 baht for both of us. So tonight we splurged on upscale Thai food dining. Tomorrow? Back tot he 80 baht dinners – which are almost as good, but lack the atmosphere.

In Thailand its OK to fall asleep after dinner in these bamboo huts. The best ones are floating on the river. We have some photos from some of those Thai food restaurants in Isaan (northeast) Thailand that I'll have to find sometime. — In Thailand it is quite OK to fall asleep after your meal in one of these bamboo huts. The ones that float on the river are even better. We have some photos from that type of hut while we were in Isaan (northeast Thailand) that I will have to find sometime to share here...

When are you coming to Thailand?

Clean Food, Good Taste: Symbol of Thai Food Excellence?

If you come to Thailand chances are you’ll want to eat something. Chances are you won’t know, where is a safe place to eat. There are millions of small street-side vendors with Thai food carts all over the cities and villages and you don’t really know what is good and what isn’t good. “Good” meaning, safe, clean.

Obviously the sanitary conditions are different in Thailand than in your home country. Probably. Probably you would never in your life go into a place that looks like some of the restaurants in Thailand. The health code has higher standards in the states and most other English speaking nations.

Upon your arrival in Thailand you’ll want to get busy tasting Thai food in all it’s glorious varieties. I know! Here’s how to go about it.

1. Look for a place that many Thai people are eating at. Now, there are Thai people that will eat anywhere the food is cheapest – these are called “students”. They will eat for 15 – 25 baht per lunch or dinner. 10 baht for breakfast if they can find it. This is what NOT to do.

You’re on vacation, go another step above that. Eat where the Thais with the yellow shirts are eating. The yellow shirt – the King’s color – is what Thai teachers and government workers – and workers in businesses of all sorts wear to work. It’s acceptable for anyone to wear one, no matter what their job in the office as it’s respectful to their King – which means a LOT. So, first tip is look for a place where there are lots of yellow-shirted Thais’ eating.

(click the photo to see www.outtospace.com, with posts about Thailand – great photos)

Thais know where the good, clean, delicious food in Thailand is – and they eat there frequently. Maybe every day. Follow their lead even if they’re not wearing yellow shirts. Maybe they’re wearing hospital scrubs? Suits & dresses? OK, good enough.

2. Look for this sign that Joy is holding at one of our favorite restaurants from a long time ago (I’d lost this photo until now!). CLEAN FOOD, GOOD TASTE. This sign is in the restaurants that maintain a certain standard of cleanliness and food preparation.

I’m not sure how valid it is – but I always feel a little bit better when I see this sign. I’ve not had a bad eating experience in a restaurant in 3 years that had this sign – lets put it that way. I think it must count for something. It is given by the government and is well known by most tourists that visit Thailand. Now you know too.

That’s it – basically all you need to know about finding edible, safe food to eat in Thailand!

Thai Food E-Books!

Sawasdee Ka!

Revising Joy’s Ebooks now – ready in a few weeks!

If you don’t know what an e-book is, it’s simply a Word file with photos and nice formatting converted into an Adobe PDF format that you can read on your computer, PDA, phone, or maybe even your watch. It makes the files easy to read on electronic readers too – you may have heard about Microsoft’s and Amazon’s new readers. They are e-book readers designed specially for reading e-books.

We are giving away a sample PDF file of the first 11 pages of Joy’s Thai Food Recipe eBook below.

Joy’s Thai Food Recipe E-book Sample, 11 pages, fully illustrated, fully FREE! This is to give you an idea what you’re getting.

Please check back in a few weeks to see if we’re offering Joy’s latest two updated Thai Food Ebooks at that time!

Thank you!

Sawasdee ka, joy