If there’s one thing Thailand is known for…it’s the food. University students eat out for most meals, and gathering around the table is a perfect way to catch up with friends and make new ones. The streets of Thailand are bustling with restaurants, cafés, and food stalls at all hours of the day and night. After living here for almost three months, I’ve tried everything from duck’s beak to Pad Thai to dinner from 7/11. Prior to studying abroad, I could count on one hand the number of times I’d eaten Thai food. Now, I crave rice and spicy chili powder for every meal!
P.S. Don’t read this post if you’re hungry.
Thai Food
I’m not sure what secret ingredient makes every meal here so delicious. Maybe it’s the many different foods that make up each dish, or maybe just the MSG (a flavor enhancer). Life here revolves around food. Thais love their flavors: sweet, spicy, sour, and salty. Most meals incorporate multiple flavors, including some unexpected combos. For example, the fruit here is often eaten with chili powder!
My TEAN program attended a cooking class in Bangkok, where we were taught how to make several Thai dishes. After eating out for every meal, the class was a great way to understand the effort and ingredients it takes to cook Thai food. My favorite dish here is sweet green curry chicken. (In Thai, you say “kaeng khiao wan kai.”) This soup is made with coconut milk and palm sugar, giving it a “sweet” taste. The green color comes from the green curry, but eggplants, peppers, and basil are added, too. No Thai dish would be complete without rice; something has to balance out all the spice!
Stir-fry dishes are another amazing Thai option. One of my favorites is stir-fry squid with salted egg yolk (pla muk pad khai khem). Tom Yum is another classic. This soup is blends sour and spicy flavors from mixing together lime and chili. Every Thai dish is a mix of a staple carb, such as rice or noodles, with a meat like chicken and pork. When I crave veggies, my favorite dish is pumpkin with egg—over rice, of course!
Classic Thai dishes we made during our TEAN cooking class: Pad Thai, sweet green curry, spring rolls, and tom kha.In my opinion, the top dessert in Thailand is mango sticky rice (khao niaw mamuang). Mangoes alone are to die for, but this dessert features coconut milk poured on top of sticky rice and mung beans. Thai dishes are all about presentation. Mango sticky rice often comes with a beautiful flower arrangement or with the rice dyed pink, green, or blue!
An assortment of colorful mango sticky rice at a mall in Bangkok.Another amazing dessert option is fresh fruit. At any given fresh market, 7/11, or roadside food stall, you can find tropical fruits such as mango, jackfruit, pomelo, banana, papaya, pineapple, and so many more! Fruits I’d never seen before were rambutan, a small fruit that looks red and spiky on the outside but doesn’t hurt to touch, and mangosteen, with a taste similar to rambutan but with a purple/brown outside.
This is rambutan, a delicious fruit despite its wacky appearance!The abundance of cafés here came as a cultural shock to me. Take any given street in Bangkok, and every few stores will be a café. As a coffee lover, this was a pleasant surprise! These cafés offer a refuge from the scorching sun and humidity, with AC blasting and upbeat music playing. I like to order simple coffees or lattes from each café I visit, but that’s not all they offer. Most of them have smoothies, teas, boba, and milkshakes! Another amazing drink to try from Thailand’s cafés or boba shops is taro milk tea, a classic purple drink that’s as sweet as its color.
Other Cuisines
While living in another country, trying new foods can be an exciting experience at first, but gradually you may find yourself craving classic comfort foods. While American foods are hard to come by, eating different international cuisines is a great option!
In Thailand, there are plenty of other Asian restaurants. One place I love to eat at is a Japanese sushi restaurant near my apartment. This restaurant offers the best sushi I’ve ever had. I ordered one roll with garlic on top, and seriously had to stop myself from licking the plate. Learning to use chopsticks was a fun experience, too, and now I can say I pick up sushi with them instead of stabbing the food!
My favorite garlic sushi roll.In Bangkok and its surrounding areas, there are plenty of Indian restaurants. One restaurant all my friends love near where we live is called Kukkad Tavern. This restaurant has the best garlic naan, tikka masala, and butter chicken! Indian food is a bit spicier than most Thai dishes, but the blend of spices in every meal make it so worth the burn.
One last cuisine I’ve tried in Thailand is Korean food. I like to order the classic bibimbap, a dish with rice, steamed veggies, meat, and an egg. This dish comes in a skillet with the ingredients separated, and you mix together all the ingredients and let it cook a bit before eating.
This is Bibimbap, a classic Korean dish.In short, Thailand has no shortage of food options. Every street, side road, and alley has food ranging from high-end restaurants to cheap food stalls on the side of the road. With an adventurous diet, you’ll be satisfied and overwhelmed with all the options available. If the unfamiliar food is a hindrance to deciding to study abroad, let me be the first to say that your taste buds will thank you.
Alexis Elzey, William & Mary, is studying abroad in Thailand with TEAN.
