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Published: March 10th 2013
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Breakfast
There are a lot of options for breakfast in Thailand, but it isn't quite like the selection one might find at a nice cafe. There are quite a few breakfast joints whipping up omelets and fresh fruit pancakes, or a standard 'American set' of eggs, toast jam, coffee, juice, but the method of preparation just doesn't quite scratch that home-cooked itch. The ubiquitous cooking implement over here is the wok, so omelets often come out glistening in oil and lack that magical fluffiness. And the fruit is fresh, but I don't think anyone over here is working on that perfect pancake recipe, so the result is a little dry, a little chewy and, again, not magically fluffy. Don't get me started on the 'syrup.' However, there is stil plenty out there to munch on. When you hear that street cart food is available 24/7, they aren't lying. Walking around town at 5AM, it isn't hard to find something tasty to eat.
Down the street from our guesthouse you can stop at the barbecue cart and pick up some tasty pork kabobs and sausages, or perhaps you prefer grilled fermented squid? They smell great. Right next to the BBQ
cart you can get your cup of joe from the coffee cart. Fresh Thai coffee comes standard with plenty of milk and sugar, so make sure you specify black. I love a nice iced coffee, but even if I get it in the morning it can leave me buzzed until the wee morning hours. Along with your meat and coffee you can also grab some mini coconut batter pancakes from the third cart. Go team.
Another delicious option calls for a trip to the fruit stand. These are easily located, just listen for the blender in any open air market. A vast array of tropical fruit awaits your decision. Papaya mango? The knives fly into action, deftly peeling and chopping juicy chunks into the blender. She can skin a pineapple in 5 seconds flat. Banana, dragonfruit (look it up), coconut, passionfruit (it actually ripens over here), orange, melon, all ready to be mixed with some ice and frappe'd. This is another beverage operation that you have to watch carefully. Not only is their speed amazing, they might assume that you want some heaping tablespoons of sugar syrup! Again, a lot of Thai's have a well enameled sweet tooth, so
Quail Eggs
Love the banana leaf bowls watch what goes into the blender. I recently had a 'conversation' with one of the night time smoothies cart ladies (she doesn't speak any English). "Mai sai nam tan, mai aroy. Sai nam tan, aroy mak." No put sugar, not tasty. Put sugar very tasty! The fruit stands also serve up a fruit muesli bowl. All of the fruits chopped up and piled high with some muesli and yogurt, all for just 50 baht. It is so big that it's often easier to share one, and each place makes theirs a little differently. Devout expats will make their morning pilgrimage to their chosen fruit stand of worship, sometimes waiting half an hour for their blessing, fie on the other stands with no lines.
I often go with a more savory meal. Across from our fruit stand is a woman who serves up some very tasty fried chicken in the shopfront of her home. She starts early, shortly after dawn, and always says hello and asks what I am up to for the day. She also has skewers of chicken livers hot off the electric grill, glazed in awesome sauce and carefully tended by her son with some tongs. These
are what I'm here for. "Gai see an" gets me 'chicken 4 skewer' and I'm on my way, set back a whopping 20 baht (66 cents). An additional 5-10 baht next door gets me a bag of piping hot sticky rice, and the two complement each other very nicely. Roll up a small ball and pop it in your mouth, then take a bite of chicken off the stick and chew. The fried chicken lady has sticky rice, too, but each person's batch comes out differently so I split the trip. My sticky rice gal also tends to about half a dozen large stainless steel bowls full of different dishes. All of them are spicy. There's larp, minced meat mixed with herbs and spices. Pork and veggie soup. Vegetable mushroom soup. Fish soup. Beef and veggie soup. Whichever you want, they'll ladle it up into a plastic bag with some fresh greens and tie it with a rubber band. Most food comes this way, unless you're eating in, but more on that later. The stand also has small packs of chili paste folded in banana leaf, should the food not be spicy enough. There are also small, deep fried fish, various sweet, banana-leaf-envelopes of fermented pork paste stuff and other snacky things. Don't try to wait in line behind people or you might not get served. They can get a rush of people, so just wait for a spot at the counter to open up and start pointing.
Another traditional Thai breakfast is jok moo. Jok is a rice porridge similar to Cream of Wheat. The moo stands for pork, in this case pork balls (non-testicular) which float in the scalding porridge. The jok is made by the cauldron, and each to-go bag is prepared via mini assembly line. Someone prepares stainless steel cups by lining them with a bag. The ladler will scoop the porridge into the bags, avoiding the pork balls if you don't want meat. Then the bagger will ask "sai kai?" and if you say yes, a raw egg will be cracked into the jok, which is hot enough to soft poach the egg. Finally, the bag will be pulled out of the cup and rubber banded shut. You also get a small packet of fresh slices of ginger and green onion, as well as a packet of crunchies. Everything gets mixed in and is very tasty. While considered a breakfast meal, our neighborhood jok restaurant (they have other things, too) has been open 24 hours a day since it opened years ago and people line up at all times to grab a bag or six.
The choices are diverse and it's fun to walk around the market at any time of day, but watching everything wake up is the most exciting. Thai peoples' days start at dawn and someone is always preparing a meal. If you get to the market early enough you can watch the Buddhist monks in their morning alms walk, collecting food and goods, and offering prayers while people make merit. Deep fried aromas waft through the air, mingling with the omnipresent scent of fermented fish. Butcher ladies chop up kilos of meat on their wooden rounds, while their customers peruse different cuts waiting idly under slow fans, plastic bags tied to blade ends as fly deterrents. Plastic blankies are pulled off stacked pyramids of napping fruit. Noodle soup is not a problem. Fish wait in their tub while the coals get stoked. Time to eat!
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Sheila & Kevin
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Yum!
I remember eating the porridge, yogurt, and fresh fruit EVERY morning. The little island we were on didn't have as many yummy options. The fruit was good...but nothing savory. Also, have you seen the ladies with baskets on the side of the road. Eggs in one basket, little cooker in the other. Then you get the cooked egg but it has an actual baby chick in it...YUK! We didn't eat those!