A visual feast - Or Tor Kor Market

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http://www.heygo.com 26th January

Today I set the alarm for 7am to join a tour in Bangkok. Wow what a colourful visual feast.



Or Tor Kor Market was established by the Marketing Organization for Farmers (MOF), which is a state enterprise under control of the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives aiming to help farmers and the villagers in marketing, sales, and storage of agricultural products.

It is the 4th largest food market in the world.

The area of the market is 6,500 sq. m with more than 600 stalls selling their goods and is divided into separate area such as meat zone, seafood zone, dried food zone, fresh vegetables zone, fruits zone, rice zone, food center zone.



Another zone is the place where ingredients for cooking are sold, ingredients such as shrimp paste, curry paste, pickled garlics, pickled chili paste.



Just some of the fruits we saw Mango, Durian, Dragon fruit, Tamarind, Guava, Mangosteen - the Queen of Thai Fruits & Sugar Apple - I wasn’t familiar with this fruit but we learnt that it is quite small in size, its green skin is hard with a soft white flesh and black seeds inside. The taste of this fruit is sweet like custard mixed with apple So sometimes it’s called custard apple.

It was interesting to hear that the cherries were imported from the U.S.



Spices, vegetables, & herbs. So many items on sale.

Galanga - it looked a little bit like ginger but it is used in soups,curry pastes and is sliced up for use in salads. Bitter Melon - a very bitter vegetable used in stir-fries and soups. Green papaya - shredded to make the famous spicy Thai salad, just a few that were new to me.



Fish & seafood all shapes and sizes, crabs, prawns, squid and lots that I didn’t recognise - available fresh and dried.



I briefly saw just one stall selling flowers, but maybe our guide wasn’t aware I am a flower arranger!

We did see some Jasmine Phuang Malai - the local name for flower garland which literally translates into “bunch garland”. You see these everywhere in Thailand.

Hung in motor vehicles for luck - Offered to Buddhist statues or statues of Hindu gods as a way of paying respect - Used by business people to attract luck - Offered to spirit houses as a way to stay on the right side of dead relatives.



There was a food centre within the market but due to social distancing only 2 people were allowed to sit at a table, and the tables were well spaced apart.



At the end of the tour just managed to spot a couple of jewellery shops with pearls & filigree silver items looking very tempting. Oh well window-shopping only today !



It was 7am in U.K. when this tour started so by the time it had finished I was ready for my breakfast - no exotic fruits sadly but I did enjoy some blueberries with my cereal.

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