Thailand – street food at its best
We are going to Thailand!
If you talk street food there is one item you have to put on your bucket list and that is eating fried insects and of course those air-breathing eight legs creatures, scorpions.
I took my daughter to Thailand for her 18th birthday. As my brother is living in Bangkok we got clear instructions, no Westernize food for the period that we will be visiting him. My first thought, this cannot be too bad.
One thing I don’t have is an adventurous palate. I like to stick to food that I know what it is, how it is cooked, and where it comes from. On the other hand I feel that if you tour other countries you must be willing to try their local cuisine and that is what I’ve been doing. After all, what can be worse than the Aussie’s beetroot salad on a hamburger or even sheep tripe from my own country?
Then one night just before we left I watch a documentary on television about Thailand. Guess what popped up? This world-famous guy selling fried grasshoppers, cockroaches, scorpions, and many other insects in the town of Pattaya on the eastern side of Bangkok, 147 kilometers away.
I gave a sighed in relief. I will be safe!
Pattaya is far away from Bangkok especially if you must make use of public transport, my thoughts.
Thai people love to snack! You will see plenty of them stopping at street vendors on their way to work for a snack. They will snack in the morning and the afternoon and if it is not fruit or noodles it will be fried ants.
One thing I don’t have is an adventurous palate. I like to stick to food that I know what it is, how it is cooked, and where it comes from. Then again, I feel that if you tour other countries you must be willing to try their local cuisine.
On our arrival, we booked into our hotel and await my brother. Soon we had to discover that he had a “surprise” for us, we are going to Pattaya!
No ways!
On our second night in Pattaya, he took us to Walking Street, a tourist attraction and a street filled with traffic during the day and at night with people walking visiting the stalls of vendors, restaurants, clubs, go-go bars and, yes, those street food stalls.
Google maps
Google Maps
Believe it or not, one of the first stalls we saw, the same guy I saw on television.
At first sight, you feel very creepy when you see what you are about to eat but then you tell yourself that at least they are dead and fried. It is not a twisting octopus tentacle or a beating heart of a frog. It is insects fried in a wok with seasoning like Thai pepper powder sprinkled on top.
Before I could place my first fried bamboo worm in my mouth I was told that it is extremely high in protein. Little did the vendor know that one worm is not going to be as high in protein as the steak I had for lunch.
The worm was not too bad and so not the frog legs, crunchy that’s for sure and also salty. I love crunchy food.
When it came to the scorpion I called it a day. I will rather stick to Tom Yum Goong, Thailand’s famous spice prawn soup.
When I took hubby to Thailand a visit to "my favorite stall" in Pattaya was a must. Same, place, same guy and same menu. This time I tried a grasshopper. Surprisingly it even had a nutty taste.
At least I can say, I did it and I liked fried insects unexpectedly.
Street food, it will leave you with food for thought but you have to try it !
*All images are my own
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