The Well-Fed Bong

Authentic is not always what you expect it to be. I spent three days in Khao Lak, searching for chillies and coconut milk; screaming in frustration at finding only ginger, soya and rice wine. Looking for locals feeding themselves got me to a strange mixture of hotpot and hot plate; I was quite excited by it but apparently that was as local as Chinese in Mumbai. Markets are usually good hunting grounds. The local wet market did have food stalls, but most were closed by the time I got there - apparently Khao Lak's bucolic populace start early and shut by noon. The one stall that was open looked authentic enough but, in a sleepy unhurried afternoon was feeding only two tables - a German-sounding family and a European couple with too much suntan. A little bit of sign language did produce a classic tom yam with the much sought lemongrass and chillies, rustic chunks of ginger, galangal and onion floating about, reasonably rendered and reasonably fiery. Emboldened by my lack of distr...

When IMA invited me to Phuket on what really important people call a junket, I was quite excited. Visions of pork-lined streets and wonderful curries glazing my eyes, I braved roaming charges to land at Phuket airport and discovered a slightly different destination – Khao Lak , rather than Phuket. Not so bad, I told myself, the name has eating in it and anyway, how far from good food can you get in Thailand. Life has since been more of a challenge. Khao Lak is, it turns out, a small, rural, mildly sleepy town better described as a string of hotels plunked into some dramatic scenery, peppered with more Scandinavians than Thais. Faced with so much white skin the chefs at the intensely pretty JW Marriot treat chillies with great wariness – a single one probably powers an entire lunch service. As for real Thais eating real Thai food, It's easier to find McDonalds and steak than a local grabbing a meal. However, I'm not about to give up that easily. As in Goa, renting a scooter ...

I gathered much material for Thai food; this might yet evolve into a Rambo-quality series. This is my second instalment about eating Thai off the streets, sitting down in air-conditioned comfort ordering food off a menu. Waiting for food to come to you rather than walking up to it. Haute of a sort. Thailand is, in a sense, like India – most of the best renditions of classic cuisine is found in the hole-in-walls rather than at fancy places. Like most Indian food, prices are usually attached to ambience rather than to food quality. This can make for a minefield of disappointment for the dedicated foodie – how do you decide visually what is worth visiting? Worse in a country where local reviews, blogs and even menu descriptions are written in gobbledygook. Haute can end up with pretty waiters instead of pretty good food.   The (English) guidebooks’ choice for high thai seemed to be Bo.Lan . From decidedly hippie Lonely Planet to the decidedly snootier Travel+Leisure ...

I spent most of my time on the streets of Thailand, but I did venture into a few restaurants. Lets start with Hua Hin. Lonely Planet told me the place to go for seafood and atmosphere was Chao Lay (ranked #2 on the list of things to do in Hua Hin though there are some differing opinions ) but I was eventually taken there for a rather offbeat reason – MakeMyTrip (who was making our trip) organised the usual desi lunch at that place. Apparently one of their chefs – Portuguese parentage from Macau and has lived in Nepal -  knew Indian (read Punjabi) food. I met him on the way out of the restaurant, trying to do my usual duck and hide lunch run when faced with Indian food; he convinced me that if I stayed he would make me real Thai from the restaurant’s usual menu. Thus my rendezvous with green lip mussels and the first tom yam of the trip. The main reason for the popularity of Chao Lay is its location; its a wharfside restaurant with unending views of the sea. Few places in the ...

It took me a while to start my first day at Chiang Mai. Its a slow city; even the morning newspaper arrives only at 11am. By the time I was out of the door the sun was already showing off a little, and the day's bustle past its morning peak. Beyond the tuk tuk stand outside the hotel was a small cluster of restaurants, one of which caught my attention. It advertised mutton biriyani. The restaurant, it turned out, offered local Muslim food (properly certified by the local mullahs, the sign also said). I'd been told by Lonely Planet that Muslims here were the legacy of Chiang Mai's bygone glory days, when caravans from Yunnan brought goods, foods and religions. Quite different from the pork-centric menus of the rest of the populace, the stall offered chicken, mutton, beef and shrimp biriyani. However, rice weighed too heavily on my unexercised conscience, so I ordered oxtail soup instead. This was revealed to be a steaming bowl of clear, bracingly spicy broth full of large...

Day Two, I went jogging. It sounds horribly exotic to go jogging in Hua Hin specially when I duck it so frequently at home, but I did lace up and start running bright and early. Only to find food within minutes. A hundred yards out of the hotel gates a most odd barbecue cart pulled up next to me; it was attached to a scooter and the man was driving it around like a perfectly normal scooter - fire, meats, grill and all. I was to learn later that this was not unusual in Thailand, but it certainly provided a quirky start to my day. Barbecue in hand from this mobile pork heaven, ornate temple in the background, I continued my jog now accompanied by a very hopeful street dog (he eventually did get half my barbecue). Another kilometre of uneventful jogging later, I found myself at a canal lined on either side with kaccha roads that the recent rains had turned to mud. The crossing - a small road bridge - yielded another postcard moment. Against the backdrop of the canal was a hugely ...