See Fah Kao Mun Gai (Chicken Rice shop)

Chicken Rice ("Kao Mun Gai") is another one of those popular dishes in Thailand. You can find it almost anywhere, and there are many shops that specialises in Kao Mun Gai.

Chicken Rice is a very simple dish composing of boiled chicken, plain rice cooked in chicken broth, and served with a soy bean sauce (generally a combination of soy bean paste, ginger, garlic, soy sauce, etc). Although its seems like a simple dish and rather plain in flavour compared to other Thai dishes, Kao Mun Gai is full of wonderful subtle flavours, and very delicious...and especially good for those who can't eat spicy food (just don't put too much sauce)!

Most of the eateries / street stalls in Thailand will also serve cooked chicken blood with the dish, but that's not really my cup of tea, so I usually ask for no blood (as well as no fat on the chicken!).

I usually have my Kao Mun Gai at See Fah at Meechok Plaza, Chiang Mai, since it's near my office and it's very clean. See Fah's rice is especially great, and served steaming and fragrant. Their sauce is very tasty, and you can add fresh ginger and chilli to your liking!

The price is good too! 25 baht for "regular" size, and 30 baht for "piset" or "special" (which means a bigger portion).

Kao Mun Gai restaurants can be found pretty much everywhere and also in food courts.

See Fah Kao Mun Gai

Meechok Plaza (near Rimping Supermarket)

Opens early in the morning till around 3-4 pm.

Vieng Joom On Teahouse (aka "Pink Teahouse")

Vieng Joom On is one of my favourite places to bring visitors when they come to Chiang Mai. Literally, Vieng Joom On means "pink city" ...and yes, it's a pink themed tea house / tea shop. Guys, don't worry, other than the bright pink main building, the rest of the tea house isn't totally pink! There is also a beautiful garden terrace out the back where customers can relax, sip tea, have snacks and chat with friends.

There is a huge selection of tea to choose from - various Chinese teas, masala, chai, rooibos, fruit teas, as well as Vieng Joom On's own blends. They also serve various snacks, sandwiches and desserts such as Cherry Panna Cotta, scones and High-tea set.

If you happen to like any of the teas offered and want to take some home, you'll be able to buy them from the gorgeously decorated tea shop. Warning - it's not cheap - but the packaging is so beautiful and the tea very high quality.

Highly recommended for tea lovers.

Vieng Joom On Teahouse

53 Charoenraj Rd

T. Watgate A. Muang Chiang Mai 5000

Opens daily 10:00am-7:00pm

Tel: 053 303 113

Website: www.vjoteahouse.com

Suan Paak Restaurant

Famous for their salads and noodle dishes, especially Yen-ta-fos, Suan Paak (literally "Vegetable Garden"), is a complex of three restaurants. The original Suan Paak Restaurant serves salads, organically grown in their hydroponic garden, various Western dishes, and Thai dishes. There is also a Thai Restaurant, and the newer Noodle Restaurant on the premises. Whatever restaurant you end up going to, you won't miss out on the food from the other places, because you can order from all three!

My favourite is the Yen-ta-fo, a rice noodle dish (choose from thin or thick noodles), seafood (or fishballs, whatever you like), morning glory, white fungus, etc., in a tasty pink-red soup. Don't worry, the red colour isn't from blood (although blood cubes are often in the soup - can you spot them?), but from fermented red tofu. The soup is rich in flavour and of course, very delicious! Most noodle shops will sell Yen-ta-fo, but Suan Paak's Seafood Yen-ta-fo possibly costs the highest (and spiciest??), at 130 baht per dish - but you do get a lot of seafood - large prawns, and very big mussels and calamari. The serving is very large, possibly 3 times what you'd get at 30 baht places. The soup is also a lot tastier than your average noodle shop & served with crispy salmon skin that you can soak in the soup...a bit like croutons! Mmm.

Suan Pak's signature dish, though, is Khao Ping (literally, Grilled Rice). It's basically rice stir-fried with Thai shrimp paste, chilli and mince pork, wrapped in banana leaves and grilled. Served with fresh vegies (including lotus stem) and a very delicious clear mushroom soup. The shrimp paste gives the rice a very rich, earthy flavour, which I found very nice on the first few bites, but became too strong if the rice was eaten by itself, but was great with the salad. Not sure if I would have it again though, but it was very interesting and worth a try, and I'd recommend you try it, especially if you have someone to share with! 90 baht.

Here's the Chef's Salad. We ordered it because it was the most expensive - at 290 baht (most of the others were around 100-150 baht). No, I don't usually go around ordering the most expensive dishes on the menu, but I was curious - What's so special about it? Well, it has EVERYTHING - a combination of all the other salads on the menu, and it was humungous! They also had a selection of dressings to choose from. We went for the creamy dressing, which was served on the side, and very good as well.

The previous time I had the Thai dressing, which was very tasty, but it overpowered the western-style salad somewhat - much, much too strong. However, the salad with the Thai dressing went really well with the Khao Ping. The tartness and spiciness of the dressing complimented the salty, earthy flavour of the Khao Ping really well.

In the end, it was an enjoyable meal, especially the Yen-ta-fo! Suan Paak also has a lot of other interesting sounding dishes, so we'll definitely be back!

Suan Paak

61 Moo 3, Airport Rd,

T. Suthep, A. Muang, Chiang Mai 50200

(Next to Airport Plaza)

Tel: 053 202222, 053 904201

Alice in Phuket

Taking a break from the Chiang Mai foodie scene, I took a holiday with my family from Oz to the resort island of Phuket. I was not the organiser of this trip, so I just sat back, relaxed and enjoyed the ride, which is nice for a change! ..and since I was so busy just before, I didn't get a chance to research Phuket restaurants.

There was, however, one restaurant that we discovered on our first trip last year, and we couldn't wait to go back to this time, and that was Lotus, at Bangtao Beach. As for the other restaurants, we went by the recommendation of our driver, Khun Mon, which turned out to be quite good (mostly!).

Lotus Restaurant, Bangtao Beach, Phuket

Lotus Restaurant is an independent fine dining restaurant right on Bangtao Beach serving seafood, Thai food, as well as burgers and steaks. There is something for every one, even the non-seafood lover!

The restaurant is situated just behind the Laguna Resorts complex, which consists of various resorts and hotels including the Sheraton and Dusit Thani, and I'd say most of the clientele comes from Laguna.



At this point, most of you may think, "tourist restaurant", which means may be OK food and exorbitant prices. Not so at all. I'd count it as one of my favourite restaurants in Thailand (not that I have been to THAT many, mind you, and I've only been to a handfull of restaurants in Phuket). Not only is the view from Lotus is stunning, the food, especially the seafood, is fantastic.

As we arrived quite early (5:30pm) for the sunset, we started of with drinks and entrees of various Thai staples - Deep fried prawn cakes, Beef Salad, Spring rolls, Tom Yum Koong - all of which were lovely. The prawn cakes were quite large, firm in texture, and delicious. The beef in the Beef Salad was tender and had a smokey flavour. My favourite was the Tom Yum Koong (Prawn tom yum soup) - the fragrant soup was concentrated with flavour. Mmmm.

For the mains, we chose:

Fried Tiger Prawns with Garlic and Black Pepper - the prawns were the largest I have ever seen, weighing in at a whopping 200g each! ...and oh, it was so good! The flesh was firm and sweet, and went perfectly with the fried garlic and black pepper. We kept piling the garlic on the prawns with each bite (and sometimes just eating the garlic by itself!). The prawns were served with a chilli sauce, but we didn't need it.

Raw Oyster served with lime, chilli sauce, garlic and crispy shallot. Again, the oysters were huge. I've only ever had raw oyster with lemon juice, but the combination of lime, chilli sauce, raw garlic and crispy shallot seemed to work. I quite enjoyed the combination of flavours and crunch from the crispy shallot on the oyster.


Fried Mudcrab with Curry Powder. Another huge dish, as the crab was 2.2kg! The largest mudcrab I've ever seen, and even if it wasn't the best curry crab I've had, it was still great. The crab meat was lovely and sweet, and the sauce - delicious on rice..let's just say there weren't much left!


After that, the 7 of us (and one 2- year old) were extremely full. The total price came to 6,600 baht. Great value, considering the excellent seafood and the location. I'd highly recommend this restaurant when you go to Phuket. I'll certainly go back on my next visit.

Booking is highly recommended. The restaurant also has a free shuttle service from Laguna area.

Lotus Restaurant.
Open daily from 11:00am-11:30pm
31/13 Moo 4 Cherngtalay
Thalang, Phuket, Thailand
Tel: 081 797 3110, 076-362625-6
www.lotusphuket.com
(On-line reservation also available)


Other restaurant we enjoyed in Phuket:

Pah Yaah Thai Restaurant

This restaurant commands a great view from a cliff overlooking the ocean and the famous Patong Beach. It's in a more convenient location (closer to town) than Lotus.

There is a variety of food - Thai, seafood, as well as burgers (which looked rather sad in the display fridge - but I'm sure it'll look and taste better when made fresh to order). The Thai food is great there, and not expensive, pricing at a similar level to Lotus.

Our favourites were the Musaman Curry, the huge (and very tender) satays and steamed oysters. The Pad Kee Mao (Stir fried "drunken noodles" with mushroom) was also great.

We had Beef Salad at both Lotus and Pah Yaah, and found that the Lotus' beef were more tender and had a smoky flavour, while Pah Yaah's had the tougher beef but a tastier, more strongly flavoured (and spicier!) salad.

The total for the 7 of us (and one 2 year-old) came to about 2500 baht (no seafood).

Pan Yaah Thai Restaurant
249 Prabaramee Rd.
Patong, Phuket 83150
Tel: 076 290450-1
1.5km from Patong Novotel on Beach Rd to Kamala

NC Bakery and Food

This restaurant was recommended by our driver. On first look, the food, displayed buffet style, didn't look too appetising, however, we were also able to order a-la-carte and decided to give the restaurant a go, and we were glad we did!

NC serves local Phuket / Southern Thai food. They serve excellent "Knom Jean", a rice noodle and curry dish, served with a large basket of fresh vegies - yes, a basket! Other dishes we enjoyed were - Phuket style hokkien noodles and Pineapple fried rice (very good with lots of curry powder). The "Khao Yum" - a sort of southern style rice and vegie salad was also good, but dressing a little too sweet. The dressing is served on the side, so you can always put less of it. Their "Hor Mok", I was told, was also excellent (unfortunately I missed out on it!!).

This turned out to be our cheapest meal, costing only around 500 baht for 7 people and the 2 year old.

We enjoyed it so much we went back the next day for breakfast! Note- this is a Thai breakfast - steamed buns, Khao Yum, Knom Jean, etc. They can also make fried eggs and toast on request.

NC Bakery & Food
183/6 Phangna Rd
Talad Yai, Muang, Phuket
076 224 668

Do you have a favourite restaurant in Phuket? Please share with us the restaurants you enjoy (or the ones we should avoid!).