Showing posts with label southeast asia. Show all posts

Sunday, 10 May 2015

Week 20: MALAYSIA - Penang → Borneo

Image of the week: orang-utan
at the Shangri-La Rasa Ria Nature Reserve, Sabah, Borneo
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Where in the world

A one hour 45 minute flight from Bangkok to Penang in Malaysia, where we stayed for four nights.

Then a two hour flight east to the Malaysian part of the island of Borneo, specifically the area of Kota Kinabalu, where we stayed for four nights.

Thoughts

I didn't even realise Penang was a whole state in Malaysia rather than just a city - and an island at that - until we were coming down to land on it. Such is my shameful lack of research into the place, and the country as a whole before visiting.

(Actually, the island is only half of the state of Penang, the rest of which is on the mainland. But people who visit tend to stay on the island part).

All I knew about this stop was Malaysia is a Muslim country, and Penang has great food. I didn't really know what to expect from the former (I was hoping for some good eating from the latter), or what to expect from Malaysia full stop.

I certainly hadn't anticipated for it to be as developed as it is. It's closer to the order and solid infrastructure of Thailand, when I had prepared myself for something along the lines of the manageable chaos of Vietnam.

But the most prominent observation of all, and one you can't miss from the offset, is that it's full of different faces. And I absolutely love that.

fisherman fixing his net, Penang
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Look one way and I could have been in south India again: dark skin, bright cloth, tamil phrases. Our taxi from the airport passed a sprawling Indian celebration of some sort - I suspect a wedding - spilling out from the Indian Palace restaurant, right over the street and into the 24hr McDonald's forecourt. It was a see of sarees.

Look the other way and there are shop fronts covered in Chinese characters, that would be any other city's Chinatown. A whole host of languages are spoken, foods eaten, faiths followed, and cultures expressed.

I suspect it's probably quite like Mauritius, in that its colonised history, trading, and cultural exchanges between East and West has resulted in a melting pot of multiculturalism.

Not that I would know, I've never actually been to the homeland.

a snapshot of Penang's street art
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And then there's Borneo. The third-largest island in the world and the largest island in Asia.

Half of it is Indonesia, the other half of it is Malaysia, and it's also home to that funny little nugget of sovereign state governed by a sultan that is Brunei, which I always thought was somewhere in the Middle East.

Borneo was everything I had hoped it would be. A breathtaking example of our planet's ability to stop us dead in our tracks with its utter gorgeousness.

sunset in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Borneo
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The best things I ate this week

The cross-pollination of cultures and cuisines is an age old recipe for very good eating. And there are few better examples of this than in the tight knot of ethnic diversity that is Penang, where arguably some of southeast Asia's best hawker food (street food) can be found.

There's a lot of it to seek out, and this very handy Penang Food Trail PDF, written by the Penang Tourism Board, is a great resource to get you started.

Here are some of the things we enjoyed:

Wan tan mee (wonton noodles, BBQ pork)

A bumping Chulia Street in Georgetown lead us to some very good wan tan mee, egg noodles with wontons and BBQ pork. The wet version is in a broth, the dry sees the noodles and dumplings tossed in some dark soy.

We got one of each, and added some pickled chillies. I've never waited as long as I did that night to give my order at a street food stall, it was that swamped. And I had to pick the busiest place, obviously.

Here are the husband and wife team that made our noodles.

Nasi kandar (rice and curries)

This is a Penang dish from the Indian Muslim community. You select your curries from what's available that day, they're piled on top of rice, then splashes of various gravies are added.

They'll be served alongside some veg, here cabbage fried with turmeric, but often long beans. I chose beef, chicken and mutton curries, and they were rocking. They also had squid curry and fish egg curry, which are equally popular.

At Restoran Kapitan, 93 Lebuh Chulia, Georgetown, Penang

Roti canai (roti and dhal)

Another Penang staple from the Indian Muslim community. It's a type of Indian-influenced flatbread served with a little curry, often dhal, and available with either sweet or savoury toppings, like sardines, cheese, onions, bananas. 20p for one portion - we got a few.

Economy rice (buffet meal)

This picture was taken in the food court of one of the low cost housing areas in Penang, on the food tour covered below (see Street food must-eats).

Economy rice is the name given for a collection of cooked foods, of which you can select as many different ones as you like, accompanied by steamed rice - a bit like an al fresco buffet. It's good value, has variety, and is a great opportunity for the community to socialise.

top: wan tan mee (noodles, dumplings & BBQ pork), nasi kandar (curries and rice)
bottom: roti canai, economy rice
Penang dishes

Street food must-eats

Penang food tour

Junie from Food Tour Penang

Another week and another food tour of epic proportions. This time with the lovely Junie from Food Tour Penang which is part of Food Tour Malaysia, also found directing people towards the best things to eat Kuala Lumpur.

My tour happened to be private just because no one else was booked in that day, but whether there are two of you or more, you are driven around to the different stops (in a car or van).

The AC between all of the eating is very welcome, and it means you visit different areas in one evening that would be too far to reach by foot.

Here's what Junie fed me with (there is a lot, skip lunch):

Chendul (shaved ice dessert) | Assam laksa (spicy noodle soup)

We kicked off with dessert, as the place to get it closes at 5.30 - it was a spot on way to start. Chendul is shaved ice (literally ice shaved from a big block) in coconut milk, rice noodles made green from pandan leaves, and kidney beans. Quite fantastic and inordinately refreshing.

While I was half way through that, an assam laksa turned up. Thick round rice noodles hiding beneath a spicy, slightly sweet, dark brown/orange broth made tart by assam (sour tamarind) and thick with disintegrated fresh mackerel fillets. Also in it, cucumber, pineapple, red chillies, red onions, and black sweetened shrimp paste.

At Penang Road Famous Teochew Chendul, 27 Lebuh Keng Kwee, Georgetown, Penang

Prawn fritters | Loh bak (fried sausage)

Junie then took us to a family run business at the Tan Jetty selling Nyonya (Chinese / Malay) prawn fritters and loh bak, which are pork marinated in Chinese five-spice powder, rolled up in bean curd skin, then fried. Moist and aromatic - strong snacking.

top: chendul (shaved ice dessert), frying prawn fritters, assam laksa noodle soup
bottom: sweet fritters, popiah (fresh spring rolls), ban chien kueh (peanut pancake)
Penang dishes
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Goreng pisang (banana fritters)

Again, around the Tan Jetty, there's a family run shop that only sells fried fritters - a favourite tea time treat in Malaysia - for a few hours each day in the afternoon. They do goreng pisang (banana fritters), and also the three layered fritters pictured above, with sweet potato, New Year cake (glutinous rice cooked with sugar), and yam.

Popiah (fresh spring rolls)

These are Hokkien (south Chinese) style fresh spring rolls. All sorts going on here - juicy turnip filling, sweetness from prawn and crab meat, Chinese lettuce, sweet sauce, spicy sambal, and the skin is a sort of thin crepe.

At the New Lane hawker centre, Lorong Baru, Georgetown

Ban chien kueh (peanut pancake)

A crispy pancake made by layering the batter over a hot griddle and filling with roasted ground peanuts, sugar and sweet corn. Some customers also request an egg mixed in. It's a popular hawker food in Penang and sublime straight off the hot iron.

top: Chinese sausage in a bun, Hokkien mee (spicy noodle soup)
bottom: char koay teow (fried noodles), dosa (Indian crepe)
Penang dishes
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Hokkien mee (spicy noodle soup) | Char koay teow (fried noodles)

Hokkien mee is a spicy soup of both egg and rice noodles in a stock made from prawn, dried shrimp, pork ribs or chicken. It's garnished with sliced boiled eggs, prawns, leafy veg, fried onions, and chilli paste.

Arguably Penang's most famous hawker food, and my favourite from the tour, char koay teow is a savoury umami dream. Flat rice noodles are stir-fried with shrimp, cockles, Chinese sausage, eggs, bean sprouts, and chives in a mix of soy sauce.

There's a great charred aroma from stir-frying the noodles over very high heat in a well-seasoned wok. And that char seems to be a common factor in the noodle dishes I like the most, also seen in Thailand's fried noodle dish, kuay teow kua gai (which I talk about in last week's post), which is just as stellar.

At the New Lane hawker centre, Lorong Baru, Georgetown

Dosa (Indian crepe) | Teh tarik (frothy Indian tea)

It was as if I were back in Madurai again; my first feel of south India since I left it in January. And it was good.

All Tamil staff, wonderful curries with the dosa, and a sweet and fortifying frothy tea, going supremely well with the spice.

Penang's hawker food scene is vast and encompasses a host of different cultures, cuisines, languages and locations. If you're there for a limited time, a food tour like this is an excellent way to get a taste of most of it, with someone who knows the landscape taking you to the best places.

Junie isn't the only guide working at Food Tour Penang, but I can't recommend her highly enough. She had full and informative answers to every question I threw at her, and the 4.5 hours we spent together flew by.

Tours with Food Tour Penang are held in groups, include private transportation, last for around four hours, and cost RM160 (around £29) per person.

Note: This tour was kindly hosted by Food Tour Penang. All views are my own.

Did you know?

Penang is a superb example of different cultures and faiths getting along in close proximity just fine. Jalan Masjid Kapitan Keling road in Georgetown, affectionately known as 'The Street of Harmony', demonstrates this well, bringing together the town's four religions.

Take a short walk down it and you'll come across an Anglican church, a Buddhist temple, a Hindu temple, and a mosque, all within a stone's throw of each other. Its this multi-cultural heritage expressed in the variety of religious buildings of different faiths that's part of the reason Penang obtained it's UNESCO status in 2008.

The peace and acceptance found amongst the people of this town is a strong message, and one the rest of the world could do with paying attention to.

street in Penang

My insider tips

People who visit Borneo often have orang-utans on the agenda. There are a whole load of reserves and rehabilitation centres you can choose to visit (this is quite a useful run down of the good and the bad), but as the article states, many exist to serve mass tourism rather than to rehabilitate the apes.

What I really liked about the orang-utan viewing at the Shangri-La (see Highlight below) is that it's only available twice a day for about half an hour, so the animals are not paraded to a constant stream of tourists.

When the viewings do take place, the groups are not large and are confined to stand on a single platform. Outside of those feeding times, the apes are free to live up in the trees of the 64 acre jungle reserve without anyone bothering them, just as they would in the wild.

Attending a feeding is available to those not staying at the hotel too. And I would say it's probably one of the least intrusive orang-utan experiences available on the island, from what I have read online.

orang-utan at the Shangri-La Rasa Ria Nature Reserve, Sabah, Borneo

Highlight / Lowlight

Highlight.

The whole time in Borneo felt like one extended highlight. I loved everything about it - the wildlife, the stunning scenery, the exoticness of it all.

And a lot of that was down to staying at the Shangri-La Rasa Ria Resort (I'll get to writing more about this stay in a few weeks), their unrivalled location, and the host of activities and trips they have available.

There was a fantastic cruise along the Tambalang River and its narrow mangrove creeks at sunset, where we spotted long-tailed macaques, flying fish, a crocodile and an awesome view (see video below).

We then took the firefly cruise straight after and visited the same waterways, this time in the pitch black.

The skies were clear, with the dark shadows of the mangroves twinkling like hundreds of fairy lights, mimicking the constellations above. They were full of glowing fireflies, as if the stars had fallen from the sky and got caught in the trees.

I've never seen anything like it, like something out of a film. Magical is definitely the word.

If that wasn't awesome enough, the next morning we attended an orang-utan feeding.

The Shangri-La Rasa Ria Resort have secured part of the Borneo rainforest as a 64 acre nature reserve, established in collaboration with the State Wildlife Department, which backs onto the hotel. It's mission is to facilitate rehabilitation programmes for endangered species of faunas endemic to Sabah.

In it, there is a huge array of wildlife, including a load of long-tailed macaques, and four juvenile orang-utans. These orang-utans live freely but are protected and looked after by the reserve, which includes feeding.

We stood in the near 100% humidity of the jungle absolutely drenched in sweat, the keeper calling out into the trees for a while, armed with a bin full of fresh fruit. After a few minutes, the high-up branches in the far distance started to rustle and sway, and from the tangle of dense treetop vegetation, this little guy emerged.

He was swinging through the trees, from one arm to the other, like something out of The Jungle Book, then came right up close to check us out. One of his mates wasn't far behind.

Sitting cross-legged on the floor as a kid watching David Attenborough documentaries, I would dream of witnessing orang-utans living freely in their natural habitat.

Therefore, this may have been my highlight of the past five months.

Now here are a couple more pictures of these cuties. Because there can never be too many snaps of baby orang-utans.

orang-utan at the Shangri-La Rasa Ria Nature Reserve, Sabah, Borneo

And then there was all the other stuff we did at the Shangri-La. Like I said, it was a good few days.

activities at Shangri-La Rasa Ria, Sabah
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Lowlight.

I asked Matt to hold my bottle of water while I was taking a picture, and in his attempt to check the map on his phone to see where we were headed, his sweaty hands fumbled and dropped it, and the screen smashed.

For someone who takes a lot of pride in never losing or damaging his possessions, he was very upset about it. So much so that he created a make-shift plaster to stick over the smashed corner, so he didn't have to look at it.

It still works. All is not lost.

Next week

After five months, we bid farewell to Asia. It's been pretty amazing. Next week we'll be crossing the equator for the first time, and saying hello to Melbourne in Australia.

Postcards

wan tan mee stall, Penang

colonial buildings, Penang

street corner, Penang

siesta, Penang

Penang

street food, Penang

great hornbill, Kota Kinabalu, Borneo

Sunday, 3 May 2015

Week 19: THAILAND - Bangkok

Image of the week: Bangkok skyline by night, view from the Shangri-La Hotel
More images at the end of the post
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Where in the world

A 25 minute boat journey from Koh Phangan to Koh Samui, where we took a short flight back to Bangkok, staying there the whole week.

Thoughts

My preconception of Bangkok was largely lifted from the film The Hangover II, which sees a group of unwitting amnesia-stricken stag do party-goers retrace their steps through the strip clubs, tattoo parlours and cocaine-dealing monkeys of Bangkok, to locate their missing friend and make it to the wedding in time.

I'm sure some truth can be found in that if you're on the search for it, and Bangkok certainly has its fair share of sleaze strips (more on that later). But by and large, the city is a civilised, respectful, sprawling metropolis, full of smiles, the familiar chaos of a capital, and racing towards the future.

You'll find 200-year-old village homes sitting in the shadows of slick climate-controlled megamalls that use the same amount of juice as whole provinces.

Buddhist temples with golden rooftops shimmering in the sunlight share space with the 'go go bar girls' on the scout for that evening's source of income.

Soaring skyscrapers play host to trendy rooftop bars for tourists, expats and the city's young urban professionals, while street food shacks, some unpacked from the back of a motorcycle, serve up some of the best grub in town.

Bangkok
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It would be remiss, though, to visit Bangkok and not wander around the city's sex trade hubs, out of curiosity if nothing else.They play a huge role in the city's entertainment industry, and to truly understand a place, one must bear witness to both the good and the mucky.

It's an odd sight for a first-time visitor to the country, to see old overweight western men so brazenly parading the streets like peacocks with young, sleight Thai girls on their arm. Or sit in a restaurant where the same western male stereotype is this time with a young Thai boy, both eating their meals in sullen silence with not a scrap of conversation or eye contact exchanged between them.

But the thing that struck me the most, was the openess of it all. Yes, clearly, these people are with prostitutes. But this is Bangkok, a city known for its sex tourism, and people barely bat an eyelid over it.

Soi Cowboy, Bangkok
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Walk through the streets around Soi Cowboy (above, and a lot of where The Hangover II was filmed, incidentally) and you'll see stalls flogging obscene sex toys and packets of viagra to unassuming middle-aged men visiting from India, directly next to another selling pretty ornamental soaps in the shapes of fruit and veg to a little girl and her mother.

Girls launch themselves in a high-pitched tirade of 'hellooooo, where you froooom?' as soon as they spot Matt (who is always at least ten feet in front of me), then respectfully retreat and move onto another male once they see me. I had a guy whisper in a very serious tone, directly into my ear as I walked past him, 'ping pong show?' to which I replied, 'I'm alright for now, thanks.' I like how he directed that at me, rather than Matt.

(If you want to find out what a ping pong show is, W ikipedia can help).

You might see a local working girl trot in her stripper heels into a 7/11 convenience store, wearing little more than a bra and knickers, buying mouthwash and floss for her next client hanging back behind her, who has a halitosis problem. All this whilst a robed Buddhist monk passes by outside (ok, he's probably in the wrong part of town).

Airbnb apartment
near Central Plaza Mall, Bangkok

I don't know nearly enough about what I'm sure is a complex and multi-faceted industry with a lot of history, to pass judgement on anyone involved. But it is indisputably a big part of Bangkok's identity, and it's fascinating to observe.

Despite all of that, the thick heavy air, constant state of sweat, smog, or perhaps because of it all, Bangkok is totally rocking, and I love it.

I've been here a total of 10 days (over two visits) and it's not nearly enough. It's a place I could totally envisage living in, staying permanently in one of the many flash condos punctuating the skyscape, like the one we secured through AirBnB (right).

Not that I plan to live here, don't worry, parents. But visit again, most definitely.

The best things I ate this week

One of the reasons I think I could live in Bangkok? Because the food is so - freaking - good. And cheap.

And if there's one thing that makes me fall hook line and sinker for a place, it's what it can feed me with.

Bangkok food tour

Mod from Bangkok Food Tours

As I mentioned last week, there are few better ways to quickly get acquainted with a city's food scene than by taking a food tour.

This week I joined an effervescent Mod (bubbly guide from Bangkok Food Tours), and a few other overseas visitors, for a night time group outing that saw us ferried around the city by tuk tuks, for a showcase of Bangkok's late night dining haunts.

The Best Eats Midnight Food Tour by Tuk Tuk starts at 8pm, follows a series of around seven tastings - as well as a visit to Wat Pho, the night time flower market, and a rooftop bar for a beer - and finishes around 12.00 - 12.30am.

Whizzing through the manic streets of Bangkok in the cool of the late eveing gives a different perspective to the city (in a similar vein, see the excellent night time food tour we did in HCMC, Vietnam on the back of mopeds), particularly when visiting deserted sites that would otherwise be overrun with hoards of tourists during the day (like Wat Pho - see Insider Tip below).

I'd been in Thailand for a couple of weeks already, so a few of the items on the tour were not new to me. But then, there's no such thing as too much of the good stuff.

First up was khao man gai (Thai chicken rice) at a place called Khao Mun Gai Ton Pratunam that's been doing it for over 40 years, and plates were moving briskly. Here, the rice is cooked in chicken broth and chicken fat for maximum flavour.

The sauce condiment to drizzle over this dish is important; I have had better elsewhere at other khao man gai stalls in Bangkok (see street food around Victory Monument below), with a stronger flavour, but this sauce certainly wasn't bad. A bit of blood pudding and chicken liver, with a sticky rice and mango chaser from a stall next door, and we were well on our way.

top: serving broth with Thai chicken rice, donut (patongo) dough, frying donuts
bottom: donuts with green pandan custard, cooking pad thai, Thai dessert
With Bangkok Food Tours
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Also across the road was what I presume were a father and son duo making and frying patongo (Thai donuts) from a great flaccid mound of dough, to be dipped in a green custard, luminescent from pandan leaves. Piping hot, fresh from the fryer, a touch of salt in the dough, and quite lovely with the sweet dip.

I suspected the 'best pad Thai in Bangkok', as advertised in the tour description, might be Thip Samai, which we went to and very much enjoyed last week (to the extent that Matt annihilated three plates of the stuff).

And I was right, but it was good to eat it again, and to know that there is little difference in the length of the queue at 6pm or 11.30pm (check out the video of them wrapping noodles in a thin layer of egg in last week's post). It does move quickly though.

But without hesitation, the best plate from the tour, and a new one for me (bonus), was the fried noodle dish kuay teow kua gai, which Mod mentioned is also known as the 'Asian carbonara'.

Wide rice noodle ribbons (sen yai) are fried in pork fat over charcoal until charred, crisp and smoky. Then, pieces of boneless chicken that have been marinated in salt and pepper are added. An egg is then either mixed in by the chef, or the plate arrives at your table with the egg cracked sitting proud on top, which you mix in yourself like in the video above. Hence the 'carbonara'.

I wasn't expecting so much flavour from something so simple, but then isn't that always the way. Smoky crisp noodles, salty peppery chicken, wet from the runny mixed-in egg, add chilli flakes, pickled chillies, served with a bowl of broth heavy on the lime. Utterly splendid.

I've eaten my way through two food tours in Bangkok, both good, but each catering for a slightly different audience. My advice would be to take this one with Bangkok Food Tours early on in your visit; it's a great introduction to Thai cuisine and Thai street food.

Then, once you're acquainted with the well loved staples, you could move onto the Old Bangkok Food and Culture Walk from Chili Paste Tours (covered in last week's post), for off the beaten track items and more adventurous eating.

Bangkok Food Tours are held in groups. The Best Eats Midnight Food Tour by Tuk Tuk costs 1900 baht (around £38) per person and includes a drop off back to your hotel.

Note: This tour was kindly hosted by Bangkok Food Tours. All views are my own.

Lunch at Nahm

It wouldn't be right to visit Bangkok and not dine at Nahm, the restaurant that's repeatedly topped the Asia's 50 Best Restaurants charts. Although, it got bumped to the number 7 spot this year, replaced by progressive Indian restaurant Gaggan, also in Bangkok.

And so the set menu for lunch was booked, and at just 1500 baht (about £30) per person, it's a steal for what you get. Two appetisers, your choice of a salad, soup, curry, and stir fry (to share), and both desserts on the menu.

lunch at Nahm, Bangkok
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My favourites from that day's pickings, ordered in the collage above from top left: blue swimmer crab with peanuts and pickled garlic on crunchy rice cakes; prawn and coconut wafers with pickled ginger and strips of tofu - like a really light, sweet and sour taco; a Chiang Mai larp salad with guinea fowl scooped onto raw veg; a roast duck, Thai basil, and young coconut soup; sweet thai wafers with poached persimmons and golden duck egg noodles.

Nahm (inside the COMO Metropolitan Hotel), 27 South Sathorn Road, Thung Maha Mek, Sathon, Bangkok.

Street food must-eats

The best places for street food in Bangkok

Bangkok is known as the 'street food capital of the world', so it's probably little surprise that this is the largest section of this post.

When good looking stuff to eat flirts from every corner, it's difficult to know where to start. My advice would be firstly, take a look at this great Top 16 Bangkok Street Food Sanctuaries article written by Mark Wiens for guidance on where to head.

Below is what we got up to.

Yaowarat Road in Chinatown

A common theme I've found during these travels through Asia, is that some of the best street food stalls and markets can be found in a city's Chinatown; those Chinese sure do know how to eat well.

Armed with little more than the name Yaowarat Road (the main neon sign-lit street that runs through Bangkok's Chinatown), we wondered along it one evening, pulling up two stools at whoever was bumping with business and had good looking stuff on display.

Yaowarat Road, Chinatown, Bangkok
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As Mark mentions on his really helpful all-things-Thai-food website Migrationology (do check it out for where and what to eat anywhere in the country, and lots of other countries for that matter), Yaowarat Road is a cut throat environment for street food vendors, meaning only the really good ones survive.

Therefore, you're almost guaranteed a good meal from these parts, wherever you choose to eat.

I had a hankering for noodles and roast meats. Specifically, duck. And at that moment, walked past a great roast duck display; what's that if it isn't fate lending a helping hand with my eating decisions.

First stop, beautiful thin springy wonton noodles, slicked with a little oil, succulent bird meat with crispy skin, broth for spooning on the side, about £1 for a bowl.

top: tuk tuk in Chinatown, roast duck and wonton noodles, roast duck display
bottom: pork and noodle pepper soup, sesame dumpling ginger soup, Chinatown face
Yaowarat Road, Chinatown
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A few meters further down the road, another place, this time an open restaurant with the kitchen on the street, also swamped with eager clientèle. I spotted a young guy who looked like he could speak English and asked if he had a menu.

"We don't have a menu, but we do char siu (BBQ) pork with noodles in a pepper soup." Sold.

It's actually a dish called kuay jab nam sai, and it's rolled up rice noodle triangle shapes, all parts of the pig (if you wish), swimming in a porky black pepper soup that's heavy on the pepper. Gorgeous. £1 for a small portion, which is actually rather large.

It turns out this place is pretty famous and is generally a stop on food tours that work this area. It's called Kuay Jab Uan Pochana and you'll find more info on it here.

Kuay Jab Uan Pochana. Located in the heart of Yaowarat Chinatown on Yaowarat Road in between Soi 9 and Thanon Yaowa Phanit

char siu pork and pepper broth at Kuay Jab Uan Pochana, Yaowarat Road, Chinatown

I'd read about the warm Thai dessert bua loy nam khing, which are dumplings filled with a black sesame butter in ginger water, and it read like a dream.

They're two of my favourite flavours, so I was keen to seek it out. There are some great looking dessert stalls on Chinatown's Yaowarat Road, so this is easy to find. 60p for a powerfully soothing bowl of life affirming joy, with sweet nutty dumplings. A real pleasure to eat.

The easiest way to get to Chinatown is by taxi, but alternatively you can take the MRT to Hua Lamphong station, and then walk to Chinatown from there (10 mins) or take a tuk tuk / motorbike.

Sukhumvit Soi 38

This is a short strip of street food stalls which is a great introduction to the country's kerb-side dining scene.

Here you'll find the well-worn favourites (pad thai, mango sticky rice, papaya salad), menus are in English as well as Thai, vendors speak a good amount of English, and you'll notice quite a few tourists.

street food stalls on Sukhumvit Soi 38, Bangkok
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We started with 10 little skewers of tasty chicken satay for £1, with a lightly pickled cucumber and onion salad and peanut dipping sauce.

We sat in the back to eat them, where a rat ran past my foot and a small cockroach landed on the table. We've been in Asia long enough for this to barely raise an eyebrow these days - imagine the pandemonium that would follow a similar scene in London.

Then it was a few stalls down (the same place Mark gets his salad with raw crab from here) for some som tum mamuang, green mango salad. This was excellent. Hot, sour enough to make your gums ache, and heavy on the fish sauce. Just how I like it. With sliced shallots, roasted peanuts, and a Thai quiz show on the box.

top: satay skewers, satay stall, green mango salad
bottom: dry wonton noodles with crispy pork, mango sticky rice stall, fruit shake stall
Sukhumvit Soi 38, Bangkok
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Then came some wonton noodles from a stall towards the end of the strip, that I later learnt has been serving this stuff for over 40 years. It was busy (what drew me), and we ordered dry wonton (pork and prawn dumplings) noodles with soup on the side, topped with crispy pork. This was very good. I loved the wonton noodles in Hong Kong, and this reminded me of them a lot.

Dessert came in the form of some mango sticky rice from the lady with piles of the fruit neatly arranged at the front of her stall, in the small cul-de-sac on the right shortly after you enter the road. And then a mango shake because I can't get enough of these Asian mangoes.

We returned to the strip on a separate night, guided by the irrepressible desire that had gripped us that day to devour a sloppy, juicy, really good burger. It had been four months since the last one, and western cravings were getting the better of us.

'The Steve' burger from Daniel Thaiger at Sukhumvit Soi 38, Bangkok
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A quick social media straw poll on where to get the best burgers in Bangkok, and I was unanimously directed to Daniel Thaiger's street food burger truck, more often than not found on Sukhumvit Soi 38 (check his Facebook page though, as he does move around).

Everything, including sauces are made from scratch. There was a charred patty shell, yielding juicy middle, crisp bacon, glossy toasted sesame bun, lettuce, tomato, some sort of super sauce, and burger juices down my arm. 'Hit the spot' didn't quite cover it.

To get to Sukhumvit Soi 38, take the BTS Skytrain to Thong Lo station. Exit 4 (you’ll see the street perpendicular to the station as you are on the skywalk), walk down the steps, then make an immediate u-turn, and you’ll be there.

Victory Monument

On a fleeting day where the temperature mercifully dropped by about 10 degrees to a far more sociable 25C, I left my hair down, threw on a light jacket and headed to Victory Monument for dinner shrouded under grey drizzly skies; it could have almost been London.

the Victory Monument roundabout, Bangkok
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There's a whole load of cracking street food around the Victory Monument roundabout; it's like a circular grazing route. Do a lap, and stop at whatever takes your fancy.

Our first was for kaeng kiaw wan gai (Thai green curry with chicken), and some other sort of dry curry with pork, I think. Not entirely sure what it was, but it looked good so I pointed to it and got some.

Then there was some khao man gai (boiled chicken over rice), the Thai version of Hainanese chicken rice (from Singapore). Juicy meat, fragrant jasmine rice cooked in the chicken broth, bowl of broth for spooning, an excellent accompanying chilli dip. All of the comfort for 70p.

And finally, a central curry with rice noodles and fish balls, with six fully loaded plates of garnishes to fill your boots with.

To get there, take the BTS Skytrain to Victory Monument station, Exit 3 or 4, and start exploring by walking around the monument first.

In the bottom right of the collage below I've also included a picture of a honey pear, because the fruit in Thailand is some of the best I've had. These honey pears are enormous, obscenely sweet, and take about half an hour to eat.

Either my fruit selection skills have dramatically improved, or the produce on offer in Thailand is consistently great. Not a dud item in three weeks.

top: central fish curry, Thai green curry and dry pork curry
bottom: chicken and rice, honey pear
Around Victory Monument
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Did you know?

top: departure gate
bottom: walk to departure gate
Koh Samui airport

Koh Samui airport is the quaintest, most laid back I've ever come across. It's privately owned by Bangkok Airways, and has been designed to be completely in tune with its natural surroundings.

You'd have no idea you were in an airport if it wasn't for the occasional, infrequent plane taking off or landing.

The walk to the departure gates is a tree lined avenue flanked by boutique shops and eateries.

The departure gates themselves are littered with deck chairs overlooking palm-fringed grounds that would be more at home in a five star resort.

The shuttle bus that ferries you to the aircraft is a quaint tram.

And, Bangkok Airways provide complimentary food and drink at the departure gate while you wait for your plane.

The whole airport is open, which is gorgeous. But that does mean there's no AC, so everyone quietly melts.

My insider tips

Wat Pho by night

I only realised one of Bangkok's largest and oldest Buddhist temples - Wat Pho (pronounced Wat Po) - could be visited at night, when I was on the above Bangkok Food Tour.

Our group turned up at around 10pm and because there's no one at the ticket office at this time, it looks as though you don't need to pay for the entrance fee.

The opening times are listed until about 5.30 pm, but Mod informs me it's actually open until around 11.30pm - quite the difference. However, we only spotted people as part of tour groups in it at this time, so I suspect you need to be part of one to not be stopped by the guards.

Still, it means you can get some alternative night time shots, there's hardly anyone else is around, and it's a damn site cooler.

the stupas of Wat Pho by night, Bangkok
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Highlight / Lowlight

Highlight.

thunderstorm over the sea
between Koh Phangan and Koh Samui

We had to take a short 25 minute boat ride from the island of Koh Phangan to Koh Samui (the latter of which has an airport).

We moved away from clear blue skies and directly into a thunderstorm.

We were on the boat, with rumbling thunder resonating and lighting striking the water all around us. It was pretty exciting / scary.

The second undisputed highlight of the week was having access to a washing machine, over which I did a little victory dance.

For the first time in weeks, every item of our clothing armoury was put through a hot cycle. Before then, we'd been relying on the portable washing machine, The Scrubba, to get our clothes clean. Which actually does a pretty good job.

But it sure felt good knowing our clothes were getting a mechanical seeing to.

Lowlight.

Probably just that these were our last few days in Bangkok, and in Thailand as a whole. I got myself a matcha soft serve ice cream to cheer me up.

Next week

We bid a teary farewell to Thailand, and hello to our final Asian country, Malaysia.

Postcards

Bangkok