I have now been living in Thailand for over two months. This equates to a lot of divine food that I have consumed. In this post, I will share with you photos of some of my meals, to give you a peek into what I eat on this side of the world.
These are the two standard breakfasts that I eat at school: jok (rice porridge) and khao piak (rice noodles), each with eggs, green onions, and chili sauce when I'm in the mood for spice. These are traditional breakfasts here that many teachers at my school eat daily.
My first time having jok, a fellow teacher brought it to school for me! See the cute little note that says, "I hope you like it! -T. Pui :)"? I love Teacher Pui, she is the best! Now I get this breakfast all the time.
Another precious Teacher Pui moment: one day I asked Pui where the place she purchases breakfast is, so that I could go get it myself rather than needing to bother her to get it for me. She told me where the place was, so I got khao piak from there and came to school. That morning, Teacher Pui and her mother cooked khao piak and sent a bag of it to school for me! I of course had the homemade version, it was delicious. I am still so grateful for her and her mom caring for me!
One more picture of khao piak, with chili sauce and delicious runny egg. The noodles are so doughy too, which I just love.
Another option for breakfast: grilled eggs. They are made by emptying the eggshell, scrambling the yolk and whites with soy or fish sauce and pepper, re-filling the shells, and grilling the eggs. They taste like scrambled eggs but in a hard-boiled format! So unique and yummy.
A standard in my breakfasts every day: bananas! I love to have one or two of these with my main dish. The ones I buy are typically smaller than the ones pictured above!
THE COOLEST BUG I HAVE SEEN IN THAILAND. This multi-colored praying mantis was guarding these bananas in a very convincing fashion - needless to say, I opted for a different bunch.
A little convenience store breakfast: traditional Chinese pastry with boxed soymilk.
Breakfast for me plus some to share: bananas, sweet rice cakes, and a couple of grilled eggs.
Brunch
Now for some weekend brunches! Some fried eggs and a small baguette at a cafe near the river.
When my friend visited, we indulged in some amazing honey toast, complete with banana, whipped cream, and ice cream. We ate this just after noon, so it's okay that it was dessert... heheh.
Next day's brunch with the same friend at the same place! An omelette for me, chocolate honey toasts for my friend. We also got another honey toast with ice cream to share, after this. We were really hungry, okay?
Khai-jeow: The Thai Omelette
This is my absolute favorite food that I eat in Thailand. It is normally made with pork, but I order "khai-jeow mangsawirat" (vegetarian omelette).
I order this every weekend day at my favorite restaurant in my town.
Served over rice with chili sauce and vegetables.
Two days over a long weekend, my favorite place was closed. I went to two other places on the same street that day and tried the omelettes there. Both delicious, but my favorite place still holds its spot!
My heart and soul. This is the one that I had yesterday... yum. Yum. YUM. Aroy mak. (That means, "very delicious"!)
Lunch
I eat lunch every weekday at an awesome vegetarian restaurant down the street from my school. It is the only vegetarian place that I have found in Thailand, and I am so fortunate that it is so close to my workplace! They have a variety of entirely vegetarian dishes to choose from every day, with tofu and vegetables prepared in all sorts of different combinations, with different levels of spiciness, all over rice and with a side of soup. Here are a series of photos of lunches I eat here.
Last but not least, I took my friend here the weekend that he visited! Look at this glorious spread.
Dinner
This is the fresh market, where I buy dinner every night.
Here are some of my main cook friends! The closer one has tons of skewers of meat that he fries and sells with lettuce and chili sauce, I always buy fish from him. The further one makes banana pancakes (featured below).
Fish skewers from my main cook friend! Paired with vegetables and rice from my other friend (not pictured), Lek.
Another great meal, all from Lek. Grilled fish, sticky rice, and cooked greens.
A couple more dinner combinations from Fry Guy and Lek. You'll notice that these are all served in my pink dish, as I eat dinner back at my apartment to relax after the day.
A meal I had pre-pink bowl! Noodles, bean sprouts, and a fish skewer from a different street stand.
A meal on a special day, near Loy Krathang (the full moon festival in November), featuring a delicious sweet coconut rice cake and some bomb papaya.
Treated myself one night to a dinner by the river: vegetarian fried rice over a cooked spinach/vegetable mix.
I stayed at that restaurant for many hours and made friends with the people that worked there! They fed me watermelon and jackfruit. I had never tried jackfruit before that day - it was so good!
The meal spread on scout camp night at my school. The green fruit in the photo on the right is called a guava, farang in Thai. Farang is also what they call foreigners here! While I was eating some guava, I made a comment: "Farang gin farang." ("Foreigner eating foreigner.") It cracked up the Thai teachers!!
The long-awaited banana pancake feature!!
Made with egg, banana, and thin pancake, sprinkled with sweetened condensed milk and powdered sugar, these are more delicious than I can explain.
Up-close shot of the finished product.
I don't get these super often, but when I do, they are the highlight of my day. You can tell these are from separate days because of the different fruit sides! Hehe.
If you are curious how these are made and want to watch the whole process, I took this video to show a couple friends from home and put it up on Youtube:
This is what my bike basket looks like when I'm coming home from the fresh market with dinner in tow.
Dinner out with my friend when he visited. This place was right by the river, and it was the first place I've been to in Nong Khai that had Thai food like I've had in America (green curry and pad see yoo). It was so yummy!
Last but not least, a fruit feature:
Papaya, rose apples, mango, and yellow watermelon.
Drinks and Snacks
This is my favorite way to caffeinate if I am feeling particularly sleepy at work: genmai flavored green tea. I don't drink coffee and rarely drink caffeine, so this stuff works like a charm when I do opt to have it!
Recently, a drive-up boba place began permanently parking on my street. I have gotten drinks there twice, both times the Choco Thai Milk Tea with boba. SO GOOD. It is very dangerous that this is now a consistent fixture on my walk back to school from my lunch place!
They put chocolate powder on top. Imagine the willpower it takes not to buy one of these every day.
My favorite snack from the market by the river: mixed dried fruit. 100 baht for this whole sack, about $3.
This is called Ma-kam. It is essentially a long seed pod, steamed in sugar so the pod itself is sweet and soft. The seeds themselves are very bitter, be careful not to bite into these if you ever try this!!
My friend Teacher Jaae deep fries mushrooms sometimes. She brought in this plate to work and shared it with me! She knows that I am vegetarian (pescatarian, as I eat fish), and whenever she brings something that I can eat, she makes sure I enjoy it with her. These are delicious! One day she will show me how to cook them.
It's guilty pleasure time! Left: rolls of fake oreos my friend and I bought while he was visiting. They are 10 baht for the entire roll - that's about 30 cents! Right: my favorite chocolate treat in Thailand, the Gery crunch roll. Chocolate core surrounded by caramel and rice crispies, all dipped in dark chocolate. One of these is 6 baht, about 18 cents USD.
One of my students had a birthday and brought in donuts for all of the teachers and her classmates! Happy birthday, Pear. I love when it is my students' birthdays, hehe!
That concludes this massive post about the food I eat in my hometown of Nong Khai, Thailand!
If you made it this far, I am amazed. I hope you enjoyed vicariously eating these foods along with me!
Until next time...
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