Mong La's wildlife market

Mong La is an odd place. Perhaps one of the oddest. Located on the Chinese border, the city lies within Myanmar, but is part of the semi-autonomous Wa State, a finger of land controlled by the United Wa State Army, an ethnic militia closely associated with drug production and trafficking. The Wa -- former headhunters -- have their own government, license plates (attached, almost exclusively, to white, '90's era sedans) and road signs. Chinese is the lingua franca in Wa State, and the Chinese Yuan is the accepted currency. Mong La is one of the few cities in all of Myanmar to have electricity 24 hours a day.

Years of open and unrestricted prostitution and gambling made Mong La the epitome of the lawless border town. The vices were a huge draw for Chinese tourists, who came in great numbers to visit casinos, fornicate, take photos at the town's "zoo", and catch a stage show at the town's transsexual cabaret. Drug use among locals was rampant and open, and Mong La became known in the western press as the "Las Vegas of the east".  Finally, in 2005, the Chinese authorities decided that the party had gone on long enough, and closed its side of the border to all but locals.

Today, Mong La is largely the shell of the place it used to be. The Wa authorities claim to have eradicated drugs in the area, and have erected a bizarre museum to honour this achievement:

Many of the town's casinos are abandoned:

The former transgender cabaret is crumbling and covered in weeds, and the town has an overabundance of huge, mouldy hotels.

Yet the one vice that appears to have survived in Mong La is the trade in wildlife.

In one corner of what appears to be an otherwise typical Southeast Asian market is a knot of vendors selling items gathered from the forests. Goods range from paraphernalia associated with wildlife -- porcupine quills, bile, bones, organs:

including what appeared to be squares of elephant skin:

to entire animals, dead and alive, including civets and voles:

reptiles and birds:

larger animals including deer:

and smaller animals:

I had been taking photos for several minutes and to my surprise, the only person who objected was the woman preparing the animals above. Although she couldn't speak Burmese (very few people in Mong La appeared to), it was clear that she was threatening to call the authorities if I continued to take photos, so I left.

In addition to these vendors, there were also shops around the perimeter of the market stocked with what appeared to be ivory and exotic animal pelts; eyewitness reports and photos online suggest that tiger skins and organs are among the wares available.

It's a disturbing sight, particularly when coupled with the state of the environment surrounding the city, one of hills bald from deforestation or covered by vast rubber plantations. Yet Wa State's autonomy and increasing demand from China ensure that the trade in wildlife will continue indefinitely.

Mong La's Morning Market Mong La, Shan State, Myanmar 6-9am

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Home cooking in Wan Naung Gon

Wan Naung Gon lies a few kilometres outside of Kengtung, in Myanmar's eastern Shan State. It's predominately inhabited by the Tai Neua, a group of people related to the Shan and Thai. It's a quiet, traditional-feeling place that's also the home village of my guide, Leng.

Leng was kind enough to arrange a day of making local dishes with some of his relatives including Sam, a former cook. I know a bit about Shan-style food from the time I've spent up in Mae Hong Son, but I'm always curious to learn more about it, as many of the techniques and ingredients seem to echo what the Thai people ate in the distant past, before their food began to be influenced by that of the Muslim world, China and the West.

In particular, I was curious about a dish Leng had mentioned called neua sa. On the surface, the dish seemed pretty similar to northern Thai-style laap or saa, dishes of minced or chopped meat supplemented with herbs and spices:

But for this version, Leng added a special ingredient: makok (มะกอก).

The sour fruit and the tart leaves:

of this tree are common ingredients in rural Southeast Asia. But for this recipe, Leng used the bark of the tree. Hacking off the hard outer bark from a branch revealed a green inner layer with a fresh, citrusy aroma. This was scraped off:

and minced directly with the pork:

I was told that using the usual tart suspect, lime, would just be too sour.

Sam took over from here and added dried spices -- prickly ash and dried chili -- and a mixture of finely chopped herbs -- green onion, coriander and rau răm:

The mixture was seasoned with salt and MSG and mixed by hand:

At this point, the dish was essentially done. A taste revealed it to be assertively herbal, as well as spicy and fragrant; a world away from its northern Thai counterpart, which is generally a meatier dish that emphasises blood, offal and savoury flavours.

Because I thought it best to stick with cooked meat (I was alone in this), Sam took half of the mixture, added sliced pork skin and a couple tablespoons of water, and fried it in a wok:

He put the other half on a cabbage leaf, wrapped this with foil (traditionally this is done with banana leaf, he was keen to explain) and grilled it; this he called saa aep -- a dish similar in name and ingredients to northern Thai aep, a sort of casing-less sausage.

The next dish Sam made was pla lam, fish cooked in a bamboo tube. He began by chopping a couple small catfish, and combining them with a variety of herbs, a bit of dried spice, and unusually, the tender leaves of chayote:

These were seasoned and stuffed into a joint of bamboo:

which was sealed and put over a flame for about 25 minutes:

The contents were emptied out:

and served:

Again, the emphasis here was on herbs. The dish was not overly fishy, and the fish had a delicate texture and was surprisingly moist.

Sam's wife made a simple nam phik makheua som, a dip based around tomatoes. After skewering chilies:

and grilling them along with some tomatoes

She then mashed a bit of raw chili, shallots and garlic in a moral and pestle:

and added the peeled grilled ingredients, seasoning the dish with salt and MSG. The result was a spicy, savoury, smokey dip.

One of my favourite dishes of the meal was nam phik mak heng ta chang, a dip made from pea eggplants. To make this, Sam boiled pea eggplants until tender. While they cooled, he made a base by sauteeing garlic, tomato, turmeric, dried chili, MSG and salt in oil:

The eggplants, which had been roughly pounded in a mortar and pestle, were added to the base along with a bit of water. The mixture was simmered a bit longer until it had reduced and amalgamated:

Perhaps due to the slightly bitter nature of the eggplants, Sam insisted we eat this dish with nor khom, a type of slightly bitter bamboo that was in season at the time.

The last dish Sam made was a Shan-style stir-fry of phak kut, fern fronds. A similar base of sauteed shallot, tomato, garlic, chili and dried turmeric was supplemented with thin slices of pork belly.

This was seasoned, yet again, with salt and MSG, the and the ferns were added and cooked briefly:

This result was pleasantly oily, crunchy and savoury.

After all this work, we had ourselves a beautiful Shan-style feast:

which ended -- lest you get the impression that this was some sort of stuffy ceremony to cookery -- like this:

If you’re visiting Kengtung and want to learn more about the local food, Leng is an excellent guide, and can be contacted at +95 94903 1470 or sairoctor.htunleng@gmail.com.

Killing a pig in Wan Loi

I heard the sibilant shrieks of a pig from the opposite hillside and knew that they could only mean one thing: a festival was under way.

You see, the height of Southeast Asia's dry season is a particularly auspicious time for Tai people. In Myanmar's Shan State, it's a time for Buddhist ordinations and weddings, all of which involve feasts, and thus, animal slaughter.

The doomed pig was heard in Wan Loi, a rather traditional Tai Khoen village just outside Kengtung (also known as Kyaing Tong and Chiang Tung), in eastern Shan State:

The Thai Khoen (also known as Thai Khün) are a Tai ethnic group who speak a dialect closely related to Shan, and more distantly, Thai (in Thai, the village would be known as Baan Doi -- บ้านดอย -- "Mountain Village"). They have their own unique script and are closely associated with the culture and history of Kengtung.

The villagers told us that preparations were being made for the wedding of a 19 year-old boy. A pig was going to be killed, and no, they had no problem with us watching the slaughter. And although what happened next was admittedly graphic, not to mention a first for me, it was also a fascinating insight into a culture (and cuisine) that appears to have changed surprisingly little.

We followed the villagers to a nearby field, where the pig spent its last few moments posing rather defiantly:

After wrestling the immense animal to the ground (not an easy task), the villagers tied the pig's legs together and its mouth shut. Holding the pig down and covering its eyes, a knife was swiftly thrust into its neck, severing its jugular vein:

From this wound spurted a frankly astonishing amount of blood, most of which was directed into a bucket pre-seasoned with herbs and spices. I reckon it took the pig a good five minutes -- and some considerable squealing and struggling -- to die. It was undeniably brutal, but the villagers weren't malicious (nor squeamish) about it, and in fact, the slaughter felt rather anticlimactic.

This was the easy part -- for the villagers, at least. Breaking down the pig would take another four or five hours, and was a job that involved what seemed like all the village's young men.

First, the hair needed to be removed, which was done directly in the field, using hot water, knives and shaving razors:

When the pig was hair-free, it was rinsed in an adjacent stream:

By this point, some of the blood had begun to coagulate, and the villagers ate it, uncooked:

a dish they called boe wan.

Next, the pig was split lengthwise and its innards yanked out:

The intestines and other offal were rinsed in the stream:

Some were chucked directly into hot coals, a cooking process they called jee:

Other bits were cooked over a flame, a process called phao. Some of the blood was boiled, and all of these were eaten with a delicious dip made from dried chili, MSG, salt and makhwaen (prickly ash):

I was fed blood, snout, stomach, intestines, what I suspect was spleen and what I was told was penis. A few of the guys were eating bits of grilled meat seasoned with raw, bitter bile from the stomach of the pig, something I wasn't previously aware that Tai people (or anybody else, for that matter) ate. I was told that those who took part in the slaughter get dibs on the best bits (these appeared to be snout and tail) -- a reward for their hard work. The flame-grilled spleen and the boiled blood were excellent; tender and smoky, not to mention spicy from the dip. The penis had little flavour, but compensated by being the inspiration for several dick jokes (a universal cultural trait, I suspect).

The carcass was divided up:

and brought back to one of the houses:

Home-made rice alcohol had been brought out at this point, and several of the guys stayed on, eating and drinking as it became increasingly dark:

Despite the brutality and messiness of what had happened, and perhaps aided by the rice alcohol and seduced by the setting, I have to admit that I found the whole event quite stirring. In its own unique way, it really was a beautiful, touching occasion, and I was struck the by notion of what I'd just witnessed having probably happened in this very place, in this exact way, for hundreds, or quite possibly even a thousand years. There was an inherent ease and intuitiveness in how the men went about their task, and it felt like the most Tai thing I'd ever witnessed, although we were technically in Myanmar.

Back at the house, those who hadn't helped with the slaughter were busy cutting the meat into even smaller bits:

The pig produced an astonishing amount of meat, much of which was cooked in advance -- fried or boiled -- for the next day's wedding feast.

We stayed until about 10pm -- late by Shan State standards -- chatting, eating and drinking. I bought the guys a case of Leo and some cigarettes, and one of the villagers made us a special version of laap, the northern Thai meat dish, in which the pig's brain was minced along with the usual pork. The fatty brain and the assertive spice mixture came together in an intersection of spicy and rich that was profoundly delicious. But I suspect that time, place, culture and history were the ingredients that made this meal quite possibly one of the most delicious and memorable I've encountered in Southeast Asia.

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In addition to being a previous and future outlet for my photos and text, Saveur is hands-down my favourite food magazine. So it was with some pleasure that I learned that this blog has been chosen as a finalist for the magazine's annual Best Food Blog Awards. I'm a finalist in the Best Culinary Travel Blog category, the registration process is simple and ends on April 19, so go here and vote now!

Khao Soi Phor Jai/ข้าวซอยพอใจ

I was sceptical, but in my opinion, justifiably so; khao soi, the northern-style dish of wheat noodles in a curry broth, should not be served with shrimp or fish:

I was also sceptical about the khao soi I ultimately ordered --  the more traditional chicken version -- as it arrived with chunks of boneless chicken meat rather than the standard drumstick.

But all this before I actually tasted it. The khao soi at Khao Soi Phor Jai, in Chiang Rai, may inspire scepticism in those familiar with the more traditional versions of the dish, but it turned out to be rather delicious: mild, pleasantly rich and oily, and surprisingly meaty.

It's also practical. The curry broth here is essentially a combination of three things: a thin, watery broth; meat in a thick, oily curry paste; and coconut cream. These three ingredients are kept separately and are only combined to order. When asked why it was done this way, the vendor explained thusly: "Other vendors combine the curry and coconut milk in advance. If they don't sell it all, they have to throw it away. This way I can use the curry paste later if I don't sell it all."

I didn't ask her why she chose to sell khao soi with shrimp, but suspect the answer would be equally practical.

If you can't get past the oddities of the khao soi here, they also do a short menu of northern Thai standards, including sai ua (ไส้อ่ัว):

the herb-and-pork sausage, served here, Bangkok-style, with thin slices of ginger and sprigs of coriander.

naem (แหนม), tart fermented pork, here wrapped in a banana leaf and grilled over coals:

and nam phrik num (น้ำพริกหนุ่ม):

Fresh, green chilies that, along with garlic and shallots, have been grilled then pounded to a spicy, stringy paste.

Khao Soi Phor Jai Th Jetyod, Chiang Rai 7.30am-5pm

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Making tofu

Perhaps because of their relative isolation, the residents of northern Thailand's various Chinese communities have been able to lead distinctly Chinese lives for several decades now. This remoteness has also meant that they've had to become rather self-sufficient. Even today, the Chinese residents of towns such as Ban Rak Thai and Mae Salong continue to produce their own air-dried ham, sausages, pickled vegetables, noodles, tea and tofu -- the same staples their parents and grandparents would have made back in Yunnan.

Ban Thoet Thai, in Chiang Rai, although not exclusively Chinese, is yet another example of this.

Walking past the house above, I noticed blocks of tofu being dried in the sun:

Investigating inside, I discovered a virtual tofu factory:

Although they spoke very little Thai, the folks were kind enough to humour my camera and my questions, and I got to witness the entire process of making tofu, from beginning to end -- something I hadn't seen previously.

It began by grinding re-hydrated soy beans, adding water to facilitate the process:

The thick mush was combined with a bit of hot water, and the mixture was strained through a suspended cheesecloth via some pretty vigorous spinning and shaking (the leftover solids were used for pig feed):

The liquid was poured into large, wok-like vats and simmered for about an hour:

After the liquid had thickened slightly and a skin had formed, it was taken from the vats:

and immediately combined with a coagulant. After about 15 minutes, curds started to form:

The chunky mixture was then poured into permeable plastic sacks that were rolled to combine the solids and extract water:

After manually removing as much water as possible, the bags were formed into rectangles and pressed with heavy wood blocks and the additional force of a car jack:

After about an hour, the bags were removed from the press and set aside:

And after another couple hours of additional draining, the finished tofu was removed from the bags and cut into cubes:

In China, the tofu would probably be finished at this point, but to provide it with a bit more shelf life in Thailand's hot and humid climate, the cubes were dried in the sun for a day before being sold.

KMT food

In the remote corners of northern Thailand, typically near the Myanmar border, are several villages that are more Chinese than Thai. Tea plantations, pine trees, steep hills and Chinese architecture make up the landscape of these places, which are also predominately populated by ethnic Chinese.

These villages, such as Mae Salong, in Chiang Rai, began to appear in northern Thailand in the early 1960s. From the current edition of Lonely Planet's Thailand guidebook:

Home Away From Home

Mae Salong was originally settled by the 93rd Regiment of the Kuomintang (KMT), who had fled to Myanmar from China after the 1949 Chinese revolution. The renegades were forced to leave Myanmar in 1961 when the Yangon government decided it wouldn't allow the KMT to remain legally in northern Myanmar. Crossing into northern Thailand with their pony caravans, the ex-soldiers and their families settled into mountain villages and re-created a society like the one they'd left behind in Yunnan.

After the Thai government granted the KMT refugee status in the 1960s, efforts were made to incorporate the Yunnanese KMT and their families into the Thai nation. Until the late 1980s they didn't have much success. Many ex-KMT persisted in involving themselves in the Golden Triangle opium trade in a three-way partnership with opium warlord Khun Sa and the Shan United Army (SUA). Because of the rough, mountainous terrain and lack of sealed roads, the outside world was rather cut off from the goings-on in Mae Salong, so the Yunnanese were able to ignore attempts by the Thai authorities to suppress opium activity and tame the region.

Infamous Khun Sa made his home in nearby Ban Hin Taek (now Ban Thoet Thai) until the early 1980s when he was finally routed by the Thai military. Khun Sa's retreat to Myanmar seemed to signal a change in local attitudes and the Thai government finally began making progress in its pacification of Mae Salong and the surrounding area.

In a further effort to separate the area from its old image as an opium fiefdom, the Thai government officially changed the name of the village from Mae Salong to Santikhiri (Hill of Peace). Until the 1980s packhorses were used to move goods up the mountain to Mae Salong, but today the 36km road from Pasang is paved and well travelled. But despite the advances in infrastructure, the town is unlike any other in Thailand. The Yunnanese dialect of Chinese still remains the lingua franca, residents tend to watch Chinese, rather than Thai, TV, and you'll find more Chinese than Thai food.

In an attempt to quash opium activity, and the more recent threat of yaa baa (methamphetamine) trafficking, the Thai government has created crop-substitution programs to encourage hill tribes to cultivate tea, coffee, corn and fruit trees.

Not surprisingly, along with culture, language and agriculture, the Chinese also brought their cuisine. The various dishes available at Thailand's KMT villages are often described by Thais as Yunnanese, but I suspect that they probably have origins in a variety of regional Chinese cuisines. In general, wheat plays a big role, and features in staples such as steamed buns and noodles; dried spices, including Sichuan pepper, are common; pickled vegetables and other preserved foods from the colder regions of China make appearances; and there are also some palpable Muslim influences. And best of all, these unique dishes are available in restaurants in the various towns.

A few places to sample KMT-style Chinese food in northern Thailand include:

Gee Lee/จี๋หลี

Gee Lee, in the remote outpost of Ban Rak Thai (Love Thailand Village, formerly known as Mae Or), and dating back to the 1970s, is quite possibly the oldest restaurant in Thailand serving this type of food. The restaurant has a short menu of Thai KMT village staples, including black chicken stewed with Chinese spices (ไก่ดําตุ๋นยาจีน), stir-fried vegetables (done the Chinese way, with a pinch of salt, a dash of soy sauce, a smashed clove of garlic and lots of flame), an unusual stuffed omelet, and perhaps best of all, muu phan pii (หมูพันปี), 'thousand year-old pork', thin slices of braised pork belly surrounding a slightly sweet mound of minced pickled vegetables, and served with mantou, steamed buns:

Gee Lee Restaurant Mae Or (Ban Rak Thai), Mae Hong Son 8am-7pm

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Yunnanese Restaurant/ร้านอาหารจีนยูนาน

Located a couple kilometres from Pai, Ban Santichon (Peace Village, yet another hyper-patriotic, Thai-imposed name) is arguably Thailand's most touristy-feeling KMT village. Several restaurants in the area do OK versions of the staple KMT dishes, as well as good bowls of noodles. At the largest of these, a no-name open-air shack, the noodles are hand-pulled, and come topped with a unique mixture of minced pork, par-boiled greens and ground peanuts and toasted sesame:

Yunnanese Restaurant Ban Santichon, Mae Hong Son 8am-8pm

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Salema Restaurant/ร้านอาหารซาลีมา

The steep hills surrounding Mae Salong, in Chiang Rai, are home to Thailand's premier tea plantations:

so perhaps it's not a surprise that the leaves feature in the local cuisine.

Fresh tea leaf salad is available at all of the restaurants mentioned here, but typically it's served with sweet, tomatoey tinned mackerel. Before ordering the dish for the first time at Salema, I asked the eponymous owner if she used the stuff, and her face turned into a disgusted frown. "The taste is too strong," she said, and explained that she prefers the more neutral tinned tuna. She's right, and the result is the best version of the dish I've encountered: tart and nutty, with a subtle hint of dried spice that I wasn't able to identify (cumin?):

Salema also does an excellent beef curry, simple but tasty fried noodles, and a mild khao soi.

Salema Restaurant Mae Salong, Chiang Rai 7am-8pm

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Seu Hai/ร้านอาหารซ่ือไห

Another ingredient found in nearly every former KMT village is muu naam khaang (หมูน้ำค้าง), 'dewdrop pork', so called because after being seasoned, the strips of pork belly are left to dry overnight:

At Seu Hai, the pork is sliced thinly and fried with sliced green chili (pictured at the top of this post); it's a salty, spicy oily dish that's one of my favourite things to eat.

The restaurant also does a tasty salad of stringy-but-rich dried and deep-fried beef, good flash-fried vegetables, and hearty noodle dishes.

Sue Hai Mae Salong, Chiang Rai 7am-9pm

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Restaurant Ting Ting/ร้านอาหารถิงถิง

An all-around solid restaurant, Ting Ting, in Ban Thoet Thai, does good versions of nearly all of the dishes listed above. In particular, they serve delicious kun chiang, the Chinese-style sausage that's sold in the morning markets of nearly all former KMT settlements:

Ting Ting's version, made in house, is spiced with just a bit of chili and Sichuan pepper. The sausage is simply sliced thinly and fried until crispy, and is served with rice.

Ting Ting also do a great muu phan pii and a warming soup of black chicken and Chinese spices.

Restaurant Ting Ting Ban Thoet Thai, Chiang Rai 7am-9pm

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Mae Hae/แม่แห

Mae Hae passed away eight years ago, but luckily for us, one of her daughters has carried on serving her mother's northern Thai recipes.

"My mother was a famous cook here in Lampang," explains the current owner. "This restaurant's been open for 60 years!"

Indeed, the antique shophouse structure and old-school dining room, with its ceiling fans, aged furniture and blaring TV, appears to have changed little in this time. The restaurant's customer base doesn't appear to have skewed much either, and on the day I stopped by, the median age looked to be about 50 (in Southeast Asia, this is generally an indicator of good food).

Mae Hae serves a spread of approximately 20 local-style soups, dips, curries and stir-fries:

The restaurant's sai ua (ไส้อ่ัว), an herb-packed northern-style pork sausage, is allegedly a local celebrity, and is lean and meaty, with a hint of Sichuan pepper. I ordered this, as well as tam khanun (ตําขนุน), a dish of young jackfruit pounded with herbs, and jor phak kaat (จอผักกาด), a northern Thai soup staple of mustard greens.

In addition to the feeling that you're eating them in Mae Hae's living room, the dishes seemed to be united in their rich and slightly tart flavours.

Mae Hae 1017 Th Upparaj, Lampang 054 221 904 11am-7pm

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Three noodles worth eating in Lampang

Lampang, in northern Thailand, is home to chaam traa kai (ชามตราไก่), Thailand's emblematic 'chicken bowls':

so perhaps it's not surprising that I encountered some good noodle dishes there. Actually, exceptional is more accurate; I'd say that each of the below is among the best version of the dish I've encountered just about anywhere in the country.

The noodle I keep on my radar when up north is khao soi, the dish of wheat-and-egg noodles in a curry broth.

and with the help of food-based pamphlet printed by Lampang's tourism board (ของกินถูกใจ: Food You'll Like), I was pointed in the direction of Omar.

At a glance, the bowls here -- served with smooth, pale noodles and a garnish of coconut cream -- call to mind the Muslim version of the dish. Indeed, Omar is located in a neighbourhood with a mosque and several Muslim restaurants. But there's pork on the menu, and a taste reveals that the khao soi here is much meatier than your typically mild Muslim version. I ordered the beef, which is easily among the richest and meatiest bowls of khao soi I've ever eaten. There's very little dried spice flavour, but a teaspoon of phrik phao, the condiment of chili flakes fried in oil, made up for this.

Also noteworthy was the way the dish was made. Rather than combine the curry paste, meat and coconut milk in a single broth as many shops do, the cook here started out with a thick, almost stew-like broth of beef and curry paste. To order, scoops of the beefy/spicy stew liquid and a much lighter chicken broth were combined in a bowl, and the lot was garnished with a ladleful of coconut cream. Despite the potential for things to go wrong, the elements blended perfectly, making what must be one of the tastiest bowls of khao soi in the north.

Khao Soi Omar/ข้าวซอยโอมา Th Suksawat, Lampang 8am-3pm

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One doesn't have to look particularly hard to find khanom jeen nam ngiaw, fresh rice noodles topped with a pork and tomato mixture, as the dish is available just about everywhere in northern Thailand. But it's rare to find a version that's this exceptional.

I think it's fair to say that the nam ngiaw served at Paa Bun Sri is so smokey they should consider calling it a grilled dish. This is a relic of the days when chilies -- in this case those employed in the dish's curry paste -- were dried via the smoke from a hearth. This assertive smokiness was just barely countered by the tartness of tomatoes, and smoothed out by a couple chunks of rib and several cubes of blood. An intriguing bowl of noodles with a lot of delicious, disparate things going on.

Paa Bun Sri/ป้าบุญศรี Th Talad Gao, Lampang 8.30am-4pm

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Phat Thai is a dish that I rarely, if ever, seek out. In general, I tend to find it a bit gloopy and heavy, and up north, as mentioned previously, they do a few things -- namely adding pork -- that would arguably make the dish even heavier. But somehow, it works.

A standard order of phat Thai at Yay Fong, a street stall near Wat Suan Dok, arrives wrapped in a thin omelet. Inside, you'll find a tangle of rice noodles that, in addition to the usual phat Thai ingredients -- tofu, salted radish, dried shrimp, garlic chives -- includes minced pork and pork rinds.  To counter this, the seasoning was just slightly sweet with a bit of tamarind sourness. The dish had a slightly smoky flavour (it was fried in a small wok rather than on the flat round surface that many vendors use) and came served with garlic chives and sprouts and, unusually, a couple leaves of lettuce.

It's a meaty, moreish (I ate two dishes) phat Thai that's definitely worth seeking out.

Phat Thai Yay Fong/ผัดไทยยายฟอง Th Boonyawat, Lampang 5-10pm

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Baan Thoet Thai's morning market

Despite its location in a narrow river valley between some of Thailand's most breathtaking tea plantations and a remote stretch of the Burmese border, Baan Thoet Thai, in Chiang Rai, doesn't look like much at first. The surrounding mountains have been mercilessly deforested, and the town clings to a dusty, scruffy strip of road where people drive too fast and where there seem to be more karaoke bars than restaurants. But it does have an interesting history: in its previous life as Baan Hin Taek (Broken Stone Village), Baan Thoet Thai was, during the late '70s and early '80s, a hideout for Khun Sa, the notorious Shan narco-warlord once dubbed the 'Opium King'. Get off the main strip and you'll also find one of Thailand's most diversely populated small towns. The bulk of the village's inhabitants appear to be Shan, but there are also many Chinese, the descendants of KMT fighters who originally fled communist takeover in 1949. There are also quite a few Akha, and the area is thought to be home to the first settlement of this group in Thailand. Other groups living in the area include Lahu, Hmong, Tai Lue, Lua and Liso.

This diversity is most apparent at the village's morning market, where these groups converge to buy and sell ingredients and dishes unique to their cuisines, bizarre goods imported from Myanmar, fruit trucked in from China, and edibles scrounged from the surrounding forests. It's really one of the more unique markets in Thailand.

For some images of Baan Thoet Thai's morning market, hit the play button above; click the button in the corner for full-screen mode and captions.

Baan Thoet Thai's Morning Market Baan Thoet Thai, Chiang Rai 6-8am

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Dog curry in Baan Bor Luang

Baan Bor Luang, a tiny village in the far eastern part of Nan province, is about as remote as it gets in today's Thailand. But for hundreds of years it was an important stop on the route of caravan traders in northern Southeast Asia for one reason: salt.

The village (also known as Ban Bor Kleua: Salt Well Village) is home to wells that emit salty water, an immensely valuable commodity in the days when the mineral was only available from the sea -- more than 600km from Nan as the crow flies.

The tradition of salt gathering in Baan Bor Luang continues to this day, although the salt is used for local consumption or sold to tourists. As I've blogged previously, a handful of aged gatherers still collect the salt in the traditional way. They also still cling to the belief that a spirit oversees their wells, providing them with salt year after year. To appease the thep, or angels, who serve the spirit, once a year they hold a ceremony. The ceremony is known as Buang Suang Jao Luang Bor (บวงสรวงเจ้าหลวงบ่อ), and is said to date back at least 800 years.

The ceremony spans three days, and to avoid disturbing the spirits during this important period, the village's main street is closed:

On the morning of the first day, a black dog is sacrificed for the thep. Why black? "It's the thep's favourite kind of dog to eat," I was told by a villager. Every other year a pig is also sacrificed, and on every third year, a buffalo.

I happened to be in Baan Bor Luang on a pig year. Early in the morning of the first day of the ceremony, a dog and a pig were killed with spear-like knives that are said to date back several hundred years.

The animals were broken down:

and used in two dishes. The pork skin and entrails were boiled:

and combined with raw blood and meat in a northern-style laap.

The dog meat was stewed with lots of herbs and spices ("To cover up the strong smell of dog meat," I was told):

in a thick curry called kaeng khua maa (แกงคั่วหมา):

I didn't get a chance to try to the laap, but the dog curry was actually pretty good: assertively spicy and herbal, with lots of the dried spice flavour that is also present in northern-style laap.

The bulk of theses dishes, as well as the head and feet of the pig, were given as offerings to the thep (shown at the top of this post). The food that was left over was eaten by the older salt gatherers, then later, by the villagers.

Afterward, at a shrine dedicated to the spirit:

a spirit medium channelled the thep, and while in this state, and between bouts of drinking, smoking and napping, was given offerings (Fanta and other brands of pop seemed to be popular choices) and asked for advice:

Afterwards, the medium placed a small bunch of flowers behind each person's ear:

reminding me of scenes depicted in the 150 year-old murals at Wat Phumin, about 140km away:

While the spirit channelling was going on, a group of local students had arrived and were asking questions about the ceremony. One particularly precocious girl asked a man why he was beating a drum during the trance. "It's tradition," he said, matter-of-factly.

"But why beat a drum?" she asked again, pursuing some detail.

"You have to understand," said the man, beginning to express his frustration. "It's tradition," he repeated, without any additional explanation.

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Nan's Saturday market/ถนนคนเดินน่าน

Nan is a charming town in northern Thailand that, it must be said, has one of the least charming eating scenes in the region.

There are a couple famous northern-style laap places, and the take away food at the evening market looks tasty, but all the restaurants I've eaten at over the years serve some pretty abysmal food. (And it isn't just me: Nan natives have also confided in me that their city's restaurants suck.)

Luckily, the situation has changed somewhat with the arrival of Nan's weekly street market.

Just about every provincial capital in northern Thailand is holding a "walking street" market these days. Chiang Mai's is the biggest, but similar markets can be found in Lampang, Pai, Chiang Rai and Nan. Having been to all of these, I'd say that I like Nan's most of all. There's a distinct emphasis on food, and market had at least six vendors selling a pretty interesting spread of local dishes:

There were even a couple vendors selling unusual local sweets:

But best of all, those who organise the market have cleverly set up a table with stacks of bowls, dishes and silverware. Simply grab a dish, take it to the vendor, who will fill it for you, then sit down to eat it at one of the northern-style tables shown at the top of the post.

I opted for the vendor at the southernmost end the of the market, and ended up with one of the best meals I've had on this trip. There was yam phak heuat, a slightly tart northern-style salad made from the tender leaves (phak heuat; ผักเฮือด) of a tree one only encounters up north; it doesn't look that sexy, but this is one of my favourite northern dishes, and this vendor did a really excellent version. There was also nam phrik khua, a deliciously savoury/spicy dip made from garlic, shallots and dried chili:

So assuming you're in town on a Saturday, don't waste your time with restaurants; the Saturday market has finally provided Nan with an interesting, perhaps even charming, place to eat.

Nan's Saturday market Th Sumon Thewarat, Nan Saturday, 6-10pm

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Lung Phu & Paa Kaew/ลุงผู ป้าแก้ว

When push comes to shove, northern Thai is probably my favourite regional Thai cuisine. Unfortunately, it's also probably Thailand's most elusive regional cuisine, and even up north, it can be hard to eat local food. There are quite a few restaurants selling laap and other similarly meaty dishes, but if you want the various dips, soups, salads and other northern Thai specialities, generally the only option is rather gentrified tourist restaurants, or if you're lucky enough to have your own dishes and silverware, to-go bags from the local evening market.

That's why I was so happy to come across Lung Phu and Paa Kaew, two adjacent roadside stalls in the northern Thai city of Mae Sai.

Lung Phu prepares more than dozen dishes, all of them northern, all with flavours that are closer to home cooking than restaurant food, and best of all, there's seating.

I suspect Lung Phu is famous for his laap plaa, fish laap, because I and virtually every other diner had ordered a plate of it. The fish -- grilled catfish, I think -- is minced finely, and the dish looks more like a dip than a laap, but it's tasty: meaty and with lots of dried spice flavour. I also had a tart, crunchy salad made from paper-thin slices of nor som, sour bamboo, and nam phrik num, fresh green chilies that, along with shallots and garlic, have been roasted and pounded into a stringy, spicy dip (the latter pictured at the top of this post).

Next door, Paa Kaew does northern-style grilled meats -- pork teats (!), intestines, banana leaf packages of meat and herbs, and other similar good stuff -- as well as a variety of northern-style nam phrik, chili-based dips:

Together, they represent virtually the entire spectrum of northern Thai food in one convenient location -- at least if you're in Mae Sai.

Lung Phu & Paa Kaew Th Phahonyothin (across from Th Mueangdang), Mae Sai, Chiang Rai 4-10pm

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Bismillah Halal Food

I'm up north again, this time doing the footwork for Lonely Planet's Thailand guide.

Often in the course of doing this type of work, people ask me if I ever choose not to reveal some of my favourite places. The answer to that is a pretty straightforward no. On a practical level, if I didn't include places I like, I'd have a pretty hard time reaching my word counts (not to mention updating this blog). And anyways, I like sharing good things with people -- both for people's enjoyment, and for the benefit of the people doing the good things.

With this in mind, why would I not share Bismillah Halal food, a Muslim restaurant in the northern Thai city of Mae Sai?

After all, the biryani at Bismillah is excellent. "It's Pakistani style," said the friendly owner, as she brought the plate to my table. "Thai biryani is just yellow; this one has lots of spices," she added, as she nearly jammed her finger in my plate of rice, pointing out cloves, cinnamon and bay leaves. And right she was: unlike most Thai-style biryani, which often seem to be flavoured only with turmeric, this version had relatively little of the dried orange root, but compensated with the aforementioned spices, not to mention carrots and peas.

The rice was coupled with beef curry; mild and meaty, it reminded me of the version of the dish one gets in Myanmar -- not surprising that Bismillah is a five-minute walk from the Burmese border. The owner asked if I could eat spicy, and before I could reply, she had given me a tiny bowl of balachaung, a spicy, crunchy mixture of dried chili, fish and peanuts that is served with just about every meal in Myanmar. The biryani also came with homemade pickles and a light broth that was flavoured with the type earthy of dried spices one encounters in Chinese-Muslim cooking.

It wasn't until the next morning that I noticed that the restaurant had a tandoor oven:

So naturally I had the very Burmese-Muslim breakfast of freshly-baked nan served with a slightly sweet dip made from pigeon peas:

Why would I keep this to myself? It's going in the book (and here).

Bismillah Halal Food Soi 4, Th Phahonyothin, Mae Sai 5am-5pm

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Kuaytiaw Khua Pet/ก๋วยเตี๋ยวคั่วเป็ด

A while back, I blogged about the stalls and restaurants serving kuaytiaw khua kai, wide rice noodles fried with chicken and egg, near Bangkok's Phlapphlachai five-way intersection. I mentioned three places in that post, but was aware at the time that there were a few more vendors selling the dish. In particular, I'd noticed one vendor selling kuaytiaw khua pet, a previously unknown variant using duck.

Eventually I made it back, and after a few visits, this version of the dish might now be my favourite.

The dish is sold at the head of the narrow and nameless alley that leads to Nay Hong (my former favourite):

Kuaytiaw khua kai is undeniably a noodle dish, but in this part of town it's prepared a lot like a pancake: after cooking the noodles on one side (in lard, over coals, of course), with a minimum of stirring or mixing, the vendor flips the entire thing over in one go:

allowing the other side to cook, again, without stirring or breaking it up. The result is a crispy, fatty, salty and smokey disk of noodles and egg. For the duck version, the meat is cooked in advance by frying it in lard; it's then prepared the same way as the chicken version, except that crunchy preserved squid -- thankfully, if you ask me -- doesn't feature. (Andy Ricker has fantasised about a decadent duck version using duck fat and duck eggs -- keep your eyes peeled at Pok Pok Phat Thai.)

Adjacent is a stall that does pretty good fruit shakes; I recommend the watermelon.

Kuaytiaw Khua Pet Off Th Yukhon 2, Bangkok 5-10pm Sat-Thurs

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Muu Thup/หมูทุบ

Muu Thup isn't exactly the name of this restaurant, located in Mae Sariang, southern Mae Hong Son. In fact, it doesn't really have a name, nor a sign. Instead, locals know the place by its most noteworthy dish. Tup means to hit, and refers to a technique in which tough cuts of meat are grilled then tenderised via the vigorous thwacking of a mallet. It's a dish I first encountered in Vientiane, Laos, then later in Chiang Mai. I've come across a few similar places since then, but Muu Thup stands out in my mind as the epitome of this style of northern Thai restaurant: rustic, meaty, smokey and almost exclusively frequented by men. It also stands out because the food is very, very good.

Most diners come for the eponymous muu thup, the pork version of the dish, but the restaurant also does beef and buffalo:

I had the latter, which was smokey, meaty and pleasantly dry and stringy, and came served with a really delicious salty/spicy/garlicky dip (shown at the top of this post). Deceptively simple and utterly delicious.

Just about everything else on the brief, wall-mounted menu is grilled:

Including aep muu, banana leaf packets of minced pork (including one version that uses pork brains) and herbs:

A dish that's equal parts meaty and herbal:

not unlike like the restaurant's sai ua, the famous northern Thai sausage:

which has a similar, albeit fattier, combination of pork and herbs:

The least interesting dish of the meal was the one thing that wasn't grilled. The laap muu suk, cooked pork laap:

rather blandly emphasised blood and offal over the usual dried spice mixture, although I was pretty happy with the generous topping of deep-fried pork crackling.

Dishes that are as simple as they are delicious, yet also so rare outside of northern Thailand; I couldn't have imagined a more fitting meal for my last one in Mae Hong Son.

Muu Thup Th Wiang Mai, Mae Sariang 8am-7pm

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Khao som

Khao som means 'sour rice', and is a snack beloved by the Shan people, particularly by those living in Myanmar's Shan State. There, the dish is made from rice that has mixed with turmeric (and sometimes potatoes), kneaded into thin disks, drizzled with fried garlic and garlic oil, and served with a side of crunchy, pungent leek roots:

In Mae Hong Son, home to a significant Shan population, the dish takes a slightly different form. There, the rice is mixed with tomatoes and tamarind and/or turmeric, and is shaped into balls or small disks. It's typically served with a type of salad made from green beans, young jackfruit or both, garnished with deep-fried crispy garlic and dried chilies fried in oil, and drizzled with garlic oil. Regardless of where it's made, khao som is generally not as sour as the name suggests, and instead emphasises savoury, garlicky and earthy flavours.

I'd been taught how to make khao som on a previous visit to Mae Hong Son, but until this trip, I'd never really noticed much of it for sale. My favourite version was probably that available at the covered area next to the Jao Phor Khor Meu Lek shrine in central Mae Hong Son city:

An elderly vendor here sells the yellow, turmeric-heavy version, and the balls of rice come with a dollop of bean salad, a sprig of cilantro and half a disk of grilled thua nao, a condiment made from fermented and dried soybeans. It's a tasty one-dish meal that set me back a total of 15B (about US$0.50).

Khao Som Vendor San Jao Phor Khor Meu Lek, Th Singhanat Bamrung, Mae Hong Son 8-11am Mon-Fri

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Another good version of khao som can be found at the tiny lakeside market that pops up during Mae Hong Son's tourist season, from approximately November to January. Most of the food for sale at this market isn't that great, but during these months, Paa Add, one of my favourite vendors, sells a small variety of local dishes, including a good version of khao som:

Tomato heavy and almost meaty, her version of the dish has a lot of savoury flavour, and depending on what day you come by, it will be accompanied by green beans, tiny young fava beans (my personal favourite) or jackfruit.

Paa Add Th Pradit Chong Kham, Mae Hong Son 4-8pm November-January

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If you find yourself in Mae Sariang, in southern Mae Hong Son province, on a Sunday afternoon, you can get khao som at the tiny town's Kaat Tit (Sunday Market):

A vendor here sells a version that appears to include both tomato and turmeric. The dish is drizzled with lots of garlicky oil, and unusually, the accompanying salad includes both green beans and jackfruit. The same vendor also sells the dish at the town's morning market (pictured at the top of this post).

Kaat Tit (Mae Sariang's Sunday Market) Th Wiang Mai, Mae Sariang 4-9pm Sunday

Mae Sariang's Morning Market 6-9am

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Khao som is also available at Mae Hong Son's rotating market and at Pai's afternoon market.

The Most Delicious Laap in the World/ลาบอร่อยท่ีสุดในโลก

I was driving along a rural road outside of Pai when I encountered the above sign. It says, "The Most Delicious Laap in the World, 1km."

Obviously I had to investigate.

Upon arriving, I realised that the claim wasn't just a ballsy boast; it appears to be the actual functioning name of the restaurant.

I ordered laap muu suk, northern-style cooked pork laap. It was a solid laap:

garlic-heavy, lots of dried spice flavour, and slightly 'wet'. But the best in the whole, entire world?

Nah. Not even the best laap in Pai.

But the restaurant is located in an attractive setting:

And it serves the mostly meaty repertoire you'd expect at northern Thai-style laap restaurant: grilled pork, kaeng om and steamed beef with a galangal dip.

The Most Delicious Laap in the World Wiang Nuea, Pai 10am-10pm

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The perils (and benefits) of eating on the job

My day job is writing guidebooks for Lonely Planet. I enjoy what I do, but writing about holiday destinations can, at times, feel a bit frivolous. It can also be rather frustrating.

Specifically, if you're as interested in local food as I am, slogging through the eating selections of Thailand's more popular tourist destinations can be a pretty discouraging experience. Pai, in Mae Hong Son, northern Thailand, is a good example of this. Despite being located in a province that's home to a very unique and delicious cuisine, the restaurants in town serve very few local dishes, instead proffering a bland melange meant to appeal to food-wary western backpackers and urban middle class Thais alike. In doing research for the current edition of Lonely Planet Thailand, I subjected myself to bad burgers, poor pastries, sub-par Vietnamese, heavy-handed (and overpriced) southern Thai and bland central Thai, among other things. I eventually found a couple local places serving local dishes, but the bulk of Pai's food had little or nothing to do with Mae Hong Son or northern Thailand.

In the end, the only genuinely recommendable restaurant that stood out in my mind was Larp Khom Huay Poo, a place just outside town serving excellent northern-style laap and other largely meaty, local dishes. At the time, I was fully aware that it's not the type of place that is going to appeal to everybody (offal and blood feature in just about every dish, and there's no English-language menu). But partially out of frustration, and partially out of a desire to encourage people to try local food (not to mention the fact that it's a very good restaurant), I decided to give it top billing in my writeup, sticking it with an 'Our Choice' icon and describing it as "...the best meal in Pai."

Fast-forward a year and I'm back in Pai, investigating new places, but really I'm just waiting for the chance to eat at Larp Khom Huay Poo. Two days and several mediocre meals later (why must all meals in Pai come served with 'French fried'?), I can't stand it any longer and decide to go to the restaurant. Upon arriving, I am struck by a new sign, gloriously illuminated (with glowing Coke logo) and sporting Roman script. Inside, the dining room has been upgraded and re-arranged, leaving it much more open and approachable than previously. And perhaps most conspicuously, there is a large, English-language menu posted on the wall. I can't imagine that the descriptions, derived from heavy-handed transliterations such as 'yang room' (actually yaang ruam: mixed grilled meat) and 'rince' (pork rinds), would be of too much help for foreign diners, but at least there are pictures to fall back on.

Reassuringly, I was greeted by the same friendly owner, who recognised me from my many previous visits, but I remained a bit bewildered by and sceptical of the changes. Could I have gentrified or perhaps even spoiled a good restaurant by recommending it? While I was thinking about this, a young, backpackery, European couple arrived. "We read about this place in the Lonely Planet," they informed us. I was suddenly face to face with the cumulative effect of what I'd done: foreign tourists were actually, literally eating at this local laap shack because of my recommendation, and this appears to have had a significant impact on the restaurant.

I was beginning to reconsider my original intentions, but any fears I held vanished as soon as dinner arrived. For me at least, Larp Khom Huay Poo continues to serve what are the archetypal versions of the northern-style laap and kaeng om (both pictured at the top of this post). The former is rich, fragrant and spicy, and the latter is meaty, herbal, thick and warming. Coupled with sticky rice, pork rinds, bitter greens and a bottle of Singha, it was easily one of the most delicious and satisfying meals I've ever eaten.

Before leaving, I asked the owner if she'd noticed more foreign diners over the last year. She said that she had -- "every day" -- and that she'd noticed many of them carrying the same book. I told her that I was the one who wrote the listing, and asked if she was comfortable with being included. "Of course," she glowed, "I like foreign customers, they're much easier to deal with than Thais," referring to visitors from Chiang Mai and Bangkok, who according to her, sometimes sent back food that they weren't familiar with. She explained that business had been good, and that she'd used the profits to improve the restaurant. She was obviously happy with the situation, and asked if I had any suggestions for her. I thought for a second, and requested that she not change her dishes to suit foreign diners; reducing the chili heat a bit was OK, I offered, but I urged her not to compromise her recipes or ingredients.

Her friend -- incidentally, the man who'd translated the menu into English -- thanked me for supporting the restaurant, and generously paid for my meal, and I left Larp Khom Huay Poo feeling honoured, satisfied, and perhaps most importantly, distinctly un-frivolous.

Pai's Wednesday Market

Like many areas in rural northern Thailand, Mae Hong Son province hosts a mobile market that sets up shop in a different town once a week. I happened to be in Pai when the market came into town (it's held in Mae Hong Son city on Sundays, and in Soppong on Tuesdays), and on a very cold Wednesday morning, stopped by.

It's a low-key affair that brings together a handful of vendors selling an almost exclusively local selection of produce: think disks of dried soybeans, freshly-ground turmeric, black sesame seeds, mustard greens. There's some bizarre stuff imported from Myanmar -- herbal remedies, suspicious-looking tinned curries and ancient-looking sweets -- and several prepared food vendors. The latter make it a good breakfast option, particularly if you're in Pai, and it's possible to get a hot bowl of khao sen (thin rice noodles served with a pork and tomato broth), crispy deep-fried triangles of chickpea flour (pictured above) or Shan/Thai Yai-style sweets.

Click the button in the corner for full-screen mode and captions.

Pai's Wednesday Market Behind police station, Pai 7-10am

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