With
this being the 12th anniversary of the Pattaya Mail, there has
certainly been much food eaten in the quest of showing the readers some
different places to eat. 12 years of munching has undoubtedly shown that
there is an enormous spread of foods and international cuisines on offer.
With the growth of Pattaya in that time, there has been a concomitant growth
in the restaurant community as well.
There
is a tendency (natural enough, too) to think that all the best food in
Pattaya can only be had at one or other of our top hotels, or fine dining
establishments, all of which have also become more numerous in recent years,
too. However, there are some excellent “other” eateries that should be
tried by everyone who lives here, or is even on a holiday stop-over. These
are the pavement caf้’s or roadside restaurants.
There are several obvious reasons that these great little
eating outlets are not frequented more often by the expat community. First
is generally a lack of confidence in kitchen cleanliness and secondly a lack
of confidence in the ability to order dishes in Thai, since most of these
places do not have an English menu board!
Over the past 12 years, the Dining Out Team has hit the
streets many times to find some of the best places for you and to make the
ordering of dishes a simple task.
Let’s clear up a few of the basic worries. First,
cleanliness – the main problem in the ethnic eating stakes lies with
incompletely washed vegetables or food stored at a warm temperature for too
long. In one case the bacteria/viruses are left on the food and in the other
the incorrect storage allows proliferation of the bugs.
This
can be got over by careful selection of the food requested. Stay clear of
raw vegetables if unsure and only order dishes that are cooked directly in
front of you. This does mean that you won’t be ordering a curry from those
large pots at the roadside vendors, and som tum (salad) with the pickled
black crabs is also best avoided. Mind you, this can be taken to extremes.
One friend on his first visit to Thailand ate only bananas as he thought
they were the only “safe” food he could think of, that had not been
touched!
Stick to ordering food that is cooked before your eyes.
Stir fries, satays and omelets are fine and give you many menu choices.
Learn a few of the required phrases like gai pad num mun hoy (chicken
in oyster sauce), kai yat sai (Thai omelet), gai pad king
(chicken with ginger), khao pad gai (fried rice with chicken) and gai
pad bai kaprao (chicken with basil). Remember too the phrase “mai
pet” if you do not want your food too spicy!
There are many venues that you can try, and you will
always find that the better ones are crowded with local folk. You will also
find that the cooks will try hard to understand your order and nothing is
ever too much trouble (even running across the road to get a beer to go with
the evening’s fare).
One
such is on the footpath outside the (first of about six) 7-Elevens on
Jomtien Beach Road. You can get your drinks in the 7-Eleven and order
directly from the food carts on the sidewalk. Not much English is spoken
here, but the cook on the noodle cart at the corner does have a little if
you get totally stuck!
Another is on Third Road, close to the intersection with
Soi 17 (with another 7-Eleven on the corner). A very popular place, this has
food on offer from many different regions in Thailand. There is also another
on Sukhumvit Road (opposite Pattaya Cane) between Central and North Roads,
and another very busy and noisy area behind Walking Street and close to the
Marine Bar.
For a great experience you owe it to yourself to try this type of
cuisine. It is a most inexpensive night out. Bargain on spending around 100
baht for two people for dinner! You can feed 12 diners for the price of one
elsewhere!
