Now to resume my culinary tales through Thailand...
After Bangkok, we headed north to Chiang Mail. Chiang Mai differs from Bangkok on many levels. First of all, the weather is considerable cooler and drier, dry in that the humidity is less, but it rained a whole lot more. Secondly, the hustle and bustle is toned down quite a bit. Chiang Mai seemed like a more controlled chaos. And lastly, food in the north is much more different than anything I've had on the rest of my Thailand trip.
Khao Soi
Khao soi is a "Burmese-influenced...soup-like dish made with deep-fried crispy egg noodles, pickled cabbage, shallots, lime, ground chillies fried in oil, and meat in a curry-like sauce containing coconut milk." I've had khao soi before not really knowing what it is and I thought it was weird and so I didn't really appreciate the rich spicy flavors. This time around, I grew quite fond of all the differing textures from the fried noodles, soft egg noodles, bits of shallots and pickled mustard greens and the varying levels of intense flavor, the heat, the creaminess, the spice. The portion at Huen Phen was pretty paltry, but it was enough to judge quality. This was certainly better than the street food version I had.
Kanom Jeen Naam Ngeow
I never had this dish until I came to Chiang Mai, but it seems to be almost as popular and representative of Northen Thai cuisin as khao soi. It consists of hand made rice noodles served in a pork-tomato based curry soup. This version had plenty of blood cubes, which I did not enjoy, and ended up pushing to the side. While khao soi was dominated by a coconutty curry taste, this was marked by a deep tomato flavor which I liked a lot.
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