Nakhon Sawan Province – Thailand

I’ve never been to Bangkok let alone Nakhon Sawan so I was very lucky that during my recent trip there I got acquainted with 2 very nice people who has since became my friends. Without Nui and Eke I think my food adventure would’ve became just burgers and “anything on-sight.”

Soon as Nui picked me from Don Mueang my food adventure has begun. Our first stop on the 30 minutes drive to Nakhon Sawan is along the highway at a place call Mae La Pla Pao Restaurant. In Malaysia highway

our highway R&R is make up mostly of small stalls, so to see an actual restaurant smack right by the highway is quite an experience for me.

We had some nice spicy and tasty tom-yum which is very rich with coconut milk. There are big juicy prawns, cuttle fish and fish slices in the tom yum. It is a different version of what I use to have in KL and of course I know there are different version of tom-yum as some tom-yum are relatively clear without coconut milk.

The accompanied dishes include this quite huge Snake Head fish. Alright, so it doesn’t look that huge 🙂 I had a bigger meaner one in Nakhon Sawan itself but that will be in another post. Anyway, I say it is quite huge because in KL our normal steam or grill fish wont be coming in these sizes.

The popular way of cooking the Snake Head fish in Thailand is to sprinkled it with sea salt then have it wrapped in aluminum foil  and grilled.

When the fish is served we will have to peel off the rather coarse and hard skin to get to the meat.

The fish are fresh so the meat has that freshness sweetness and the meat are well, meaty and juicy. Compared to the regular fish we have in KL the meat of the Snake Head fish are fuller in texture and give you a better fuller chewy sensation in the mouth. And oh yes, the fish is accompanied with some super duper hot bird’s eye chilly in fish sauce.

Our next dish is the Muar equivalent of Otak Otak but served differently.

There are different style of making otak otak in Thailand, some are drier and some is with a little bit of “juices” and this is just one of them. In Malaysia we only have 2 main type of otak otak – the Muar and the Penang. I would venture to say the Thai otak-otak is quite like the Penang. The otak we had here are steamed and wrapped in betel leaves. I am not sure if it is betel leaves or morinda leaves but the smell and taste are “sharply” distinctive. Will have to find out more if I have the opportunity for another visit.

Besides the otak otak we also have succulent deep fired fish cake and fried vegetables.

The fish cake is fantastically aromatic and tasty. Each bite of the fish cake will give you a different “sensation” like WoW! or “OMG”! depending on whether you bite on the aromatic herbs or on a bird’s eye chilly 🙂 The accompanied condiments are something new to me. I have yet to find out the actual name for it.

Look at the prawns in the vegetable. We can hardly find prawns of this size and that many in a dish in KL, unless of course if you will to pay top bucks to eat in a chinese restaurant.

For desserts we had Thai Coconut Pudding – which smells “coconuty” terrific ! And of course, the weather being so hot and with the fiery tom-yum soup we definitely have to cool it with a few Thailand beer!

And we are still far far from reaching Nakhon Sawan! That will be another post. Right now I need to enjoy my food! cheers!