Aahaan....(Food)

I cant help but take a second to talk about the food that I have been eating here in Thailand. Let me start off by saying that no the spider isn't food...at least I think it isn't. But I hope you do enjoy the picture of it, I get to see this spider up close and personal as it has decided to move into my house...Yay!!! Anyways from the moment I got here I have been trying interesting new foods and having a history of not liking spicy food it has been interesting for me to try to stay away from the many spicy foods that cook on the streets of Bangkok. So far about 99.9 % of the food I have eaten is street vendor food and I wouldn't have it any other way. Many people back in the states told me either to eat the street food or to stay far from it. In the community that I live in (samaki) there isn't a grocery store nearby (unless you count 7/11, which are everywhere and you can get bread and other things there) and its alot cheaper to by from vendors. So street vendors it is!!!
Here are some of my favorites. In the morning when I am going into bangkapi, theres this lady I like to call the ice tea lady, shes awesome, and makes her teas as sweet as her personality. The iced thai tea and iced green tea are fantastic, mixed with evaporated and condensed milk, they keep me coming back to her cart. As I keep walking I see the fried banana lady, oh how I love fried bananas I usually order alot and eat alot. If neither of these ladys are around when I walk by, then my breakfast will consist of pork on a stick and sticky rice...which I also like to eat for other meals of the day. Chicken on a stick is good too, fried, grilled, cut into pieces or a whole leg on a stick, I love that everything comes on a stick!!!! For lunch or dinner I like to go to this street vendor who is a few soi (small side street) over, she makes pad thai. Since she gives big portions and is really nice, I try to get food from her and practice a few Thai words. She usually likes to joke with me, trying to put chili in my pad Thai when she knows I don't like spicy food.
By the training center in Bangkapi there are some street vendors I like to visit frequently. Usually as I walk into the office the street vendor nearest says sawatdii ka and I say it back, shes very friendly and makes a good stir fry. On the other side of the soi is a different ice tea lady she makes an iced black tea that is so sweet its like drinking sugar but I keep going back to her anyways. If I'm feeling like something simple, I go to the vendor next to her and get the chicken and rice, her rice is made with chicken broth. Farther down from the training center is a place called happyland...formerly an amusement park now a food court. There are two places that I get food from when I go there, first is the Thai-Muslim food. Its chicken and rice but the flavors and spices used make it taste very different from the usual chicken and rice that I eat. The rice has this sweet almost sour taste to it which at first I thought was weird but now I love. Thats another thing, Thai people like to have sweet, sour, spicy and tangy in there food. Ok and the second place I like to go when I'm at happyland is the roti place. Its a dessert which consist of a thinly fried dough, with egg washed sliced bananas in the middle and is covered in condensed milk and sugar. Fried with lots of oil and butter...like theres any other way?!?!
Some other delish food that I have tried are noodles with duck, fried rice with shrimp and a few different currys. I eat alot of fruit (not so many vegetables....dont tell my mom), they are very sweet and with such variety its so cool to see new and different things being sold in the market. I eat pineapple almost everyday and whats interesting is that in the morning when I want fruit, its alot harder to find a fruit stand then at night when there everywhere. Smoothies here are alot better and alot cheaper than jamba juice and robeks. Anyways I hope this painted a little picture of what I have been eating. Oh and the picture of me eating a fruit...thats a durian also known as the stinky fruit, very stinky, not very good and I will not be made to eat this again. hahaha ok see ya later
christina