72 HRS Eating The BEST THAI STREET FOOD in CHIANG MAI

If you're visiting Chiang Mai and want to eat the best food Northern Thailand has to offer, then this video is for you. Because I'm on a mission to find the most delicious Thai food in Chiang Mai, from the best Khao Soi to street-side barbecue meats. I promise you, you do not want to miss this video. Let's do it. Khao Soi, the most, well, everyone's number one dish when they come to Thailand, I think. A dish that should be top of your list when you come to Chiang Mai. I think this one is special and it's worth traveling for. It's called Khao Soi Loong Sorin. It's in the mountain village, the Hmong mountain village called Doi Pui. I think it deserves to be called the best Khao Soi in Thailand. And this is the pot of magic. Chicken Khao Soi, the famous chicken Khao Soi. Look at the color. And then that's going to be topped with a little bit of coconut milk. Just to add more richness. A little bit of chive and a sack, a sack of fried noodles that are going to garnish the top of that Khao Soi. Okay, guys, I cannot tell you how excited I am for this dish. When I knew I was coming to Chiang Mai, the first thing I thought about was this place, this dish. And I had to come here. I had to come back and show you guys this dish. I've got the chicken Khao Soi and the beef Khao Soi. I mean, come on, I wasn't going to waste this opportunity coming here and not having both. They're both incredible and you should probably get them both too. We're going to add even more spice. He has his homemade roasted chili paste and he says it's very, very spicy. And I do have that long ride to Thai tomorrow. So normally I probably put two spoons in, might just do three quarters of a spoon, maybe a little more just to you know, watch myself tomorrow. The last thing you want on a long bike journey is stomach issues. So we've got to be a little careful. So we get all of that mixed in. You can see this is the chicken one and he does it with chicken leg. So you can see the big pieces of drumstick there actually. Oh, the smell is coming off this. All right, I'm going to start with the chicken because that's the one that most people will order. So I'm going to try and get a little bit of everything. And let's see if this is as good as I remember. I have very good memories of this place. Let's try. This might be, it probably is, my favorite dish in Thailand, my favorite place in Thailand to eat Thai food. It's simple, two items on the menu, beef khao soi or chicken khao soi. But my God, it is good. And my God, what a dish. What I like about it is sometimes you get khao soi which is really soupy and whilst it might have a lot of flavor in there, it's just like a noodle soup. This one, it's thick and it's unctuous and that sauce sticks to those noodles almost like an Italian ragu. But the flavor that comes out of it, because this dish is rooted in the Thai Muslim side of the community, so you can taste those spices that come through that. But the chicken, my God, the chicken, he's cooked it for a long time and you can see that in the pot. He must have probably cooked it all night, I'm guessing. The chicken is so chickeny, it tastes like real chicken. That's what I love about coming to Asia, guys, it's amazing. It's spicy though and the spice starts to build up the back of your throat. I love it. Beef, we should switch it up. I will come back to that, there's no chance that I'm leaving that, but we should try the beef. Soft, wobbly, gelatinous beef, fatty beef. Again, cooked overnight. Oh my God, it's so unbelievably good. And you can get, yes, there are some very good places in Chiang Mai for Khao Soi. Of course, Chiang Mai is the capital of Khao Soi. There are great places, but this one is different. And trust me, this one is worth coming to. It's worth coming 10 minutes further up from Doi Suthep to try this one. And you have to have both because they are different. The base broth is the same, but the beefiness in this one is so damn good. And I promise you, you can do your best. I have, trust me, you will not find a better Khao Soi in the whole of Thailand. And therefore, that must make it the best Khao Soi in the world. Grilled meats are famous all over Northern Thailand. And you can see vendors grilling over charcoal on the roadside everywhere where they do mixed grill. And wow, it looks amazing watching them grilling over the charcoal, just taking care of it, the smoke coming up and licking the meat. You just know, sometimes you just know it's going to taste good. And this place, well, I think it's one of them. I've got a little bit of pork belly. I've got a little bit of tenderloin. And the one I'm excited for most is the intestine. Of course, it's Thailand. I was going to say it's morning, but any time of day, sticky rice cannot go anywhere in Thailand or have any dish in Thailand without sticky rice, right? So I'm going to get a little bit of sticky rice, a little bit of that meat and that dipping sauce. Let's try. Crispy, fatty, juicy, savory, salty, exactly what you want in a grilled meat. But if that one looked good, look how good that little cut of tenderloin looks. You can see on the outside where that smoke is just, well, caressed it as it's cooked and a little dip in that sauce. And oh my word, that tenderloin, that tenderloin is unbelievable. The smoky flavor, oh, it's so good. It's so good. And it just builds in your mouth after you swallow the smokiness, the sweetness, the porkiness, the saltiness. Wow. I also ordered sour fermented pork. I've never had it before, actually, but I've seen it and I've wanted to try. I love sour fermented pork and it's wrapped in banana leaf, made into a little triangle and cooked on the grill as well. And I think the way to do it is take a little bit of sticky rice, flatten that down and then just take off a piece of that fatty, sticky, sour fermented pork. This, guys, it's a little place. It's in Neiman. It's in a touristy area of Chiang Mai, but on a little off street, one that you wouldn't normally come down. But trust me, you want to find it. All right, guys, Sai Ua, Northern Thai sausage, one of my favorite things to eat in Thailand. One of the best sausages in the world. Meaty, herby, fragrant. Oh, I cannot wait. And I'm here, street side, highway side, a little bit noisy. Yes, but that's all part of the atmosphere for one of the best places to eat Northern Thai sausage in Chiang Mai, in Northern Thailand. But as I found this place, I thought I found this place, but no, Mr. Mark Wiens has already been here. We get to choose our sausage, guys. Can I check? This will do. This one. We don't want to grab one that's too big, do we? We're trying. We've got a lot of food to try. You can see the herbs, the color of that sausage on the inside should be full of lemongrass, galangal, garlic, chilies, and then of course that pork. The char on the outside looks amazing. Anyway, let's stop talking about it. Let's try it. That is the flavor of Thailand and it is spicy, but that aromatic flavor, that, as I say, is the flavor of Thailand. That is the flavor of Chiang Mai. Such a good quality sausage. And this, I must say, is one of my favorite restaurants in all of Thailand, especially in Chiang Mai. I would say it's an absolute must if you're visiting Chiang Mai and if you like crispy pork. I mean, to be honest, I don't even need to review the food for you. I can just show you what they do and you'll want to come here. They cook the crispy pork in an earthenware jar over charcoal. The fire is in the bottom of the earthenware jar and then they just hang that crispy pork in there. They have one which is slightly cooler, cooks it slowly, makes, you know, really renders that fat down and then they move it into the crisping jar, the hotter one, where that fire crackles the skin. And you can stand, you can watch them doing it. And if that wasn't enough, they also do chicken. Chicken roasted in that earthenware jar. I must admit though, I came here in 2019 and it wasn't that busy. Now it is busy. You can see just how crispy that crispy pork is, the skin on top. As he was chopping it, you could see shards of the skin flying everywhere and the sound, the crunch, the crispiness, roasted to absolute perfection in that jar. And what I love, if you look carefully, you can see crispy pork on top, then meat, then fat, then meat, then fat. You just know, you know that's going to taste good. That dipping sauce looks so good. So I'm going to give it a little dip in that dipping sauce. Oh my God, so much flavour, burst of flavour into your mouth, but moist. That fat just keeps it moist and keeps it succulent. It's so good. One mouthful and I'm a happy boy, but really it's all about that skin for me. The dipping sauce is nice. It cuts through the fattiness of that pork, but that skin, it's salty, it's crunchy, it's savoury. It's absolutely delicious. Next up, let's try the Som Tam. Papaya salad. I'm sure you've heard of it. Som Tam Thai is the one I've ordered. You get all different types of Som Tam, cucumber, sweet corn, but this papaya one is the standard one. You have long beans in there or green beans in there, peanuts, dried shrimp, garlic, the papaya, shredded papaya, of course, tomatoes, fish sauce, all sorts of things, all sorts of flavours in there. You can get fermented fish sauce as well, but not in this one. This one is more known for its acidity and its sweetness. There's lime in there and it's all pounded up and you can see them doing it in the pestle and mortar. I love watching it. Let's try it. It's so good. It's so fresh. Som Tam Thai, for me, is sometimes too sweet, but this one is very nicely balanced. Not too sweet. Kick of chilli. I ask for it not so spicy. The other ingredient I didn't mention is chilli. You can get a lot of chillies in Som Tam, but I have a long journey on the bike tomorrow and maybe it's best that we don't do that, but what I love about it is the texture, the texture, the crunch and the acidity of that papaya. It's so good. Grilled chicken or roast chicken in this case. First things first, the skin looks so sticky and so amazing. It doesn't actually, hasn't gone that roasty roasty. It almost looks sticky. Oh my god, sticky and golden. Look at that. The drumstick was the piece. I've gone for the leg. I love the leg. It's the best part of the chicken compared to the breast for me, but just look how succulent that meat is. You're not going to get a dry piece of chicken in this restaurant. I promise you. I'm going to dip it in that dip and then try it. The drumstick. Honestly, guys, the crispy pork is amazing. It's what they're famous for. It's what they're named after, but that chicken is another level as well. It is unbelievably good, unbelievably moist, unbelievably chickeny and that skin, it's salty, it's sweet. The dipping sauce, a little bit of sweetness in there. You can taste the galangal, you can taste the garlic. It's so good. A little kick of chilli at the end. It's so good. If you're a meat eater and this hasn't convinced you to come and try this restaurant in Chiang Mai, what's wrong with you? I saw this and I would quite like to try it. It is sticky rice, if you can believe, cooked inside this. Wow. I'm not entirely sure what it's cooked into, but it's called khao lam and inside is incredibly sticky rice. You have a few different flavors. I didn't fully understand what she was saying, but this one has got red bean and I believe it's also cooked with coconut. Let's just open that up. Look at that. Sweet, but not too sweet. Sometimes things in Thailand are very sweet, but that red bean gives a nice pop of texture, but very, very sticky, very glutinous. Really tasty snack. Next up, jackfruit paste. It is fried, mashed up with curry spices and as you can see, a lot of chilli. Again, very fragrant, but it's made with the young jackfruit, not with the sweet ripe jackfruit like you might see on the street. And the flavor of this is incredible. Honestly, it tastes like meat. It really is no surprise that jackfruit is used in so many vegan dishes because it has the texture and taste, not directly of meat, but you definitely don't miss the meat when you're eating it. But this is not a vegan dish. It's served with the fried pork skin. It's served with green beans, more coriander and then more cucumber. You can take one of the vegetables, take some of that paste, get it on the cucumber in this instance, and then shove it in your gob. Chase it with the green bean. Wow. If you have not had young jackfruit in Thailand or anywhere in Asia, to be honest, if you've not had young jackfruit, you should try it. And when it comes with these spicy aromatic flavors, wow, it's incredible. A little bit of pork fat and pork gubbins, a little bit of crispy skin, a bit more of that pork fat. And you can see because it's on the charcoal, the heat gets going immediately. Next up, tofu. Dried shrimp. And the turnip. Salted radish is the better way of saying it. And then look at that. Those rice noodles dried go into the pan and all of that oil is just going to coat those noodles, some bean sprouts, handfuls of bean sprouts and then some of that stock, some of that broth, just to loosen it up and cook those dried noodles. See the other guys, they cook the pork, but auntie is on pad thai duty, of course. When it matters, she takes control. The egg has gone in now. You can see the color has changed after that sauce has gone in, the sriracha style sauce. It's coming together now. Now it's starting to look like pad thai. A few more bean sprouts at the end of the crunch for the freshness and the pad thai is done and served up either onto plates or onto the banana leaf. Lap is like a meat salad, I guess you can think of it. The meat is normally ground or hand chopped and then it's mixed with a lot of different things, a lot of herbs, coriander, Thai basil, mint, and then there's lemongrass, garlic, chilies, lemon juice, green onions. This one looks like it has mushrooms in too. It can be super spicy and it can be very sour and it's normally eaten with the fresh vegetables and the sticky rice, but let's just try it on its own just to get the flavor for it. Absolutely packed with beef flavor, super fresh. I mean it's very dark, it looks very dark, but the freshness coming from those herbs and the lime juice really cuts straight through the dish. Wow, a flavor bomb, but you do have to eat this with sticky rice. So let's make a bowl of that sticky rice, pick up some of that lap and I think we'll chase it with a bit of cucumber. Yeah, that's one of the best lap that I've eaten. If you have been to Thailand before and you've not eaten that, make sure you try it. If you're coming for the first time, get that on your list to try when you come here because it is one of the true great dishes of Thailand. I'm in the night market. There's many night markets around here in Chiang Mai, but I'm at one called Chiang Poak night market near the Chiang Poak gate. It's on Google Maps. I'll leave it in the description. There's a few little things here that are really good that you should try. The first off is Khao Kam Moo, stewed pork leg. Super simple dish, but I'm not going to say another one of my favorites, but it's a great dish that you want to try when you're in Chiang Mai, especially this one. This one is famous because a cowboy stewed pork leg lady. The stewed pork leg here is fantastic. We have rice. So Khao is rice. Kam Moo is the stewed pork leg and it comes with an egg. I've gone for the larger size, $2, great value. On the side with this one, we have green chilies, raw garlic, pickled mustard greens and a chili vinegar. That is just going to cut through it. So let me stop telling you about it and let's actually try it. You can see large chunks of that pork, juicy, juicy pork dripping. So I'm going to take a spoon of everything and try it. Is it as good as I remember? Yes. I love this dish. The meat is succulent. It's cooked in a cauldron with soy, with sugar, with five spice, those Chinese warming spices. And that really, that flavor really comes through. And because I've cut it with that chili vinegar, it is fatty. Yes. But the chili vinegar just cut straight through it. And then with those pickled mustard greens, it's as good as I remember guys. All right, guys, we're going to do three in one here. I am Thai deserted up to my eyeballs. We've got soy milk, warm soy milk with Bo Loi Nga Dam, but it is a glutinous rice ball with sesame on the inside in that hot soy milk. And here they add a little bit of sugar syrup and a little bit of ginger syrup. Don't always get that everywhere. So I love that. We also have Chinese doughnuts. You see a whole plate of them, one baht each. And I don't know if we can show it, but I saw him making them. He rolled them out, floured them up, cut them up, put a little bit of milk on and stuck them together. And you get two doughnuts stuck together. So I call them, I don't know if it's true, but I call them lover's doughnuts because you can pull them apart and one lover gets one each, one partner gets one each. And finally, you cannot come to Thailand without eating mango sticky rice. So of course we've got mango sticky rice to try. Where, where should we start? Two ways you can eat this. You can break them up and put them into your soy milk and then they will soften and then you eat them like that. The other way, you can buy condensed milk or pandan custard and you can take them and dip them in that pandan custard. Look at that. How green, how vibrant. Yeah, they're really good. They're always really good. It's definitely something that you want to have fresh. So seeing him make them over there, watching him fry them and then taking them out golden and dumping them, well, dumping them, putting them on the street stool. That's kind of what you want. And that pandan custard is vibrant green from the pandan. And if you haven't had pandan before, it tastes a bit like vanilla. So think vanilla custard. It's so good. Next up, the soy milk and those glutinous rice balls. You might think soy milk is a touch boring, but when they add that ginger into it, let me try it first. Come on, it's so good. I already know what I'm going to say because I've had it before. When I'm here, I always come to this place. For me, this is one of the best late night snacks you can have in Thailand. I love these little soy milk desserts. No matter how much I've eaten for dinner, I always have space to have one of these and these glutinous rice balls. Let me show you if I can show you on the inside. You can see the jet black sesame paste. On the inside, there's glutinous rice balls. It's so rich, so delicious. And finally, like I said, you cannot come to Thailand without mango sticky rice. I won't give too much of a description on this. It's sticky rice. It's coconut milk, sweetened coconut milk. It's delicious, delicious mango. There was just something about mango in Thailand. It's so good. And when you find a good one, you'll go back again and again and again and again. We're right on the border up here in Chiang Mai. So of course, Burmese food has made its way into Northern Thailand. And there's lots of Burmese restaurants here in Chiang Mai showcasing that. So we have the pork, the hung lay curry. It's so fragrant and it's so aromatic and you can see the color of it. You can see that the pork has been cooked in that sauce because the fat is rendered out and is just sitting on top. You can see by the color of it, the herbs, the spices in there. It's actually one of the few curries in Thailand that doesn't use coconut milk, but it does use a lot of spice. It's tangy, it's rich, slightly sweet. It's very, very good. And I love that about hung lay curry. The flavor is so complex, synonymous with Northern Thailand. Another one that you must try when you're here. Look at that. In there, we have tomatoes, the young tamarind leaves, shallots, all sorts of other things, which I didn't really see. Chili, she asked me if I wanted it spicy. And I said, yes, of course. Want to have it spicy in Thailand, right? But you might think tamarind leaves? Who's eating tamarind leaves? Well, I think this will change your opinion. There's little bits of peanut in there that give a crunch. The tomato is fresh, very good tomato. The tartness of the onion comes through, but then the crunch from that young tamarind leaves, that's like not sour. That's the wrong, the wrong descriptor. They're very savory, earthy, vegetal, but in a delicious way. But for some reason, you would think there's meat in there or fish sauce. I didn't say I put fish sauce in, but you'd think there's something in there that's giving that savory, umami, rich flavor. But as far as I could tell, there's not. It's just, yeah, it's just a unique flavor. And I literally, I could just eat this and be very, very happy. Now this one for me, tea leaf, is so interesting. And there's little fried lentils, I think, yellow lentils in there too. The tea leaf, she got out of a packet. I mean, they're probably pickled a little bit so you can actually consume them. Obviously fresh tea leaf, that would be a bit strange. But there's tomato again, there's shallots again. When I was watching her make it, then tossing up and tossing up and tossing up and mixing it up. Really cool to see. But tea leaf, would you ever think you would be eating tea leaf? I don't think so. Let's try it. Again, so delicious, so interesting on the texture, actually. Those are yellow fried lentils, little bits of daal fried up. Crunchy, delicious, delicious. Definitely try it when you're in a Burmese restaurant because it is such a great salad. Try them both. Khao Soi is not the only famous noodle soup up here in Northern Thailand. Next up, we have Kanom Jeem Nam Nhao, tomato and pork based broth. It's rich, it's tangy, it's spicy, it's deep in flavor. It's one of the absolute must tries when you're in Northern Thailand. And I've come to a place, I think it's a bit of a hidden gem. It looks it anyway. Family run, got father cooking, you've got little daughter cycling around and having fun. But the Nam Nhao was cooked in a big cauldron for hours and hours and hours. The smell is amazing. I wish you could smell it, but sadly not. So let me show you instead. This is it guys. You can see by the color of it, just how rich and how spicy that's going to be. Look at the chili oil covered on top because it is cooked with a ton of chili. You need to like spicy if you like this one, but it's absolutely packed full of goodies. It's got blood cake, it's got little pork balls. As I say, it's cooked with those pork bones as well and tomatoes. It's got all sorts of spices in there. You've got coriander, you've got chives, you've got fried shallots, and then those white fermented rice noodles. You have two types. I've gone with the thinner type. We're here for the noodles. And these noodles, they're fermented. All over my face, but it is rich. It is tangy. It's tangy from that tomato. It's rich from the pork bones that it's cooked in. And then you get the spices and the chili starts to build in your mouth. I said you can see just by the color of it, how rich and how spicy that's going to be, and it is. But that's what you want. You want this to pack a punch. And then you get the sourness from the lime, the pickled mustard greens, and then the crunch from that skin. You do need it because for me, it's a little... Well, the texture's all quite similar, so you need that crackling just to make it more interesting and add another layer of flavor. What we really care about is how it tastes. And trust me, guys, it's awesome. This guy has the skills. Look at the way he throws this out. And he is just a machine working and working and working roti after roti. If I did this, it would be full of holes. It'd be like a sieve. Oh, he's made one. Folds it up, ready to go on the grill or the hot plate. And there they are. And when they're done, she takes them over to the next station and crushes them up. Love this. Look at that. And that is how you get that fluffy, flaky texture. I've ordered two dessert options, one with the sweet condensed milk and a little bit of sugar, and the other one with Milo, so chocolate. They actually gave me roti with egg and sweet condensed milk, which I'm not complaining about. You can see how flaky and soft and rich it is. Well, you can see that when they're making it, and you can see it when she's crushing it up. But when you get it, you can see those flakes. You can see those perfect layers of our roti. Oh, yeah. The egg and the sweet condensed milk works really well, actually. A little bit of a weird concept in my head, Milo, and I've never had Milo in a roti before. Let's try. Oh, yeah. Again, with the sweet condensed milk, chocolate and roti is just a match made in heaven. All right, guys, that wraps up our list of the best things to eat when you're in Chiang Mai. Hope you enjoyed it. Hope you found it useful. Subscribe and hit the like button, and I'll see you guys in the next video where I'm off to pie. See you later. And you can find that video right here.