No Sidewalks, Lots of Mosquitos—And the Best Food in Thailand

Let it be known to all that my wife, Yulia, hates—and “hates” is a word not nearly up to the task of conveying her disdain for—walking along streets without a sidewalk.

It is here that I must note that the roadside eatery we headed to last evening for dinner required that we walk to said establishment along a very narrow road here in Koh Samui, Thailand—a road that does not have anything resembling a sidewalk, or even a pedestrian-ish path. Just pavement, then dirt/mosquito resorts that you and I would call puddles of stagnant water.

And when I tell you this was a “roadside” eatery, I am not being liberal with my word choice.

I’m talking dirt floor.

I’m talking about the rumble of cement trucks trundling up to the various neighborhoods of new villa complexes going in here on the northern edge of the island, a beachy and busy area known as Ban Mae Nam. I’m talking vehicle fumes competing with Thai-spiced smoke drifting from the open-air kitchen run by a single cook—a matronly Thai woman with a shy smile. I’m talking about the wheeze and whine of motor scooters skittering by every couple minutes just a few feet away from the table we chose.

In short: Roadside dining in its most literal sense.

Yulia was displeased.

The look on her face hinted at divorce, or maybe my untimely death later when she would probably smother me in my sleep.

And then the food arrived…

Interesting how an aromatic Thai pork and noodle soup can alter the countenance of an aggrieved spouse.

We’ve been in Koh Samui now for a bit less than three weeks, and here’s one fact I can assure you is the most-true statement you will ever hear about eating on this island: The best food you will ever have will come from roadside, hole-in-the-wall shacks fashioned from bamboo, plywood, and corrugated roofing.

Most, including the one where we ate tonight, are open-air. Many have no walls, or maybe one or two walls at most.

Given the clientele we’ve seen at most of these places, I would guess that very few tourists hit these spots for lunch or dinner. In fact, the owner of this roadside restaurant actually whipped out his Fuji camera and started snapping pictures of me and my wife because, he told me, “many foreigners not here—ever.”

That’s a culinary crime.

My pad Thai with chicken was phenomenal. Yulia’s soup was fantastic—fresh, citrusy, tangy, and bright. Including chicken nuggets, fries, and a banana shake for the kid, and a small Chang beer for me, the cost: $9.90—a crazy-small amount for so much food and at such quality. Back at a Thai restaurant Yulia and I frequent at home in Portugal, the pad Thai alone is $14.

That has been our experience all across the island. All our best meals have come from hole-in-the-walls, often run by a family: Mom and/or dad in the kitchen, a daughter and/or son running the orders back and forth. At our roadside eatery tonight, a grandmother was sitting off the side of the customer tables, swinging an infant in a jury-rigged rocker.

Moreover, all of our best meals have been dirt cheap. We’ve regularly spent less than $15 for two full meals including drinks.

Pretty much everywhere I go in the world, these are the types of restaurants that always plate up some of the best local cuisine. It’s always way more authentic than versions of that cuisine you find in the US. Meaning: I’ve dined at numerous Thai restaurants across the US, and I’ve never seen a dish of fried sea bass that is then stir-fried with peppers, onions, and other veggies in an intensely aromatic lemongrass sauce and served with a sweet-garlicky plate of stir-fried morning glory (think: spinach meets green beans). But that’s what Yulia ordered at another small eatery that literally sits on the beach.

It was fantastic.

I was going to say that, “Of course, none of this is high-cuisine…”

But the truth is, it sort of is.

We’ve dined so far at two of the four restaurants on Koh Samui that Michelin has recognized as worthy of a Bib Gourmand rating, one rung below the famed Michelin Star.

One was on the beach, where we had a fantastic seafood and chicken omelet about the size and shape of three hockey pucks. The other was in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by jungle, a few ramshackle houses, and wildlife that, somewhere out past the open-air seating, was croaking and chirping and cawing as the sun set.

But locals and tourists in the know had flocked to the place so that all the seats were filled by about 7 p.m. The waitress brought us a prix fixe meal of whole fried fish and sautéed seafood and clam soup and on and on. For the two of us—at a Michelin Bib Gourmand restaurant—we paid $38.78.

We still have two more Bib Gourmand eateries to taste-test here on the northern end of the island. I’ll be writing about that later in International Living.

But I just wanted to weigh in here in Field Notes with a brief dispatch on the amazing quality of food we’re finding in Thailand, and the fact that the best meals we’ve had have all come from roadside eateries and night markets where the locals do their eating. The traditional restaurants have all been somewhere on a scale between crummy (the US-based Sizzler chain; I wanted a salad bar) and pretty good (a local sushi bar).

No matter what, though, the local mom-and-pop eateries have been magnitudes better.

If only they’d put in some sidewalks…