It’s official. According to Time Out’s global poll, based on surveys of locals, Bangkok has been declared the world’s second-best food city, behind only New Orleans (possibly the only place in the world with more braggadocio about their food than Thailand), edging up from sixth place last year. And that’s worth taking a closer look.
Those surveyed were given a variety of adjectives to describe Bangkok’s food and it’s no shocker that their number-one descriptor was ‘delicious’. Well, yes! There’s a reason you have no trouble finding a Thai meal in any far-flung provincial city on the planet. And the second most common descriptor was ‘convenient and fast’. When one can go out onto the street and get an excellent meal in a matter of minutes or have cuisine from top-tier eateries whisked across town in a heartbeat by a death-defying motorcycle courier, we’re spoiled for choice.
While the street food has been renowned for decades, the higher end was historically not as well known. For many, fine dining in the capital was thought of as overpriced, gussied up royal Thai dishes dumbed down for tourist palates or old school ‘continental cuisine’ that, while it has a certain charm, is hardly innovative.
But that has changed rapidly – there’s been enough money in this town for long enough now that people don’t just want what’s fancy, they want what’s cool. You always knew that Chinatown was a great place for noodles. Guess what, now it’s home to some of Asia’s most innovative cocktail bars and those noodles are still there for when you’re half in the bag afterwards. Ban Tad Thong has gone from an obscure byway on the other side of the Chulalongkorn campus to now being voted Time Out’s 14th coolest street in the world. Chefs, hoteliers, bartenders and restaurant owners are not only bringing the best ideas to Bangkok from all over the world, they’re going out and exploring the Thai provinces and bringing traditional techniques, ingredients and flavour profiles that were previously headed for extinction into the capital.
However, the poll did show some areas for improvement. Fewer diners marked the food scene as ‘innovative’ or ‘exciting’ compared to other cities and that’s a fair point. Much of the innovation has been at the highest end, with an abundance of wildly creative B10,000 per person chef’s tables, but a relative paucity of mid-range, date night-worthy restaurants that are more on the experimental side. A few more avant-garde offerings in the B1,000 a person range, and New Orleans might start looking nervously in their rear-view mirror.