BANGKOK’S NEW BOUNTY
THIS MAY SOUND LIKE SACRILEGE, but the best Thai food in Bangkok is no longer found on the streets. Rather, it’s the domain of a new generation of intrepid and eco-conscious young chefs who draw their inspiration from Thai ingredients, age-old preservation techniques, family recipes, and the city itself. Bangkok has never been a more exciting place to eat than it is right now.
On my first trip to the city 14 years ago, street-food stalls and generations-old eateries were still the best options for a good feed of Thai food. If diners wanted something finer, washed down with a decent bottle of wine, there was little choice but to head to a five-star hotel, where over-designed restaurants with over-decorated tables dished up insipid curries for a clientele less interested in culinary virtuosity than in the promise of air conditioning.
Little had changed when my photographer husband, Terence, and I returned to Thailand to research a guidebook two years later. But when we settled into the capital in 2009, we found ourselves documenting a relentless five-year wave of chef-driven Thai restaurant openings like nothing Bangkok had seen before, kick-started by Thai-born Duangporn “Bo” Songvisava
