For my second day, I had something for breakfast that I wouldn't normally have. But, it is something I will have to get used to! I bought this the night before near Paolo Memorial Hospital. It is kuay jub nam kon (ก๋วยจั๊บ) which is noodle soup with boiled giblets. This dish has various pork giblets in a soy sauce gravy. They also sell a version with clear soup. As you can see there is also a hardboiled egg. This cost 30 baht. It was alright but a bit too much for breakfast!

Lunch today was bought at one of my favourite shops for this dish. It is not easy to write this in Roman letters but it is pad si ew (ผัดซีอิ๊ว) which is noodles pan fried in dark soy sauce. There is also pork, an egg and vegetables. When you order you have to choose which kind of noodles that you want. I like the wide noodles which are called "sen yai". This was 30 baht.

For dinner this evening I went to Taiban Circle where there are many stalls set up in the late afternoon. I think I will be coming back here quite a few times. The meal I had was khao moo daeng (ข้าวหมูแดง) which is red pork on rice. You sometimes get a few slices of a hard boiled egg but none at this stall. This cost 30 baht.

Today I spent 90 baht on food which is about $2.90 Come back tomorrow to see what I will eat next in this 30 day Thai Street Food Challenge.

This is day one for my 30 day challenge to eat street food for every meal. I started today with pathongko together with nam tao hoo (ปาท่องโก๋ น้ำเต้าหู้). This is sometimes translated as Chinese Doughnuts though it is shaped like an "X". The drink that comes with this deep fried dough is sweetened soy milk. This set cost me only 10 baht. This is not really a traditional Thai brekafast but as it is often sold early in the morning then many people eat it at this time. I bought it at a stall near my house and they usually sell out by 9 a.m.

For lunch I had one of my favourite street food. It is khao mun gai tod (ข้าวมันไก่ทอด) which is fried chicken on rice that has been boiled in chicken stock. It also comes with some soup. An alternative is to have boiled chicken which I will have another day. Normal price for this is 25 baht but I ordered "piset" which was 30 baht.

I bought my evening meal at the monthly Paknam Food Festival in Samut Prakan. It is called krapho pla (กระเพาะปลา) which is a thick soup that has fish stomach, boiled duck blood in cubes, bamboo shoots, chicken and quail eggs! It cost 30 baht. I don't normally eat this dish but I thought I shouldn't just stick to all my favourites in the first week!

I decided to finish the day off with a dessert called sangkaya fakthong (สังขยาฟักทอง). This is a pumpkin custard which cost only 25 Baht. It is good but it was very filling! So, I managed to survive my first full day of Thai street food. Today I spent 95 baht on food which is about US$3.70.

- Posted from my iPhone

One of the best things about living in Thailand is the food. It is not only delicious, but it is also plentiful and cheap. In fact, you can find it on almost any street corner at any time of day or night. I guess we are spoilt in Thailand in having such easy access to Thai food. After all, one meal in a Thai restaurant in say London, New York or Sydney would probably be the same as our weekly food budget. I know that is not really fair to compare as portion sizes in the West are far greater than what we get here. In addition, if you order say chicken curry in a London restaurant you are actually going to get a fair amount of meat. Here you will probably get a lot of bone and a bit of meat! Basically you get what you pay for.

As you probably know, I love to cook. So, I don't actually go out and buy street food that much. If I am going to eat green curry, I like to have a good amount of quality meat in it. If I am going to have stir-fried vegetables, I want to make sure that it isn't sweetened with a lot of sugar or "flavoured" with a tablespoon of MSG. I also like playing around with recipes mixing Thai and Western recipes to create my own innovations. It is fun. Cooking for myself also means that I can have more Western meals. Variety is always good I think. I don't live in Bangkok and we don't get much of a choice here in Samut Prakan.

One of the downsides to cooking at home is the cost. If you are buying quality ingredients or cooking Western meals then it is going to cost you more than the average meal bought on the street. Electricity is also expensive and my cooker and oven contribute greatly to my electricity bill. In the West we cook at home in order to save money. If we go out we might prepare sandwiches and a flask of hot soup. In Thailand, in theory, it is the opposite. I think a lot of us would say that it is actually cheaper to eat out every night. Of course, that doesn't mean dining at five star hotels every evening and drinking wine or beer. You can easily go through a lot of money that way.

Eating out for us is going to a local food shop or buying something from a food cart. Something that I don't do nearly enough. Which is what gave me the idea for this food challenge. I decided for one month that I would eat nothing but Thai street food. This would be three meals a day, seven days a week. I am not allowed to go to supermarkets, restaurants or even 7-Eleven. At home I cannot cook or even heat things up. I won't even be allowed to boil some water to make a cup of coffee. Quite a few Thai families don't have a working kitchen. Or if they do then it is just a single gas hob. What I want to see is if I will really save money by eating out for every meal. I have already made a note of how much I spend weekly at the supermarket and also the monthly average for my electricity bill.

To make it a bit more interesting, and certainly more challenging, I am not allowed to eat the same dish twice. Straight away this means I will be eating at least 90 different dishes in one month! I am not sure if that is even possible. In addition, I cannot return to the same food shop, food cart, stall or food vendor twice in the same week. To be honest, I am not sure how easy it is going to be for me. Breakfast is certainly going to be a challenge. My Soi doesn't sell much in the morning and I have to be at work by 7.15 a.m. So, I might have to do what many Thai people do and eat leftovers from the night before. Though, of course, for me it has to be something new bought the night before. I was never one for eating spicy food so early in the morning!

My Thai Street Food challenge starts on Wednesday 1st September 2010 and will last until the end of the month. I will be posting pictures of every meal as well as running costs on my new Twitter account @EnjoyThaiFood.com. I will also be posting daily updates over at www.EnjoyThaiFood.com. As I will be exploring the Thai food scene in Paknam a lot over the next month, I decided I should also take the opportunity to do a survey about Thai food. So, I will be working on a food map and making notes of what kind of food is being sold the most. I will also take notes about the kinds of places that are selling food. I will then write about my findings here at the end of the month. So, what do you reckon? Will it really be cheaper for me to eat out for every meal? Will I be saving money or will I just be putting on a lot of weight? Let's see!

This is a dip called "nam phrik mamuang". In the ingredients pictured below, you can see palm sugar, red chilli, red shallots, dried shrimp, green mango and shrimp paste in the middle.

Put the shrimp paste into a mortar and pound in the shallots and dried shrimps. Also add the hot chilli, sugar, fish sauce and finally the shredded green mango.

Pork Soup (soup moo)
ซุปหมู

This is the Thai version of pork soup that is a little on the spicy side. In the ingredients below you can see diced potatoes, pork, carrots, Chinese celery, lime, stock cube, bird eye chillies and plum tomatoes. You could use chicken instead of pork.

Boil the pork in the stock until nearly cooked. Add the carrots and potatoes and continue to boil until cooked. Next add the plum tomatoes and Chinese celery. Season with fish sauce, salt and sugar. Take it off the heat and add the lime juice and slightly crushed bird eye chillies. We will have another Thai Food Recipe for you next week at www.thai-blogs.com and www.EnjoyThaiFood.com.

Crispy Fried Vegetables (pak chub bpaeng tod)
ผักชุบแป้งทอด

It is that time of year when people are eating vegetarian food for ten days. So, I thought we should kick off the festival with this simple dish. You can basically use any vegetables that you like, but in the ingredients pictured below, you can see green beans, onion rings, mushrooms, baby sweetcorn and sliced carrots at the bottom. There is also a dish of flour.

It is very simple to cook. Just mix the flour with some water to make a smooth mixture. Heat up some oil in a wok. Dip the vegetables into the batter and then into the hot oil. Starting tomorrow I will be eating vegetarian for ten days for the Chinese Vegetarian Festival. I will be posting here pictures of the religious ceremonies at the Chinese temples as well as pictures of the vegetarian food markets and the food that I am eating. I will be posting a lot of pictures over at the Samut Prakan Forums and www.Paknam.com.