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[Meridian007]

Lovedog100, on 2009-11-10 17:54:56, said:

Now I have something that works great.  My Thai girlfriend doesn't like spicy food.  We will look at the menu, then send the waitress to get us drinks, so that they won't hear our plan.  I tell the girlfriend what I want, she then orders it for herself, and then tells them that I want what she is going to order.  When the food arrives, we switch plates.  The waitress usually frerks out when she sees that.  I've even had them try to take the plate back saying it's to spicy for me.  We are both happy that way.  If we don't trick them, the girlfriend will get food that is to hot for her to eat, and I am unhappy with my dish.  Dealing with Thai's is hard sometimes.  They have some preconceived ideas that they just won't let loose of.

My gf and I do this too, we actually have to get separate som tam dishes because she can't handle my minimum level of spice. Pronunciation does help, if your Thai sounds two weeks old, they won't believe you, but if you can at least come close to Thai pronunciation, you usually get what you ask for.
As has been said, this rule doesn't apply in tourist areas, I'm sure the poor restaurant staff get too many freaked out farang who think a green pepper in a salad is too hot (don't laugh, a farang friend of mine is like this, I'm slowly trying to increase her exposure to spice!), and therefore just make everything mild for everyone no matter what they say.

Complaints about bland food from a bored-looking farang are not as scary as the 150Kilo, shaved-headed, wife-beater wearing, tatooed farang screaming bloody murder, running about the place, knocking over tables and such, is. No wonder they err on the side of caution!

[cognos]

try eating Thai food in western countries.. WAYYYYY overpriced and under spiced.. I just wait until i get back to LOS

[Huey]

I Loath when they mess up my food like that. Unless I specifically said something like "Mai pet krap" that shit better come back with some chilis or I will be upset. if I wanted western food I would eat western food when I want Thai food I want it to be like Thais eat it.

It's not rocket science.

Though to be honest, if they really tried to farangitize it specifically to suit me, and threw a couple legs of good Fried chicken and a slice of watermelon as a side dish I don't think I would complain LOL!

[Kitsch22]

bifftastic, on 2009-11-10 12:57:57, said:

Kitsch22, on 2009-11-10 10:34:44, said:

I am afraid that this is a whinge for the  sake of whingeing if ever I saw one.......

Didn't appear to be a whinge to me, just a question.

Not a whinge?

"I find it offensive for assumptions to be made about my food tastes  based on being a farang only. In other words, while trying to help us  out, for many of us, we are actually being cheated, not giving us the  food we ordered and are expected to pay for."

"Offensive" ... "Cheated" - If that is not a whinge, then what is?

For me, I am grateful if a Thai makes allowances for the fact that I am farang. If I want him to pretend that I am not, then I tell him so.

Quote

OP clearly stated he thought restaurants were trying to 'lessen the impact' of their food as they want people to enjoy it.
For me, I enjoy hot spicy food from all different parts of the world (Caribbean, southern India etc.) and Thai.
Someone previously mentioned that the same dishes are prepared differently in different restaurants, I think that's a good thing, shows the individual chef's particular 'take' on the dish. I enjoy trying the same thing in different places.
Usually, when ordering, Thai people I'm eating with 'have a word' explaining that I like Thai food prepared as it would be for Thai people.

But do you really mean that? You want the bones and fat and gristle that a Thai would regard as normal? Most contributors here are referring simply to the number of prik khii nuu to be found in their dish.

Quote

But no, I wouldn't like them to assume I wanted a 'farang version'. I can imagine a similar English version of the same ....roast beef and yorkshire pudding with fish sauce and 15 chillies!
I do agree I think they may be genuinely worried that we can't eat it or won't like it if it's too spicy but I tend to pre-empt by making sure they know I want the real deal, even if it does set my mouth on fire!

Then that is entirely reasonable - you tell them what you want and you accept the consequences.

[youngted]

Quote

I am not singling out any one restaurant, as most of us know, this practice is very widespread

More like it's mostly limited to the farang enclaves such as your cited Samui.
Many, if not most, Thai restaurants outside of these areas make no such distinction, although many will inquire if you can tolerate spicy food and seemed pleased when an affirmative answer is given.  

I personally would not patronize a restaurant again that farangatized (bonus point for your dandy neologism ) my order without checking with me first.

Edited by youngted, 2009-11-11 00:27:28.

[Jingthing]

Quote

Most contributors here are referring simply to the number of prik khii nuu to be found in their dish.

Nope, there is more to cooking food Thai style than throwing in a bunch of prik ki nu although of course I like that when it fits with the specific dish.

I am not interested with arguing with people who think we don't have a right to complain about certain things here. I don't care if you call it whining, that kind of talk just stifles free speech.

Quote

For me, I am grateful if a Thai makes allowances for the fact that I am farang. If I want him to pretend that I am not, then I tell him so.

What does your race have to do with your palate? People that live here and many that visit love actual Thai food exactly as Thai people eat it. Sure its OK to change it IF we ask for it. If we don't and the food is changed based on race, the intention may be polite (probably more CYA) but the result is anything but polite.

Another point, the naive tourists who really don't know. Say they take a trip here and are never exposed to real Thai food in Thailand. Perhaps they would have loved it. I feel such "protection" of people actually cheats them of the experience they traveled around the world for. Yes, many don't want the real thing, but many don't even know what they don't want, they might like it if exposed to it.

BTW, I don't like all Thai food. I don't like insects, pork blood in soup, rats, fermented fish paste for som tam, and black crab for som tam. I simply avoid those dishes.

Edited by Jingthing, 2009-11-11 01:11:50.

[Jingthing]

youngted, on 2009-11-11 00:25:18, said:

Quote

I am not singling out any one restaurant, as most of us know, this practice is very widespread

I personally would not patronize a restaurant again that farangatized (bonus point for your dandy neologism ) my order without checking with me first.

Thanks, I rather like it too. I did make it up. I don't know if it rates with the gem of my literary legacy: Thai-ier than Thai ...

[billp]

I usually say "chob aharn phet" and get the full octane. But then I avoid obvious tourist traps like Cabbages & Condoms and its ilk. It's not just the amount of chile. I find the tourist rip-off places dumb down the the food in general: not enough kaffir lime, lemon grass, garlic etc in dishes that should be full-flavoured.

[phetaroi]

ballzafire, on 2009-11-10 09:12:42, said:

I eat mostly Thai food, but, as I'm sure witnessed by most foreigners, they just offer to omit the hot ingredients and condiments (or serve them separately).  No big deal.  Common practice.

You have a point there.  Many of my Thai friends, including my SO, almost always automatically add ground chili and/or one of the various chili sauces to their food.

[wamberal]

Even my own dear wife, bless her, has to be reminded regularly that I can eat Thai food - I lived and worked in Thailand for four years, spent a lot of time upcountry, and can eat just about anything going, and have no problems with chili, garlic, whatever.  Mind you, that was before I met her.

[tracer]

bkkjames, on 2009-11-10 10:25:54, said:

Btw, Discovery or NGC had a programme on the other night about Thailand, and part of it was this lady making pla la or however it is spelled.

I thought it was disgusting before seeing how it was made.  

Well, I thought it improves the taste of papaya salad...
If you get real Thai food it probably will taste better but they always fiddle with the food so they donot get it back...
Seeing how food id made: try looking at similar programs about farang food: is an eyeopener....

[tracer]

JUDAS, on 2009-11-10 10:26:25, said:

This is actually one of my minor gripes here. It only tends to be in restaurants that I frequent regularly that I get exactly what I order, spice wise. Quite often if I'm ordering a "new" restaurant the waitress will look to my wife for confirmation that I can actually eat "thai style"

Slightly off topic but I've noticed a big variation in the way dishes of the same name are prepared and served.

Correct and it also can reduce the cost as many Thai places have a menu in Thai and one in English and prices are NOT the same in many cases... I eat in a good thai restaurant (qua taste)  and a favorite there is the plah duke foo...
A farang likely pays 30 baht more... Mango salad, cashewnuts and various other things which should be in it.
Best way to get over cooking methods is not to go and look...

[monoli87]

it's differ Thai foods taste within every each region....

Thai southern food almost best

[geriatrickid]

I am surprised that I didn't see anyone mention it yet, but over spicing the food hides the taste of poor quality or "off"  ingredients. Despite the howls of protest that will follow on my next  observation, I  believe there are  many Thais that do not   smother their food with chili. Not everyone has missing taste buds. There are  plenty of people that allow the nuances and the flavours to highlight the dishes and that use the chili and pepper as a way to accent those flavours. Yea, yea, what do I know


If a restaurant goes easy on the chili when  farangs are is in the house, then it's probably because too many previous farang  clients have complained about the spice levels. C'mon, you have all seen them when you have gone out for a meal.
It's much easier to add the chilis to one's taste level then it is to remove them from a dish.  Personally, I appreciate the thoughtfulness and am grateful someone takes into account  that I do not covet burning bum syndrome or  an inflamed mouth.

[Ijustwannateach]

This only happens to me when I am in the 'tourist zone'- otherwise I get the same food that everyone else does.

[tracer]

JUDAS, on 2009-11-10 10:26:25, said:

This is actually one of my minor gripes here. It only tends to be in restaurants that I frequent regularly that I get exactly what I order, spice wise. Quite often if I'm ordering a "new" restaurant the waitress will look to my wife for confirmation that I can actually eat "thai style"

Slightly off topic but I've noticed a big variation in the way dishes of the same name are prepared and served.

Correct and it also can reduce the cost as many Thai places have a menu in Thai and one in English and prices are NOT the same in many cases... I eat in a good thai restaurant (qua taste)  and a favorite there is the plah duke foo...
A farang likely pays 30 baht more... Mango salad, cashewnuts and various other things which should be in it.
Best way to get over cooking methods is not to go and look...

[tracer]

mahtin, on 2009-11-10 12:06:30, said:

phetaroi, on 2009-11-10 12:04:01, said:

Well...is there a middle ground? Literally.
Phet = spicy. Got that. Certainly works!
Mai phet = not spicy. Got that.     

But what's "in the middle"?

Phet nit noi. Prik neung/song works for me.

For those who want it spicy and can handle it, like I did in Singapore when working there and eating with colleagues (Singaporeans), we also had a similar problems but normally as I was hungry the bowl with chilies was finished before I had my food. Surprised people but it wasn't really hot. What I did here locally in my favorite restaurant was different, I took a pot with sambal (Indonesian pepper paste) to the restaurant and let the cook taste it. Never had a problem anymore...

[MiG16]

Huey, on 2009-11-11 00:00:10, said:

........... when I want Thai food I want it to be like Thais eat it.

ermmm, the above sentence helps me to answer all remarks better
every Thai has different taste and different tolerance level for spiciness. some Thais eat their food really really hot, some eat their spicy dishes at a mild level, while others cant tolerate it at all.
add to that the different food in different regions. Isaan and southern food for instance - can be VERY VERY hot. much more than the spicy central Thai curries.

I once went to an Isaan place overseas with a couple of Thai friends. I can take spicy food, I would say on the higher than average side. We ordered the som-tam. my friend raved about it, while I thought there was no taste to it apart from chilli. perhaps the above distorted taste by some thais has led some foreigners to assume Thai food has to come in EXTREMELY hot taste for it to be authentic?

funnily, at least when you visit restaurants overseas, foreigners never hear about let alone have tried dishes like:
'kaeng jued' - literally translates to 'bland curry/soup'

anyhow, I know the above variety in dishes is not what JT is referring to.
but in terms of what was raised by JT, given the different tolerance levels, thats why we have things like ground chilli, or 'prik nam pla'. my brother likes his food really hot, so he will scoop out the fresh chillies from the 'prink nam pla' and add to his food.

if you request for ground chili or 'prik nam pla' once they have brought your meal, hopefully next time they will remember and make your food more spicy

bon appetit

[Samuian]

Only the real thing - with a few exceptions of certain ingredients and things I do not consider proper food.

But still I think some Chef's do a great deal in "Fusion Food", but then this is NOT Thai food, as I consider Noodle soup from road side stalls, Hainan Chicken (Chicken on Rice, Kao Man Gai) and "Pork on Rce" - (Kao Kaa Moo) "American fried Rice" NOT Thai!

What is sometimes dished out as "pat Thai" and munched down by the unwary tourist, would make any Thai either cry or yell for HELP!


"All Thai Food" is too spicy is a fable, by the feeble!

Edited by Samuian, 2009-11-11 09:15:41.

[tracer]

Birdman, on 2009-11-10 13:12:40, said:

First and primarily: Choose a non touristic restaurant, popular with Thais.
Second: Order food by saying baaep thai jing jing. If you like spicy: baaep thai jing jing, pet maak maak. You can also say expressively : Mai pet jing jing, mai gin jing jing.

Note: Thai restaurants cooking really delicious Thai food are actually not everywhere easy to find. So maybe if you are disappointed, Thais are disappointed too, but they don't complain about that in the restaurant.

A funny thing is that some restaurants (assuming its worth the name) have this year much less customers but main reason for that is that most of the ladies they met KNOW where to eat and they obviously select a good tasting Thai restaurant. But if the boyfriend or whatever is a foreigner it saves them money. In my case the restaurant I have known as long as it exists and a big bottle of Chang is 60 baht (for a Thai its funnily more expensive!)But when I took some ladies the Pah duk foo they liked  it but when I took papaya salad their favorite place was next door to where they worked and it tasted better thanks to the pla Jaa...

[Jingthing]

About the issue of adding chilies on the side as an OPTION. That is the standard for some dishes, mainly noodle soups, pad Thai, etc. However, for other dishes the flavor of the dish is quite different when you COOK in the chilies vs. throwing them on top (and also consider the other herbs and spices which you can't just throw in after cooking). It depends on the dish. Of course not all Thai dishes are hot, spicy, or hot and spicy, I would just like the dishes cooked the same for me as for a generic Thai if no mention is made of spice or adjustments made for me for a call of phet the same as for a generic Thai (all depending on how a particular cook makes a particular dish). In practice, that is quite often too much to ask.

Edited by Jingthing, 2009-11-11 12:21:41.

[MiG16]

my point was - how do you know they made that adjustment just for farangs?
maybe each shop cook their food to different level of spicyness, regardless of who the clientele is?

[Jingthing]

MiG16, on 2009-11-11 12:26:29, said:

my point was - how do you know they made that adjustment just for farangs?
maybe each shop cook their food to different level of spicyness, regardless of who the clientele is?

The level of evidence required for such common sense observations does not need to get to the level of evidence for a court trial. Sometimes it is super obvious (you ask for phet phet and you get mai phet) and sometimes it is more ambiguous.

[Samuian]

MiG16, on 2009-11-11 12:26:29, said:

my point was - how do you know they made that adjustment just for farangs?
maybe each shop cook their food to different level of spicyness, regardless of who the clientele is?

My example was

"What is sometimes dished out as "Pat Thai" and munched down by the unwary tourist, would make any Thai either cry or yell for HELP!


ANY Thai served this "fried noodles"something dish, would pay and go... or maybe politely ask "what is this?"

Simply  because "Pat Thai" isn't exactly "fried Noodles", or anything close to Bami Goreng... it has it's specially prepared sauce,
a sliver of banana flower, lime wedge, spring onions, bean sprouts, peanuts (crushed), dried shrimp, fried tofu, egg and usually chicken, shrimp.

Sometimes it's served "sai hor" in a thin egg omelet wrapper

[Kitsch22]

Jingthing, on 2009-11-10 17:47:00, said:

Quote

Most contributors here are referring simply to the number of prik khii nuu to be found in their dish.

Nope, there is more to cooking food Thai style than throwing in a bunch of prik ki nu although of course I like that when it fits with the specific dish.

I am not interested with arguing with people who think we don't have a right to complain about certain things here. I don't care if you call it whining, that kind of talk just stifles free speech.

Quote

For me, I am grateful if a Thai makes allowances for the fact that I am farang. If I want him to pretend that I am not, then I tell him so.

What does your race have to do with your palate? People that live here and many that visit love actual Thai food exactly as Thai people eat it. Sure its OK to change it IF we ask for it. If we don't and the food is changed based on race, the intention may be polite (probably more CYA) but the result is anything but polite.

Another point, the naive tourists who really don't know. Say they take a trip here and are never exposed to real Thai food in Thailand. Perhaps they would have loved it. I feel such "protection" of people actually cheats them of the experience they traveled around the world for. Yes, many don't want the real thing, but many don't even know what they don't want, they might like it if exposed to it.

BTW, I don't like all Thai food. I don't like insects, pork blood in soup, rats, fermented fish paste for som tam, and black crab for som tam. I simply avoid those dishes.

For some reason the TV software will not allow me to respond individually to your separate paragraphs so I must put it all together here.

Your right to free speech is exactly the same as mine. You are free to whinge and I am free to observe that you are whingeing and that the whinge is in my view unjustified and disproportionate. And of course you are equally free to decide to converse only with people who share your views. A tedious position, to be sure, but yes, you are free to choose it.

The sensitivity of my palate is very largely a product of my culture and upbringing which features are, of course, for me like most others closely related to my ethnic origin. Believe it or not there is a respectable and valid reason why Thai restaurant owners use this kind of profiling to predict what their farang customers will want. Disappointing though you may find it, they do not do it with the express purpose to cheat and offend you.

But it's okay, is it not? It should work out well for you. If you patronise only those restaurants that treat you as though you were a Thai, you will be spared the ordeal of mixing with those horrible hoi polloi farang who do not really know what they want. A true win-win situation.