July 2017

SAMUI An underground tunnel telling the story of Poppies and leading you to Samui’s most established restaurant

Monday & Saturday: Thai Buffet & Beach BBQ THB 900 Net

www.siamwininganddining.com

FREE COPY

Thursday: International Buffet THB 900 Net

JULY 2017

Sareeraya Villas & Suites

Call + 66 (0) 77 914 333 www.sareeraya.com

On the Turn This is the time of year when it begins to get a bit cooler and fresher – make the most of it!

You can enjoy what Samui has to offer any time of the year – people even come here just for the rainy season! July is when the fierce and humid heat of the last few months begins to change. Yes, it can still get quite hot. But this is tempered by a scattering of clouds in the heat of the day.

Plus it starts to rain, just a bit, for an hour or so after dark.

Right now it’s just perfect for spending time on the beach or taking one of those lazy boat trips with lunch included.

Speaking of which, if this is your first time on Samui (or in Thailand, in fact) then you’ll need to adjust your eating habits – although this will happen automatically, anyway.

You can forget about ‘three square meals a day’. Breakfast is

OK; it’s still quite cool. But during the day you’ll probably end up doing what Thai people have grown up with . . . ‘grazing’!

You see it’s just too hot to sit down around midday and eat a big cooked meal. So, every couple of hours, you’ll nibble at something; a sandwich, a salad, a plate of fries, a selection of fruit.

But the best part of being here is the cool of the evening.

That’s when you can get out of your beachwear, and go out to explore the myriad of fantastic eateries that Samui has to offer. It doesn’t get any better than this!

"Delicious Destinations" Enjoy outstanding Thai and European cuisine from our highly experienced, award winning chef beside the golden sands of Chaweng beach.

Perfect for any occasion whether it be dinner with friends or family, or specially set up romantic dinner for two.

At Banana Fan Sea Resort

Chaweng Beach Road Tel: 0 7741 3483-6

E-mail: info@bananafansea.com

www.bananafansea.com

SAMUI

SAMUI An underground tunnel telling the story of Poppies and leading you to Samui’s most established restaurant

Monday & Saturday: Thai Buffet & Beach BBQ THB 900 Net

www.siamwininganddining.com

FREE COPY

Thursday: International Buffet THB 900 Net

JULY 2017

Sareeraya Villas & Suites

Call + 66 (0) 77 914 333 www.sareeraya.com

On the Turn This is the time of year when it begins to get a bit cooler and fresher – make the most of it!

You can enjoy what Samui has to offer any time of the year – people even come here just for the rainy season! July is when the fierce and humid heat of the last few months begins to change. Yes, it can still get quite hot. But this is tempered by a scattering of clouds in the heat of the day.

Plus it starts to rain, just a bit, for an hour or so after dark.

Right now it’s just perfect for spending time on the beach or taking one of those lazy boat trips with lunch included.

Speaking of which, if this is your first time on Samui (or in Thailand, in fact) then you’ll need to adjust your eating habits – although this will happen automatically, anyway.

You can forget about ‘three square meals a day’. Breakfast is

OK; it’s still quite cool. But during the day you’ll probably end up doing what Thai people have grown up with . . . ‘grazing’!

You see it’s just too hot to sit down around midday and eat a big cooked meal. So, every couple of hours, you’ll nibble at something; a sandwich, a salad, a plate of fries, a selection of fruit.

But the best part of being here is the cool of the evening.

That’s when you can get out of your beachwear, and go out to explore the myriad of fantastic eateries that Samui has to offer. It doesn’t get any better than this!

"Delicious Destinations" Enjoy outstanding Thai and European cuisine from our highly experienced, award winning chef beside the golden sands of Chaweng beach.

Perfect for any occasion whether it be dinner with friends or family, or specially set up romantic dinner for two.

At Banana Fan Sea Resort

Chaweng Beach Road Tel: 0 7741 3483-6

E-mail: info@bananafansea.com

www.bananafansea.com

Graeme Malley Editor

Preeda Tuajob (Puy) Graphic Designer

Akaphon Phongninlaarphon (Don) Photographer

Seksak Kerdkanno (Klauy) Webmaster

Rob De Wet Feature Writer

Dimitri Waring Feature Writer

Natalie Hughes Feature Writer

Nipawan Chuaysagul (Ning) Sales & Marketing Director ning@siammap.com Tel: 0 898 783 891

Henrik Bjørk Managing Director

Siam Map Company Ltd. 52/6, Samui Ring Road, Moo 3, Bo Phut, Samui, 84320 Thailand Tel: (66) 0 7742 2201 Fax: (66) 0 7741 3523 email: info@siammap.com www.siammap.com All rights reserved. Reproduction or use of editorial or pictorial content in any manner is prohibited without written permission from Siam Map Company Ltd. Whilst every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this publication, Siam Map Company Ltd. assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions. Neither is any liability assumed for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein. c Siam Map Company Ltd. 2017

Distribution at Bangkok Airport courtesy of Bangkok Airways.

Reservation Center: 1771 Samui Chaweng Office: 0 7760 1300 www.bangkokair.com

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Triumphant Thai Krua Bophut restaurant offers some of the very best authentic Thai food on Samui.

Krua Bophut is certainly one of the island’s favourite haunts when it comes to eating authentic Thai food in an equally authentic setting. Dining here is an experience in itself, whether you're a newbie to Thai cuisine or an old hand. It garners rave reviews and is highly sought-out, providing satisfaction across the board.

faded about any of the architecture or decor. No stuffiness or museum feel of any kind. It’s also spotlessly, immaculately clean. Staff are professional to the core; your welcome and service couldn’t be better. Should you need help with anything, they're by your side immediately, but they'll never hover.

The restaurant is remarkably different from most on Samui. It’s teak throughout, and though it was built only a few years ago, it faithfully follows the lines of traditional Thai architecture.

Step inside and it’s like going back in time to the 1930s. Only the electric lights give the game away. Plenty of antiques can be found throughout the dining room, but there’s nothing

The restaurant’s location, in popular Fisherman’s Village, could hardly be better; it faces out to sea on the north coast, allowing you to see across the water to nearby Koh Pha-Ngan. It’s decidedly romantic, and above all, very, very relaxing.

Naturally you can eat outside, too, either right on the sands, or on a terrace overlooking them.

Palms sway gently overhead giving the entire setting a truly tropical atmosphere. Come for

lunch or dinner; it’s open daily from 1:00 pm until midnight, with last food orders at 11:00 pm.

Whether you decide to eat indoors or outdoors, you'll find that each table is set perfectly, with a white linen cloth, while evening lighting remains soft, encouraging an intimate atmosphere; at night each table has a large candle that burns in a glass cylinder filled with sand and large shells.

Krua Bophut stands out when it comes to the island’s dining scene, but not just for the building alone. The food and drink are on par with the architecture. Popular with holidaymakers and residents alike, Krua Bophut has many draw cards that keep diners coming back repeatedly.

One of the least apparent is that it’s run by Bo

Fresh local fish and seafood, cooked in authentic Thai way by the owner Supattra.

Great international wines!

Just a few tables in an open Thai sala style restaurant facing a mangrove forest.

Tel. 093 2828 777 Open 6:00 pm, closed Sunday & Monday www.facebook.com/supattrathaidining Seatran Ferry

Big Buddha Market

Airport

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Phut Resort & Spa, a luxury resort just down the road, who have made their mark when it comes to hospitality. In other words, you're in the hands of professionals.

Krua Bophut translates as ‘Bophut kitchen’, which is a rather humble way of expressing what the culinary team offer. You'll be presented with the chance to indulge in a selection of the best of traditional Thai cuisine. Tuck in and you'll understand why over the last few decades, Thai cuisine has become so favoured throughout the world.

The team here have put together a menu that seems to showcase everything that Thais, and lovers of Thai food, appreciate when it comes to

dining. More than a hundred dishes await; the menu’s certainly worth browsing at length. All sorts of treats are on those pages, and it may take a while for you to make your choice.

Staff can give advice if you've never eaten Thai food before – this is definitely one of the places to come if you're experimenting for the first time.

Worried about how spicy a mealtime can get? No need; the menu has notes on each dish, and these will tell you just how fiery each one is. You can ask for things to be toned down if you need them to be. A good few of the dishes are southern Thai in origin; very fiery in other words, though extremely tasty.

Thai food isn’t all chillies, of course, and especially not at Krua Bophut; the chef here uses plenty of herbs, and you'll find coriander, basil, lemon grass and kaffir lime leaves are used in many dishes, all depending on the recipe.

Wherever possible, ingredients come from Samui itself, to ensure maximum freshness. The culinary team are always out and about early in the morning, scouting for best quality. This especially applies to seafood, and the catch of the day is all-important when it comes to pleasing clients.

Many diners who come to Krua Bophut opt for one or other of the two special menus that are on offer. They contain some of the nation’s most loved dishes, and both are highly recommended.

‘Menu A’ starts with appetizers, then there’s Yum

Goong, followed by a papaya salad, then a green curry with chicken and finally white snapper.

‘Menu B’ is similar, through with milder options; after the appetizers, there's Thai Chicken and Coconut Soup, followed by a delicious salad.

Roast duck comes next and is followed by Stir-Fried Chicken with Cashew Nuts.

Both menus end with a dessert, and all the courses are mouth-watering. As with all options at Krua Bophut, you're welcome to linger and there’s never any need to hurry. The menus are ideal if you're new to Thai food, but it’s just as easy to choose individual dishes, and there are so many of these that you’d have to visit the restaurant many times before exhausting all the options.

For seafood, you'll find dishes with snapper, sea bass or barracuda, and naturally you can also ask if there’s anything seasonal on the menu. For meat, there's a wide array of choices featuring chicken, beef, duck and pork dishes. The chef here is extremely creative and can prepare dishes in a variety of ways. You'll also find plenty of great wines to go with the food. Even the house wines are of high standard here.

Krua Bophut is most definitely a fine dining restaurant apart from one thing, and one thing only: the prices. You’ll be able to eat to your heart’s content and when the bill arrives you'll find that the total is very reasonable. Like many diners, you'll probably find yourself making your way to Krua Bophut again – with food this

delicious, and that's never going to break the bank, you'll be happy to dine here. One last thing – parking’s easy. It’s free, just a short walk away at The Wharf.

Dimitri Waring For reservations or further information, telephone 0 7743 0030 or 0 7790 2888. www.kruabophut.com

Romantic views, soothing sounds and classic Italian fare with a modern approach combine to please the most discerning diner.

Olivio - a must for visitors and locals alike.

Olivio ~ beachfront at Baan Haad Ngam Boutique Resort & Villas Chaweng Beach.

Free round trip transfer from Chaweng, Bophut and Choeng Mon. For reservation please call 0 7723 1500-8

www.siamwininganddining.com

3

Along for the Ride Sugar cane has travelled the world, but it hasn’t always brought sweetness wherever it goes.

When asked to name important world crops, most people tend not to think of sugar cane.

They’ll think of potatoes, bananas, rice and so on – all the essential foodstuffs. Sugar cane probably won’t be on the list, even though it’s the world’s number one crop. That’s because there’s a massive dissociation between the crop and what is derived from it: sugar. Sugar is everywhere and nobody really thinks about where it actually comes from. Its history is long, and so too will be its future. Given the popularity of these white crystals, it’s sure that – strange as this may seem – when the first spaceships leave to colonize the first habitable planets, sugar cane will be on board. For when it comes to crops, sugar cane is a frequent traveller. It’s been this way for a very, very long time, and sugar cane is invariably bundled up and shipped off to pastures new.

Other goods have to make way for it. So do humans. Millions of them. Were it not for sugarcane, the world’s distribution of population would look quite different. We’ll come to that in a moment.

For all its ubiquity, sugar cane started off with a very humble history. Although sugar is to be found everywhere, and forms the building blocks of carbohydrates, the most abundant type of organic molecules in living things, it’s sugar cane that we look to when we want refined sugar.

Sugar cane is no more than a grass that can grow wild in hot countries. It was first domesticated in New Guinea, around 8,000 BC. It was a remote place, and the cane lingered there for over 7,000 years before traders took it with them to India.

This was its primordial journey from which all others have sprung; from that time, it’s always been taken to new places and so long as the climate is hot, it’ll grow.

But why cultivate it at all? There are other ways to get hold of sugar, after all, such as sugar beet.

And sugar cane isn’t easy to grow, anyway. The answer explains its huge popularity. Sugar cane can create sucrose in massive quantities. And simultaneously it can then also store it, until it’s ready to be extracted by humans. Unless you're an agriculture scientist, you may be thinking, great – so what? But in the hands of a colonist it’s better than gold. Pack a few spindly-looking sugar canes and you'll soon be planting them and reaping a fortune. It’s basically like being given a factory and a storage facility and then being able to replicate both ad infinitum. The plant produces and stores sugar; you extract it and then keep on growing more and more of the plants.

After being taken to India, where it became extremely popular, Alexander the Great brought sugar with him to the West, along with cotton

and parakeets. It was a bit slow to catch on, but eventually Spain and Sicily began to cultivate sugar cane. An Indian chemist had long since managed to extract sugar from the plant in the form of sucrose, and so lovers of sweetness could enjoy the tiny white crystals that so much resembled salt and yet had a wonderfully different taste.

Sugar cane’s next major journey was again westwards – this time to the newly-discovered Americas. Christopher Columbus took it with him to the isle of Hispaniola (today’s Haiti and Dominican Republic) after stopping off in the Canary Islands and being given cuttings as a gift.

From Hispaniola, sugar cane spread out to encompass North, South and Central America. So far, so good. The versatile cane started producing and storing sugar in ever vaster quantities across the new world, while it was cultivated in more and more places. There was just one problem with this scenario. Sugar cane might be factory cum storage facility all in one place – but where were the workers? The sugar had to be extracted from the plant and then distributed. Who was to do that? No matter how many people worked the fields, still more were required – millions more.

There was an answer, but it was one that was terrible enough to darken the history of

humankind – slavery. People were soon being shipped thousands of miles to work on plantations, spending their lives in misery. The number of slaves eventually reached the 12 million mark. No wages were needed, of course, and the sugar industry became unstoppable, with prices dropping so that everyone could afford the crystal substance. Even after slavery was abolished, the alternatives were little better. The work was poorly paid, in any case, but there were many who accepted it, and lived in conditions that we would today find intolerable.

British owners of sugar cane plantations, for example, hired cheap labour in China, Portugal and India and shipped the workers wherever needed. They were indentured, a term which means they were contracted to forced labour for a number of years. It was basically the same as slavery, albeit with an end in sight. In 1836, the first ships left India, marking a beginning which eventually saw Indians, Southeast Asians and Chinese settling in various parts of the world from Fiji, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Malaysia and the Caribbean. The migrations changed the pattern of settlement across large parts of the world – all basically because of a plant.

Today sugar cane workers have better lives, but it’s still a tough job. Very often the harvesting is

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done by hand, and then there's the process of transporting the cane to the mill where it’s crushed, heated and refined in order to produce sugar.

Harvesting sugar cane is a massive industry. In 2010, over 23.8 million hectares were cultivated in close on 100 countries around the world, with a worldwide harvest of 1.69 billion tonnes. The largest producers are Brazil, then India, China, Pakistan, Thailand and Mexico.

Perhaps not all is looking so rosy for sugar cane.

Its main derivative, sugar, is branded the single worst ingredient in the modern diet, and it’s been linked not just to obesity and diabetes but cancer as well. The sugar backlash is only just starting, but whatever happens, we know that sugar cane production is hardly likely to go out of fashion anytime even remotely soon.

Natalie Hughes

Deewana at The Hut Chaweng’s Curry Hut makes Indian food that will fill you with culinary desire!

It’s a short and snappy headline. The word ‘deewana’ is Urdu for ‘drive you crazy’, and that about sums it up. The North Indian cuisine that’s served up at Curry Hut restaurant will astound you, fill you with delight, make you swoon with pleasure, tantalise your tastebuds – but also drive you crazy. Why? Because not only is the food definitively delicious, but the menu is so extensive that you’ll go nuts trying to decide what to eat!

Samui has gained a reputation of being something of a gourmet’s paradise. It’s been said that you could stay here for two weeks and eat a different dish every night, from nations all over the world. However, you’ll really have to hunt for Korean food, for instance. There’s not much in the way of Vietnamese. Even the timeless Euro-tradition of a Chinese takeaway is sadly lacking. And when it comes to that other mainstay of continental cuisine, the Indian restaurant, there are only a handful to choose from.

Possibly one of the most interesting of these is Curry Hut in Chaweng. It’s been here for 14 years now, and seen Chaweng Beach Road change beyond recognition. But five years back,

it changed its name slightly, and popped up in its present position, right in the middle of the busiest part of the town.

You can’t actually see it from the road - well, you can if you look to one side. Because it’s almost opposite the landmark of Hard Rock Café, very close to the famous Soi Green Mango. Look for the ‘Mode Milano’ shop, just 50 metres south of this. And just across the road, quite obvious in the side-street, is Curry Hut. Don’t be put off by the staff on the sidewalk trying to draw you in; this is very much the Indian style. Just nod pleasantly at them – they’ll be only too pleased to show you to a table inside.

Immediately you’ll be relaxed. Although the noise, dust, and hassles of the beach road are only 20 metres away, you’re shielded here. The restaurant is built to be sideways-on to the little side street, making it a wide, open, breezy space that’s full of light; plus there must be 30 huge ceiling fans busy at work. (There’s also a huge space upstairs than can seat up to 100, if you’re planning a wedding party or another kind of festive occasion). There are eight staff here, with one Thai and three Indian cooks, a manager and three or four waiters.

Normally I don’t stress the prices so much. But in this case I’m going to. Because in anybody’s language the prices here are extremely affordable: the ‘Happy Hour’ special for two people, with five dishes and including two beers or soft drinks is only 550 baht, for example. And, in addition to the several ‘specials’ or ‘combos’, the extensive menu lists a huge range of dishes, none of which are going to hurt your wallet – just the opposite, in fact.

I’m a huge fan of Indian food, but even so there are things here that I didn’t know and had to ask about – and the waiter was easy-going and took his time helping me. Looking under just the chicken selection I noted that you can ask for it in the form of balti, jalfrezi, kadai, korma, noorani, tikka massala, do phyaaza, jaipuri, Kashmiri, methi, madras and with white cream.

And one other thing: the chicken here is hand-cut chunks of premium chicken breast: none of the bone or gristle-scraps that you sometimes have to put up with. And that also goes for the lamb dishes, too; the lamb is imported from Australia or New Zealand. The ingredients here at Curry Hut are top quality, with even the curry pastes and spice powders

coming direct from their supplier in India.

Over the last few years there’s been a huge upsurge in the popularity of vegetarian dishes.

But did you realise that India is a nation that is 50% vegetarian? And so it’s really no surprise that at Curry Hut there’s an entire menu section of veggie food with no less than 36 such dishes listed, with the huge ‘Mixed Vegetable Tawa’ that’s enough for two people coming in at just 300 baht. Several of these qualify as vegan, and you can combine this with the sauces or curry pastes of your choice.

It’s really not enough for me to just list all the items here; the taste is the real test. And it’s totally super. The chicken korma is the creamiest, and you can even ask for it to be spiced up a little, if you prefer. Likewise the balti dishes – a great favourite in Europe. And with everything there’s the hallmark of Indian cuisine: the contrasting sweetness of a raisin popping against the tang of a cardamom seed, the aromatic hint of cumin or the sudden surprise of a snap of aniseed.

Mister Jimmy – the owner and manager of Curry Hut – is keen to point out that his offerings are even more extensive. There is a whole section

pitched at our Chinese visitors, for instance, with a selection of soups to match: coriander, Manchow, cauliflower, almond or rice, to name but a few.

Plus there is also a parallel menu which runs to all the Euro dishes that are just great for kids, or for those of you in the group who might fancy something different – there’s a big selection of pasta and spaghetti dishes and no fewer than eight pizzas. Oh – and if you happen to be Indian and reading this, there’s another section of Jain food, together with a full Halal menu, with each item clearly labelled. And there’s a Thai menu, too!

The Curry Hut will drive you crazy. All those menus, the quality of the food, so many choices.

You’ll go totally ‘deewarna at The Hut’ – no two ways about it!

Rob De Wet For further information, telephone 0 963 800 541 or 0 815 505 194

Located in the beautiful Fisherman’s Village on Bophut Beach.

Our experienced chefs proudly present authentic Thai cuisine and Southern Thai dishes.

Fresh seafood is a must with great quality at reasonable prices.

Enjoy the tranquility of the beach, the twinkling stars and the whispering waves along with the beautiful music. A superb dining experience and great memories.

Fisherman’s Village l

Tel. 077 902 888, 077 430 030 l www.kruabophut.com

Free Parking available at the Wharf!! www.siamwininganddining.com 5

Highest Orders

Samui is renowned for the quality of its varied cuisines – but just exactly what is it that people really like to eat?

Well, that’s one heading that ought to cut out most of the work on this story’s introduction. But it’s true! This esteemed publication has been going for many years now. And in that time there have been hundreds of stories about this cuisine and about that sort of food. We’ve looked at speciality dishes that have ranged from Mongolian concoctions to molecular deconstructions. We’ve delved into haute cuisine and explored backstreet Thai eateries that have plastic tablecloths and garden chairs. But not once in all that time, not ever anywhere along the way, did anyone ever actually sit back and think to ask – “What do people actually like to eat?”

It’s such an obvious question, that it never occurred to anyone to pose it! And, anyway, the answers should be pretty straightforward, shouldn’t they? Gourmet restaurants attract gourmet diners. And with all the fine-dining that abounds on Samui, then the dining experience will be as vast and as varied as all those hundreds of dishes from the dozens of internationally-renowned chefs who ply their trade on this island – won’t it? In other words, there are so many choices of so many different dishes that it would be impossible to think of any ‘favourites’ in amongst all this diversity – wouldn’t it?

Well, the answer to all of the above questions is – no! There are some surprises in store, as you’ll find out in just a moment. But in attempting this daunting survey it quickly became clear that there would have to be two distinct avenues – International cuisine and Thai. And that then means we’re looking at ‘starters, mains and desserts’ on the one hand, and at distinctly separate dishes on the other.

Take the idea of starters. There are many gorgeously seductive possibilities here. ‘Crispy Calamari Rings with Papaya Salad and Peanut Sauce’ leaps off the page at me. As does ‘Seared Sesame Crusted Tuna’. I could go on! But I’ve already given you a clue. What do these two gourmet starters have in common? Yes ... seafood. And with Samui being an island it’s hardly surprising that seafood will loom large on menus everywhere. And just about every restaurant has told me that the most popular International starters are all seafood-based. It figures. But what comes as the real surprise is what is actually the most popular of all these many seafood dishes. It’s the humble prawn cocktail! Or at least a close variation on this theme, such as the ‘Mixed Seafood Cocktail’.

Although when it comes to actual votes, the prawns have it!

Hmm ... interesting. And so one might therefore reasonably assume that the top of the pops in the ‘main course’ charts will be seafood also – fish perhaps or a mixed seafood grill? Wrong again!

Undeniably this is a hugely-popular choice all over Samui. But maybe it’s because of the seafood starters. Or perhaps it’s due to the sheer quality and value-for-money compared to what

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folks have to pay back home. But without a doubt, time and time again, what’s come out on top is ... beef steak.

It might take the vague form of ‘Surf ‘n Turf’. It could appear more directly as ‘New Zealand Tenderloin of Beef with White Prawns and Pepper Corn Sauce’. Or it might be subtly-crafted into ‘Wagyu Beef Tenderloin with baby carrots vichy, roasted yellow beetroot, mashed horseradish and Madeira sauce’. But, whichever way you look at it, some kind of beef steak is sitting happily at number one.

So what about desserts, then? I’ve seen gateaux, the very sight of which has caused my taste buds to go into overload. I’ve been tempted by fruit-flans and pastries that were fit for an emperor. I’ve come across desserts that were pure works of culinary art. But are they popular?

Do they sell? Well, of course they do or else they wouldn’t get made! But, adding up all the scores, the most-favoured dessert of all is fresh tropical fruit – sometimes with an added scoop of one kind of ice-cream or another. But it’s fruit that the majority of fine-diners go for and that’s a fact.

And that’s probably to do with the climate here, or possibly because people have already eaten well. But the light, clean taste of tropical fruit is what most Western diners seem to crave at the end of their meals.

Right then. Onto Thai food. Will the most popular dish be Pad Thai? What about the internationally-famous Tom Yam Gung? After all, these are the first things that everyone thinks of when they hear the words ‘Thai’ and ‘food’ uttered in the same breath. But no – yet another surprise. The answer is ‘a curry’. It might be chicken, pork, beef or duck. It could be yellow or green (red curry is not so popular for some reason). But out of all the top restaurants surveyed, nearly all of them came up with this.

And, more interestingly, the most-favoured ingredient of all was duck. Which is quite curious, as ‘duck curry’ is not really a Thai dish at all but traces its origins back to the Chinese influence within the Thai communities.

So, here we have quite a few eye-openers for you – master chefs take note! It is my informed judgement that today, Samui is indeed a gourmet’s paradise. Whether it’s fast food or the sort you linger over during the course of an evening, there are more dining options here than there are lottery numbers. But when it comes to the popular vote, then there are some surprises.

I’ve heard of people ‘voting with their feet’ but, in relation to fine-dining, a new expression emerges. People know what they like to eat. And on Samui they’ve proved this already – by ‘voting with their mouths’!

Rob De Wet

www.siamwininganddining.com 7

Four for the Price of One Thai food is a lot more diverse than it might appear – we look at cuisines from the four main regions.

Although it seems customary when talking about regional cuisine to begin with the central region, really this doesn’t make the most sense. Certainly it’s the area where over the years the seat of government and the Royal Thai Court have become established and, as such, has accrued a more luscious, varied, and on the whole richer cuisine than other regions. But it’s the northern and southern parts of the nation where the influences of other cultures are more-readily apparent, with the effects of the proximity of Burma, India, and then, towards the east, the influences of Khmer cooking, and China too, being pronounced towards the north, and with the Muslim and Indian influences of Malaysia and Indonesia in the south.

Many dishes that are now popular in Thailand emerged originally from China, and were gradually introduced to Thailand in the 15th and 16th centuries by the Hokkien people as they migrated southwards. But in addition to this there was also the huge cultural knock-on as European traders began to establish trade routes across the world towards the end of this period. Not only were many new herbs, spices and vegetables introduced into Thailand at this time, but probably the most characteristic ingredient of all appeared; the chilli plant in its numerous varieties. These were enjoyed solely by the

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nobility to begin with, but within a couple of generations had been absorbed into the merchant classes and then filtered down to the ordinary Thai working people. Thus, over a period of 30 years or so, the entire character of food in Thailand changed quite dramatically, and came to more-closely resemble that which we are familiar with today.

In the northern region, because of the cooler mountain climate, there’s a larger variety of vegetables than in other regional Thai cuisines, and roots and herbs have a stronger presence.

There are many sour and bitter dishes in these parts, especially evident in soups such as ‘kaeng ho’, made with pickled bamboo shoot. The north is noodle heaven, the ethnic mix of Yunnanese, Shan and Burmese having produced a seemingly endless range of ‘kuay tiaw’ (noodle soups) and ‘khanom jeen’ dishes (soft rice noodles, often curried). Another significant element of northern cuisine – and one that’s now spread all across the nation – is the ‘khantoke’ dinner. The name derives form a ‘khan’, or bowl, and a ‘toke’, a low table or tray, and the characteristic here is that six or seven different dishes are served in small bowls, like a sampler set.

Not surprisingly there’s an overlap into the north east region, but this is that part of Thailand that’s

traditionally been the least affluent, consisting almost entirely of the nation’s farming community. The influence of neighbouring Laos is dominant, and the traditional blandness of the basic cuisine has characteristically been enhanced with lashings of chillies, most notably in the fiery ‘laab’; essentially a minced chicken or pork dish.

Also the north is famous for its preference for sticky rice (rather than white rice) where it’s rolled into balls and dipped into dishes and sauces. ‘Som tam’, the spicy green papaya salad is another traditional dish throughout the north and northeast. This is an area where there’s a lot more culinary ingenuity, with intestines, organs, the bony parts of the neck and even whole chicken and pigs’ feet finding their way onto the tables – to some extent dining on Lao and Issan food is an acquired taste for the tourist, and it is not often promoted abroad!

Southern Thailand consists of a slender peninsula stretching down to Malaysia and is dramatically different from the rest of the country in both scenery and culture. Lush jungle, rocky limestone outcrops and long stretches of beach are the most familiar features, emphasised by a higher rainfall and equatorial sunshine. Southern cuisine has absorbed the influences of this environment, enhanced by the cultural interchange of traders from India, China and Java. Every part of the

coconut tree (even the leaves) are employed in local dishes, its milk thickening soups and curries, its oil for frying and its grated flesh as a condiment. Cashew nuts and pineapples are used extensively. And the Malaysian influence is apparent in curries such as ‘massaman’ curry where you’ll find potatoes being used; a rarity in Thailand.

However, this region’s constant proximity to the sea has not surprisingly resulted in it having become renowned for its seafood dishes. Many sorts of fish, lobsters, crabs, mussels, squid, prawns and scallops are prepared simply by steaming or frying, or more elaborately by cooking in a clay pot with noodles, and presented on the table with the usual assortment of sour, sweet, salty and bitter dishes to go with them. If the north is the home of noodle, then down south it’s all about seafood and curries.

And so to the central plain of Thailand, usually known as ‘the central region’. With Bangkok and the enormous sprawling provinces around, here’s where you find the most cosmopolitan groupings and a little bit of everything mixed in together.

The best rice is grown here, and there are several indigenous curries: green curry, ‘kaeng khieo’, a hot curry known as ‘kaeng phet’, and’ a milder version called ‘kaeng phanaeng’. However, simply

because of this region’s density and concentration of people, even local regional specialities have spawned-off and developed into sub-categories of their own. In Nakhon Pathom and Chonburi you’ll find sticky rice and coconut steamed in a length of bamboo (‘khao lam’). Chanthaburi has its own special noodles fried with crab meat.

There is a chilli paste dip from the coastal area made from crab, egg, and yellow chilli, and even a baked custard (‘khanom maw kaeng’) which is not found elsewhere in Thailand.

You have to bear in mind that the food the Thai people eat isn’t often enjoyed in restaurants as we know them. It’s a warm country. The vast majority of the Thai people eat out – including whole family groups – but it’s at the street stalls and the food markets where they congregate.

This is where the authentic Thai cuisine is to be found, not in air-conditioned comfort. So keep this in mind. Venture out around the streets. And that way you’ll actually get a lot more than ‘four for the price of one’!

Rob De Wet

Pizza Perfection and a Lot More Besides Ciccio Ristorante & Pizzeria presents top-notch pizzas while its sister restaurant adds even more delights to the culinary fun.

A lot has been written about pizzas and how to make them. Probably most of us have had a go ourselves at some time or another, with mixed results. It pays though to ask a fundamental question before even thinking about what kind of dough to use - is pizza-making an art or a science?

For most us, the answer tends to be – an art. But ask a true professional like Chef Lorenzo Belloni, who runs Ciccio, at Royal Muang Samui Villas on Choeng Mon’s main road, and he’ll tell you that it’s both art and science. And the science part comes first. He knows what he’s talking about, as he grew up around traditional Italian food before deciding to become a chef. Not content with that, he also undertook a special course to learn how to make the perfect pizza. He’s been working at Ciccio for four years, specifically in charge of preparing and making pizzas, and in that time he’s certainly perfected his skills. He explains the science part of the preparation, “Everything in the pizza has to be perfectly balanced. If not, it may still be okay, but only that. One of the essential things is to get the maturation and leavening process correct. Maturation means keeping the dough inside the fridge at exactly the right temperature. You need a leavening fridge for this so you can guarantee the temperature is kept constant. Leavening means

taking the pizza dough out of the fridge at the right time and at the right temperature, and then waiting for it to expand.” Lorenzo therefore makes the dough 48 hours beforehand. “This results in it being light, soft and digestible. A lot of pizza makers, even in restaurants, don’t bother to do this; many will make the dough in the morning and then make the pizzas later on that same evening. Customers don’t realize this is far from being the best way – and that’s putting it mildly.” He goes on to say that the cook has to know his or her oven, as no oven is ever identical; they all have individual characteristics.

The one Lorenzo uses is a purpose-built round ceiling one that’s fired by both gas and burning wood. It’s perfect for the job. Each pizza goes in for between two and three minutes – Lorenzo judges the exact time not by a watch but just using his eyes. “The oven is between 370 and 380 degrees Centigrade. I can therefore rely on the results.”

The dough he uses is actually a blend of three different flours (one is wholemeal), all from Italy, that he mixes together himself. Then there are all the many other ingredients and toppings, also mostly brought in from Italy, unless they're available in Thailand. So you'll find salami and cheeses that come from prime Italian suppliers, while herbs and vegetables tend to be from

Thailand. Both authenticity and freshness are therefore guaranteed; you'll realize this as soon as you tuck in to one of Lorenzo’s creations.

They're absolutely delicious.

Ciccio is a dedicated pizzeria; you'll see it has its own separate kitchen, housed in a small separate building that overlooks the terrace where you can eat al fresco. However, don’t worry if pizza isn’t for you as Ciccio shares the same terrace with its sister restaurant, Samui Sailor Grill & Restaurant. You can ask for menus from both places, see what takes your fancy, and order accordingly – no matter where you're seated.

The two restaurants (open daily from 1:00 pm until 11:00 pm), and Muang Samui’s third outlet, right on the beach, Spice Zone, are all managed by executive chef Thomas Schneider. While Lorenzo’s busy making all manner of pizzas, Thomas is in charge of all the other dishes that diners enjoy. At Samui Sailor he oversees Mediterranean-Western dishes along with a selection of Royal Thai treats. There’s plenty of seafood and more Italian dishes. You might see him flaming a steak for a romantic dinner on the sands for a honeymoon couple or simply casting an eagle eye over a freshly-prepared tiramisu just before it goes out to an appreciative diner.

He's also in charge of the various theme nights that the twin restaurants provide not just for their guests, but for anyone who cares to join in with the fun. They start at 6:30 pm and end at 10:30 pm. On Mondays, there’s a seafood night with fresh Canadian lobsters as the stars of the show.

Your dinner will be cooked to perfection, with the lobster either steamed, barbecued, grilled or prepared thermidor-style. It’s up to you to let the chef know how you'd like it. Accompany it with a sauce and a side dish – there are plenty to choose from; you might have, as sauces, lemon & butter or orange or béarnaise, and then for sides, you might have fried rice and vegetables, spaghetti or grilled mixed vegetables. This is an exceptionally good deal.

The other nights are no less spectacular, and offer the same excellent value for money. On Wednesdays, the resort holds a kind of floating market right out at the front of the property, dovetailing with the weekly night market. You'll find plenty of Thai food – all the mouth-watering favourites you'd expect. On Thursdays, it’s Thai Night, where you'll be presented with a wide triptych of a menu; open its panels and you'll find three different Thai menus, each filled with goodies. On Fridays, you can partake in the steak night, an extravaganza of great-tasting grilled meat, but the dishes include other steaks too –

try the moreish salmon steak. There are nine different types of steak for you to choose from and you can accompany them with various side dishes and sauces. If that’s not enough, there's also a salad bar and a soup of the day. So come as hungry!

Surf ‘n’ turf is the theme for Saturdays, and you can expect to find dishes such as classic tenderloin served with a half lobster. Or, as many diners do, you can opt to choose either fish or meat.

It can be quite hard to make a choice at either of these two restaurants as there's so much on offer, but whatever your reason for coming, you can be sure that you'll receive not only excellent food, drink and service, but you'll be a delightful setting in which to spend an afternoon or evening.

Dimitri Waring For reservations or further information telephone 0 7742 8700. www.muangsamui.com

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Beachside Bliss Discovering the laid-back vibes of Buri Rasa’s Beach Club is very much a ‘couples’ kind of thing!

GENUINE NEAPOLITAN PIZZA

ON CHAWENG BEACH, OPPOSITE CENTRAL FESTIVAL

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Most folk will get it wrong. Say the words ‘beach club’ and see what they think. It’s a fair bet they’ll conjure up images of cool young fashionistas, bikini girls, a DJ or two, and pool parties late into the night. And, yes, indeed, there are some clubs on the beach like this. But there’s another kind of beach club too. This sort is slower, kinder, less-intense and more laid-back. There’s no thumping music. The pool’s filled with people who want to get cool, not look it. The restaurant has far more than burritos. And at night there’s a lot of smiling people sitting quietly because the kids are in bed. This is a family ‘beach club’. And it’s what you’ll find at Buri Rasa Village in Chaweng.

Buri Rasa is one of those places which are just as nice whether it’s day or night. The resort is dotted with huge trees, and the two-story villas are shady and cool beneath their dense overhang.

The clean white walls and the trelliswork of Thai-style timbering are covered in lush tropical foliage and it’s cool and quiet as you wander along the sun-dappled paths between the villas.

It’s peaceful and the feel-good factor here is high.

Continue to wander along the twisting patch and you’ll emerge right next to the ‘restaurant’ – the whole area here being known as ‘The Beach

Club’: the restaurant, the cool little bar next to it, the poolside, the elevated terrace along the beach and even down on the sand itself, where at night the tables appear for some real on-the-beach dining. The actual restaurant itself is in true Thai style and in reality is a roofed-in space that’s open at the sides. There’s a placid atmosphere here - the décor is understated and the wooden furniture is sturdy.

Right from the start, this restaurant made a name for itself in that the nature of the cuisine, and its quality, was of prime importance. Back in the good old days, many years ago, this kind of thing wasn’t really important – you had guests, they had to eat, so you fed them. But the more perceptive resorts went a different way. They not only set up some of the best eating anywhere, but welcomed outside visitors, too. As a result the restaurant at Buri Rasa’s Beach Club was originally established by a top international chef, Umberto Piccolini. And over the years to follow, the cuisine was expanded and refined by a subsequent succession of equally renowned 5-star kitchen kings. The result is that today, there’s a culinary heritage in place that’s very hard to beat.

Leon Mascarenhas is the resort manager. And, if you get talking to him, he makes a lot of sense.

“We’re catering for couples and families, which means a selection of ‘light-bites’ and salad dishes for the heat of the daytime, plus nibble-sized dishes for smaller appetites. And of course the quality of the food needs to be tip-top. We’ve created a good balance of cost and quality, with our meat being imported from Australia and the seafood being only the freshest we can find. And so the evening dinner menu is very popular, particularly the exceptionally good Seafood Baskets which so many people come here to enjoy.”

This resort was amongst the first to set a whole new trend. Whereas it was expected that top restaurants would charge top prices, gradually the thinking changed. It was a much better idea to bring prices down. That made for lots of happy in-house guests. And it also attracted lots more custom from outside as well. Today it’s still the same - dining at Buri Rasa is exceptional value for money.

The à la carte menu is outstanding in its own right. There’s a wide selection of both Thai and international offerings, with a variety of starters, soups, meat and seafood dishes, pizzas and pastas. There are several enticing set menus, plus a superb gourmet selection of desserts which are

by themselves reason enough to come here. But there are several extra attractions which just can’t be ignored.

One is that, right on the beach, there are just five private tented ‘salas’. Each of these is a small and intimate gauzy chiffon canopy, open towards the sea, with your table inside. It’s an exclusive beach dining setting and much sought-after, so making a reservation here is a must.

And then there’s the star of the show – the Seafood Baskets. Putting it simply, there are three options. Each of these, Set A, B and C, gets bigger and more lavish. And each one comes with a bottle of very good wine included in the price.

Set A (the top set) is a veritable banquet. On your table you’ll see lobster, prawns, oysters, squid, mussels, blue crab (with yellow curry), tuna and sea bass (filled with lime and lemongrass), together with fried rice with garlic butter and mixed salad. Plus, of course, your bottle of Bird’s Block Cuvee white or red.

The other two sets vary only slightly in the quantity and selection; Set B for example doesn’t have the sea bass included. But here’s the kicker – there’s only 350 baht per person difference between Set C (which is big) and Set A (which is

gigantic). And the huge feast of Set A is just 3,900 baht for two people!

But to top it all off, every Tuesday there’s a simply splendid BBQ seafood buffet on the beach. This is one of the best around, with a huge variety of hot and cold platters and live cooking stations. All the tables are out on the sand (plus some on the terrace too), making the atmosphere one of the best you’ll find anywhere.

And there’s also some great entertainment, too, sometimes a fire show, other times a duo of acrobats – it varies from month to month. The price of this is just 950 baht per person, although you’re welcome to opt for something from the à la carte menu instead, if one of your party has a small appetite.

Coming to dine at Buri Rasa means a delightful setting, a super selection, a wide choice and exceptional value – it really is beachside bliss!

Rob De Wet For reservations or further information, telephone 0 7723 0222. www.burirasa.com

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Thai Recipe

Make it yourself: Gaeng pa moo or jungle curry with pork.

The mother of all grab-kill-eat combos, this type of curry harkens back to times way before supermarkets made it a cinch to get food. The name sums it up. In the jungles and forests of northern Thailand, you never knew what you might come across. Something rushing out of a thicket towards you? No worries if you were ready for it. It’d probably be wild boar, soon to take pride of place on the dinner table. If boar wasn’t available, then chickens would do, or perhaps some fat juicy cat fish from a lake.

Anything really. Whatever was to hand, for gaeng pa, like all of the great Thai curries, is incredibly versatile. One thing that marks it out from its luscious curry peers is that – at least traditionally – no coconut is used. That’s because coconuts weren’t cultivated in the jungle. These days the curry can be made with just about anything, and you'll sometimes find recipes where coconut milk can be added.

This month’s recipe features the most traditional kind of jungle curry and we’ll use pork as one of the ingredients. (This is for convenience as you’re more likely to find pork meat than wild boar!)

Once you’ve assembled all the ingredients, you'll notice how they look like they’ve just come out of a very wild garden.

You'll find its more fun to make this curry in a traditional Thai kitchen looking out over fields or forests. But it goes beyond aesthetics; an open-sided kitchen really is best as gaeng pa is the spiciest curry of them all. For many people it falls into the category of extreme food. Twenty chillies are called for, though even many Thais will find that amount simply ridiculous. Twenty?

No way, they’ll tell you. It should be sixty! Then there are the dried red chillies and the paste.

Once the spices are frying, the air will become blindingly acrid and your eyes will water. And they’ll water again once you start eating what you’ve cooked; it’s seriously spicy even though there’s a lot of liquid. An acquired taste? For most, definitely.

And this explains why the majority of Thai restaurants don’t have it on their menu, though they’ll have a full range of other curries. Not for the faint-hearted, therefore. Some people just don’t dare to eat it. It’s probably best not to try it out for the first time if you're trying to look cool and talk rationally. However, many restaurants frequented by holidaymakers will present a mild form of this fiery dish. Make sure you have plenty of rice to eat it with, and though you may be blown away at first by the spiciness of gaeng

pa, you may well want to come back for secondhelpings. It’s a great balance of sweet, spicy, sour and salty, and all the different flavours make it extremely yummy. Definitely a chop-and-pound labour of love, the efforts are all worth it; you’ll receive a mighty pay-off on first bite. It’s delicious.

Ingredients: for the curry paste Serves 4 • 20 fresh Thai birds' eye chillies either red or green, finely chopped • 5 dried red big chillies, chopped after par-boiling • 5 dried red chillies, chopped • 5 shallots, chopped • 6 cloves garlic, peeled.

• 1 tbsp chopped galangal • 1 lemongrass, bottom part only, chopped • 3/4 tbsp fermented shrimp paste • 1 tsp chopped kaffir lime peel • 7 coriander stems • 1 tsp peppercorns, crushed, or stem of green peppercorns • 1 tsp fresh turmeric, finely diced, or simply used powdered version.

Ingredients: for the curry • 4 tbsp vegetable oil • 600g pork, chopped into bite-sized pieces • 6 Thai green aubergines, cut into quarters • 500g chicken stock • 3 small red chillies pierced for extra heat, chopped, with or without seeds • Fish sauce to taste, up to 3 tbsp.

• 500g butternut squash, diced • Handful of pea aubergines, available fresh in Thai markets • 5 kaffir lime leaves • 1 tbsp palm sugar • 7 long beans, chopped into bite-sized slices, • 1 large handful holy basil, torn Method 1. For the paste, chop first and then grind thoroughly in a pestle and mortar. Alternatively you can use a blender, but the results tend not be quite as good – this is a traditional curry after all. Set aside in a cool place. You can if you wish, make in advance and keep in a tightly sealed container or bag in the fridge.

2. Prepare all the other ingredients and have ready. There’s quite a bit of chopping to do and

it’s quicker if everything’s done in one go.

3. Once you're ready, take either a large-sized wok or a frying pan and place over a medium heat, add the vegetable oil and once it’s hot, add the paste you’ve made. Cook through, stirring at intervals. This will take about 4 minutes.

4. Now add the pork and stir fry until the meat is brown on all sides. Add the chopped Thai green aubergines, the hot stock, chillies and the fish sauce. Bring to the boil and then reduce the heat then simmer for 8 minutes.

5. Add the squash, pea aubergines, then the lime leaves and palm sugar.

6. Cook for a little longer until the butternut squash and green aubergines are just short of done. Ten minutes should suffice for this stage.

7. Next add the long beans and continue simmering until they're cooked to your liking.

Add the basil, folding it in to the mix and simmering for no more than 5 seconds. The dish is now ready. Serve in a small pot along with rice.

Dimitri Waring

Fine Beachside Dining with Spectacular Sunsets

THE SIAM RESIDENCE B o u t i q u e

R e s o r t

Thai & International cuisine in Lipa Noi / Koh Samui Phone: +66 (0) 77 420 008 | samui@siamresidence.com | www.siamresidence.com

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Fan-Sea That!

Hidden away in plain sight is one of the friendliest little restaurants on the island – Baitong at Banana Fan Sea Resort.

Samui is just cram-full of hotels and resorts. And no place more so than the famous Chaweng Beach Road. It’s five kilometres long, and is packed end-to-end with places to stay. There are little garden resorts, boutique resorts and one or two family-owned places that still survive. And then there are the 4-star and 5-star beach resorts – mostly filling huge swathes of premium land, and with grand and imposing entrances.

But have you ever thought about this - every one of these places has two totally separate fronts?

Take a short walk along the beach road and see what I mean. In some places the road is quite a long way from the beach; also there are also dozens of smaller beachside resorts, with their restaurants that you can’t even see from the road – but what you see from the beach is quite another thing.

And then there are the big imposing resorts. These places have a frontage that gives you no idea about what lies inside – some of these resorts are so big that all you’ll see is a long wall with a small entrance-way into the reception area. In other words, what you see from the road outside is nothing at all like what you’ll find down on the ADV ALS Wining and Dining 366x118mm FA OL.pdf

seaside, along the beach. And the very lovely Banana Fan Sea Resort is a good example of this.

the tables on the beach itself when they have their buffet evening; more of this in just a moment.

You’ll come across Banana Fan Sea towards the southern part of the beach road; go past the main McDonald’s towards where the one-way road begins, and it’s situated just a few hundred metres before this. Look out for the landmark of Buri Rasa. Banana Fan Sea is only another 100 metres further along, and easy to spot if you’re in a car or taxi. On the other hand, if you’re coming along the beach you’ll have to be more careful, particularly after dark when everything looks so similar. Look for the beach restaurants’ names: Buri Rasa has ‘The Beach Club’, which is confusingly right next to ‘KC Beach Club’. And adjacent to this is the beachside restaurant at Banana Fan Sea, named ‘Baitong’.

You’ll need to go in, to spend some time with the staff, either via the front entrance and reception or coming in off the beach to the restaurant, to appreciate this ‘value-added’ aspect. Over the years I’ve written almost a thousand stories about Samui and its restaurants, and I’ve come into contact with three times that number of hotel and resort staff. One way for resorts to save money is via their staff and wage bills each month – leading to poorly trained workers unfamiliar with western standards of service, and with low English skills.

Not so here at Banana Fan Sea. All of the staff are simply super; open, friendly and responsive, and with a calm, smiling confidence that highlights the grace and serenity of the Thai people to maximum advantage. It’s a pleasure interacting with the staff in this resort and in their restaurant.

Baitong restaurant is styled very much along tropical lines – essentially a roofed-over space that’s open at the sides. Here there’s an inner area with comfy, sturdy seating and all very discretely and beautifully lighted. But there are also outer terraces running alongside the pool and on a raised terrace, under the stars and right up above the edge of the sand. Once a week, they’ll set up 1

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And before you start thinking “. . . yes, but we’re here for the food, not to chat with the staff,” think again. Maybe 70% of the complaints you see on TripAdvisor are about just this; a dining experience spoiled by the offhand or seeming rudeness of the staff. No matter how good the

food is, poor service will completely spoil your enjoyment – but this doesn’t happen at Banana Fan Sea! You can chose from international items or Thai dishes. And not only is the meat and some of the seafood specially imported (prime cuts of beef and also mussels from New Zealand, for instance) but these international dishes are created with flair. This isn’t the dull, safe ‘steak and fries’ kind of menu. This is something different and well-worth exploring. How about the Pan Fried Fillet of Sea Bass, served with Creamy Spinach, Sweet Pepper and Balsamic Sauce? Or the Grilled Duck Breast topped with Orange Sauce with Vegetable and Potato William? Both of these items are less than 400 baht.

Make a note of Banana Fan Sea and Baitong, look out for it, and drop in one afternoon for a coffee or a snack to check it out. Take a long look at the dinner menu. Then come back again later for a full-tilt dinner. The best time to come is probably round-about sunset. Not only is the sky an impressionist painter’s palette of light with the gold and rose and the fiery hues of the setting sun, but you’ll also benefit from the happy hour

that runs between 5.00 pm and 7.00 pm, just the thing to put you in the mood!

But if you really want to combine the best of both worlds, get yourself over there on a Thursday evening. This is when the tables are all moved down onto the sand for the ‘BBQ Buffet’. It’s a fairyland experience, with a multitude of hot and cold dishes, live cooking stations, and even a spectacular fire dancing and juggling show to give you a break from all that fabulous food. Not only is the cost as reasonable as all the other prices, but you can opt to eat from the main menu, too, if you have kids or people in your party who don’t have big appetites. And this buffet is just 799 baht.

There are many, many restaurants you can chose from – you’re totally spoiled for choice. But now you also know about Banana Fan Sea Resort and their super restaurant, Baitong. Let’s hope this is one that catches your ‘fan sea’!

Rob De Wet For reservations or further information, telephone 0 7741 3483-6. www.bananafansea.com

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Going Native Joining the locals at Tum Lai.

Many different possibilities await diners at Tum Lai, and all are guaranteed to be mouth-watering; choose between Issan, Thai and western from a menu that's generously long, and which has been put together by experts in the catering industry.

The restaurant has an excellent location on the ring-road, at the bottom of the hill between Big C and Makro in Chaweng. There’s a massive car park too, with space that extends right round the back of Tum Lai. Everything about the restaurant is convenient, and it’s been popular since it first opened just over nine months ago. It’s run by a family who are well-known on Samui; they run the three branches of Copacabana, a popular chain of restaurants on the island. Tum Lai is their latest venture, and it’s doing remarkably well for itself, attracting islanders and holidaymakers alike.

The restaurant’s quite striking and you can see this from the road. A giant steelwork carafe signals its presence, and the entrance leads to a series of mostly open-sided structures that cluster around a large pond. The architecture is creative, with a style that's contemporary and relies on wood to give a rustic and laid-back feel to the venue. It wouldn’t be at all out of place in Bangkok, and seems to be just the kind of restaurant that you'd find in the downtown area of any large Thai city.

Take your seat either in the main dining area or out on the decking; there’s plenty of choice. If it’s really hot, you can take refuge in the air-con dining room, just to the side of the restaurant.

Tum Lai is big enough to welcome large groups of people. In fact, many parties and gatherings are held here, from corporate gatherings to wedding receptions, though you’ll need to book ahead for these.

Opening times are 11:00 am until 11:00 pm daily.

That’s a longish day, but it’s easy for the restaurant to cope as they have ten chefs ensuring that food arrives quickly at the tables.

Lunch times tend to be quieter, while in the evening, Tum Lai can get very busy, depending

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on the season. It is definitely one of those places where people come to eat and drink in a fun atmosphere. Freshness is guaranteed, and all of the food seems to have appeared straight from the market: vegetables are vibrant and crisp, and everything’s cooked to perfection. There’s another plus point too, and you’re sure to notice it; everything is spotlessly clean throughout.

Once you’re seated, the menu will be brought to you. It starts with drinks of all kind. There are fruit juices, smoothies, all kinds of soft drinks as well as over a dozen cocktails, red and white house wine, whisky and beers (both bottled and draft). Many people just come for these as it’s such a relaxed spot.

Onto the food. One of the focuses at Tum Lai is the som tam. The menu lists an incredible two dozen variations on the basic theme. It’s up to you how spicy you'd like your choice – just tell the staff if you'd like the spice factor dialled down a bit and they'll be happy to do so.

Options include Vietnamese sausage, pomelo (a type of grapefruit) and mango, crab and anchovy.

pork with kaffir lime leaves and calamari with chilli, to name just a few of the possibilities.

Naturally, Tum Lai serves various curries with rice, too, and again you can opt for the degree of spiciness that you’d like.

There are quite a few dishes that are very mild and which have little or no use of chillies. Try the pad Thai with shrimps or any one of a series of fried rice dishes, which you can enjoy with pork, chicken or salmon steak. Alternatively, try some of the stir-fry dishes (there’s a separate section devoted to these) such as chicken with cashew nuts or bean sprouts with tofu. The grilled section, meanwhile, features many dishes that are bound to please, such as chicken, roasted streaky pork, and the highly-recommended grilled ruby fish with salt and vegetables.

If you really don’t want to try the Thai food, then there’s a small range of western options that are equally tempting. Tum Lai serves, for example, chicken nuggets and tempura deep-fried crispy shrimps, or you can just order a side dish of French fries as a snack.

Next on the menu is a similarly long list of spicy salads that range through salmon, pork neck and shrimps. Try any of these if you’d like to experience the way Thais eat up and down the country; there’s so much variety in Thai salads that you can never tire of them, and naturally they’re as healthy as they’re tasty.

Tum Lai also offers a selection of tempting Thai desserts and you might find it difficult to choose between them. Drink fresh coconut while you feast on black jelly in syrup, a Thai favourite, or try shaved ice with coloured syrup – each is guaranteed to have a cooling effect and is a great way to round off lunch or dinner here.

Tum Lai prides itself on Issan-style foods, and you’ll find a whole section of the menu devoted to North-Eastern fare. First and foremost are the larb dishes – each of these is basically spicy minced meat or fish. Here amongst all the more usual types of larb dishes, you’ll also find squid, minced duck and, if you’re feeling adventurous, even ant egg larb. All are delicious and well-presented.

It’s definitely worth coming to Tum Lai if you'd like to savour what eating authentic Thai food is all about. And with great prices and a lavish menu, you’re sure to be able to find plenty of dishes that’ll take your fancy. And since portions are large, make sure you come hungry.

Many guests opt for dishes from the deep-fried section. Plenty of vegetables accompany these choices and you’ll find pork spare ribs, salted

Dimitri Waring

www.siamwininganddining.com 15

Knowing Your Onions Or, to be more precise, knowing your pandanus.

It may not be a name that’s immediately recognisable. But there’s a good chance you’ve seen pandanus in one of its forms on your travels. Whether the tree itself, its flowers, an aqueous distillate (kewra water used in Indian cuisine), the fruit and its associated uses, or the actual leaves. And you may well have been served food wrapped in the leaves here on Samui.

There are various species of the genus grown right across the tropics, from Hawaii to Northern Australia, Indonesia, Micronesia, South-East Asia and the Indian east coast. In English, depending on what part of the world you are in, it’s known variously as the Umbrella Tree, the Screw Pine or the Screw Tree. It isn’t a member of the pine family though; the name derives from the arrangement of the leaves. There is no distinction in European languages between the single species yielding the pandanus leaves and the group of species yielding the flowers.

Commonly, the names are derivatives of the

botanical designation for the trees (pandanus odoratissimus, pandanus tectorius). Other languages do differ, however. In Thai the tree is lam cheyk, the flower is karaket and the leaves dteuy hom, bai dteuy or bai toey.

Bai dteuy is a type of pandanus leaf that grows profusely in Thailand. Its shiny, pleated leaves – long and slender like those of day lilies – are sold along with bunches of orchids. And it’s the source of a well-loved flavouring that goes into an assortment of desserts and sweet treats. One you’ll come across, particularly at market stalls, is kanom tom bai tuer or pandanus rice balls. Often they are eaten for breakfast, but are a popular snack any time of the day. Juice extracted from the leaves also provides a natural green food colouring. Pre-packaged green sweetmeats you find in the markets are scented with bai dteuy essence and make for a delicious and aromatic take-away.

As an equivalent to vanilla, bai dteuy is one of

Curry Hut Indian

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the most popular flavourings for coconut desserts; second only to the sweet essence of mali blossoms (jasmine). Country folk use the leaves to boil with water for drinking purposes, adding a refreshing almost smoky taste, reminiscent of the juice of roasted coconuts. A few of the leaves frequently find their way into the rice pot as well. And what you will see is the leaves used to wrap food for cooking, such as gai haw bai dteuy (chicken wrapped in pandanus leaves). Plus they can be neatly folded into small baskets for filling with puddings and cakes.

Additionally, some common Indian sweets, especially attributed to Bengali cuisine, have the delicate scent of pandanus water sprinkled over them before serving (ras gulla, gulab jamun and ras malai). Only the ras gulla will be left to steep in a pandanus flavoured syrup for a longer time.

Another application is in the highly aromatic rice dishes of the Moghul cuisine such as biriyani. In Central Asia and the Gulf countries, where

pandanus is unknown, similar rice dishes are often perfumed with rose-water. As there are Indian restaurants on the island and a host of other Asian orientated eateries, it’s not just with Thai food that you’ll discover the influence of pandanus.

Besides its culinary value, bai dteuy is also known for its healing properties. It has a cooling effect and is excellent for the treatment of internal inflammations, infections, colds, coughs, measles, bleeding gums and skin diseases. As it’s a common plant in Thai gardens, it’s an ingredient used in many locally-produced oils and skin-care products. This is likely due to its sweet and earthy aroma as much as any medicinal qualities. In Polynesia, as well as other places, larger leaves are woven into mats and umbrellas for protection against both the sun and the rain. And seeds found inside the fruit can be polished and made into jewellery. An hour or two north-east of Bangkok is the Thai province of Saraburi. It’s said that there are moderate-sized

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pandanus trees growing on steep, almost inaccessible karst limestone hills. Their heavily branching trunks carry crowns of strap-like, arching leaves, and the large seeds can be made into great ornaments.

Back home you may well find some South-East Asian stores that carry frozen imported leaves from Thailand, sometimes labeled ‘pandan’ or ‘pandal’, which are meant to be even more fragrant than fresh Hawaiian leaves. Alternatively, you can use a few drops of the green essence sold in small bottles usually identified a ‘bai toey’. But, as you are here, it would make sense to try out some dishes on Samui. Just remember that the leaves are for flavouring and not for consumption!

Johnny Paterson

Lovely Grub!

Don’t turn the page – an insight into the culinary world of edible insects!

There’s a great many things I could tell you about Thailand. Things about the belief in ghosts and spirits. Or about everyday superstitions. Or the reasons behind everyone’s nicknames. The way to do a proper ‘wai’ (Thai greeting) and why you don’t do this to young children. About what’s considered rude and what isn’t. It’s a whole different way of life here, and an utterly different culture. But there’s one thing in amongst all of this which I’ve seen turn the strongest people into quivering wimps . . . being faced with a plate of crispy-fried grasshoppers.

It’s not simply that it’s new or it’s strange. It’s also tugging at a lot of strings that are tied deep beneath the surface of our day-to-day lives. The psycho-boffins will nod wisely and then ramble on about our human genes and the encoded fear of creepy-crawlies, in particular snakes and spiders. That’s fair enough. And then there’s the rampant tendrils of our modern media, all reaching out to wrap anything that slithers or creeps (or even worse – jumps at you) with some really bad press.

All of this, alone and in combination, is bad enough to start with, nudging our reaction up to a level somewhere between ‘ugh I’m gonna be

sick’ and ‘eek get it away from me!’ And then, into this bubbling cauldron of blindly-nervous fear, you’ve also got to add our instinctive caution when faced with anything new. And so, when you put all this together, anyone venturing to open a fried maggot ’n’ chips shop anywhere west of the Turkistan border is instantly doomed to failure, if not actually burned at the stake like a medieval witch.

The first time my wife and I took her aging parents out for a Chinese meal was not only a sociological eye-opener for us, but also provides a further insight into the workings of the subject in hand. When the plates arrived her parents remained silent, now and then glancing at each other for clues and reassurance, then proceeded to spend several minutes separating all the ingredients into small grouped piles, in the same way that very young children are prompted to do with a box of mixed shapes at school. When they had identified the ingredients and categorised them as familiar and therefore safe, each of them ate the chicken pieces and left everything else, still neatly sorted on their plates.

And, with exactly the same self-preserving instinct at work, this is the reason why you are

unlikely to see people in the western world sitting down in their local pub with a beer and a bag of crispy bugs. The crisply-fried skin from a flayed pig, yes; these so-called ‘pork scratchings’ are everywhere and go by various names. But not insects.

Fear and loathing aside, over the last couple of decades many experts have been advocating a move towards insect-based protein. Our global resources have been shrinking for a long time now. Meat is becoming a drain on the world’s economies and fish are beginning to disappear from the seas, and thus both of these sources of nourishment keep increasing in price. But insects are not only far richer in the proteins our bodies rely on, but they cost almost nothing to maintain and manage.

And so we return to ground zero – getting our heads around munching on cooked bugs in Thailand. And right away I’ll give you a tip: just do it! They vary in taste from mildly pleasant to really delicious. There is nothing at all (as I once feared) slimy or squelchy about them at all. Even today I personally can’t bring myself to allow a slimy oyster to slide unchewed down my throat – it makes me wanna heave! But the western world

sees this as a luxury. Compared to this, a portion of lightly-sautéed silkworm grubs is the food of the gods.

Samui is now so tightly geared to tourists that it’s not always easy to track down the hot-spots of local Thai tradition that once were so widespread. But the best place by far to get to grips with this whole new foodie fad is to find the local travelling fair. (There’s one which moves around the island staying for a week in one place then moving on.) Apart from the mass-produced junk of T-shirts and bags from China, these places are a rampant smorgasbord of strange and wonderful things to eat. Insects included.

And thus some points on what to look out for when you’re finally on the brink of the abyss.

First, get a mixed bag of everything. It’ll cost about 100 baht and then you can bow-out gracefully without anyone giggling at the faces you’ll instinctively want to make . . . until the first few mouthfuls, that is!

Grasshoppers: really tasty – the best! They’re like deep fried pork skin yet much lighter and more airy, and as crunchy as potato crisps. Crickets:

much the same but with sharp spiny legs that can cut your mouth – pull these off first. Taste?

Less flavour and less crunch, but more to chew on. Then cicadas, but only at certain times of the year. These are quite big. They look a bit like cockroaches (which is off-putting) but are really light and pleasant and well worth a chew or two.

Then to my particular faves, the grubs. They aren’t at all crunchy but are full of flavour. Silk worm grubs are like mashed potato or gnocchi pasta but with a nutty flavour almost like peanuts. And the bamboo worms (smaller, longer and thinner) come second best – not really tasting of anything much but reminding me of popcorn which has been allowed to go a bit too old and soft. This is perhaps the one to start with if you’re standing there with your eyes screwed shut and your partner’s tapping you on the lips as if you were a baby and momma’s holding the spoon saying “ . . . open wide!"

Easy, isn’t it! Going over into the abyss is the easy part; it’s getting to the edge that makes us squirm. Now you’ll understand the title at the top. Lovely grub(s), indeed!

Rob De Wet

Beachside Dining at its Best

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What’s it All About?

We take a look at the differences, and sort out the confusions, between whiskey, whisky, Bourbon and scotch – not to mention rye!

There was an Irishman, a Scotsman, an Englishman and an American in a pub. The Irishman said, “Whiskey all round!” The Scotsman replied, “I’ll second that; whisky it is!”

The American butted in, “No, no, no, I don’t like whiskey, let’s make it Bourbon.” And the Englishman said, “Bourbon? I’ll have a pint and a pie.”

No – it’s not a joke. Because those few lines sum up the cultural attitude and differences between ‘whisky’ and ‘whiskey’, how those in the USA view it all, and the fact that most Englishmen would rather drink beer (or nowadays wine, maybe) yet at the same time retain a fondness for a good ‘scotch’: a whiskey that’s actually produced in Scotland.

Let’s clear the air right away: it doesn’t matter how you spell it, whisk(e)y is the overall name given to an alcoholic spirit that’s made predominantly from malted grain. The licensed manufacture of this dates back to Ireland at the beginning of the 17th century (Bushmills). In Scotland, their first distillery opened almost 70 years later in 1772, using only malted barley (the oldest surviving distiller here being Bowmore, founded in 1779). The Americas didn’t come into the picture until a century later, when they began making ‘corn whiskey’ (it later became known as ‘Bourbon’, as it originated from Bourbon County in Kentucky, although some opinions differ here). However, in both Ireland and the USA, malted barley was something of a luxury, and so substitutes were used, usually, simply, corn.

But historically and socially, things are never simple. The Irish teemed to America to escape the potato famine of the early 1800s – some half a million of them in a relatively short period, comprising in excess of 50% of all the immigrants coming in from Europe. All of them were either farmers or working in related trades. Which would then have meant a sudden increase in Irish whiskey being produced in America, one would suppose?

As it happens, no. Because in this period Ireland survived a violent civil war with England and declared its independence – one result being an English trade embargo with America which effectively halted the import of ingredients needed for making Irish whiskey. And then, just a few years later in 1861, America itself was torn by a violent and bitter civil war lasting four years.

All of which killed any kind of whiskey production by the Irish in America, although Irish farmers were instrumental in creating the first ‘Bourbon’ (even though the word hadn’t yet been invented). And another Irish influence was that the American spelling of the word ‘whiskey’ was adopted, as that was the way the Irish spelled it.

Back in Scotland there wasn’t the same upheaval.

Folk continued to make their ‘whisky’ (as that was how they spelled the word) in the same way as ever, using peat to dry the barley, thus endowing their product with its unique smoky flavour. Today however, some of the best Scottish whiskies don’t use peat-drying; rather they let the malted barley alone convey just a hint of that smokiness. Traditionally a Scottish whisky is distilled twice and then aged in oak casks for a minimum of three years. Overall it’s a

much more rigid process than that which is used in the making of Irish whiskey.

A Scottish ‘single malt’, by the way, means that it’s the produce of distillation from only one distillery. A ‘blended’ whisky, on the other hand, may include up to as many as 40 other whiskies – it’s a cost-effective way to add immature whisky and other ingredients to an original single-malt base.

Over the year Irish whiskey seems to have been produced in a great many enterprising ways. So much so that in 2014, registration procedures meant that only whiskey made in Ireland can bear the title ‘Irish Whiskey’. It must contain a ‘mash’ of both ‘malted and unmalted mixed cereals’ – meaning that, essentially, it can contain any sort of cereal, malted or not! It is generally distilled three times (as opposed to the double-distillation of Scotch whisky). And it has to spend at least three years in a wooden cask (but any wood will do).

And so back to America, and the difference between ‘Bourbon’ and ‘rye’. The production of moonshine and ‘corn hooch’ had been a thriving cottage industry ever since the day after the Mayflower landed in Cape Cod in 1620. But it wasn’t until the first President of the newly-formed United States of America (George Washington) landed firmly back on his feet after years of turmoil, that the first official whiskey distillery was built on his estate (by Washington’s Scottish plantation manager, James Anderson) in 1777.

But, just a few years later, Washington introduced a tax on liquor. This resulted in an uprising and many rebellious ‘outlaws’ fled south and ended up in Kentucky. And in 1786, the whiskey we now call Bourbon emerged, although it was initially known as ‘Kentucky whiskey’. Essentially it’s the original corn mash as used by the hillbillies and it has to be at least 51% corn to qualify – it’s traditionally started-off by using some of the first batch, hence the often-seen term, ‘sour mash’. It must be at least 80% proof, and moved to freshly-charred oak barrels, then aged in them for no less than two years.

And so to rye whiskey and some fun. Rye whiskey that’s made in Canada can have any sort of grain at all in it, as long as there’s 10% rye – take note next time you’re shopping in Tesco’s.

But Americans seem to get a bit fierce about these things, especially where Canada is concerned, and so American Rye whiskey has to be proudly made from at least 51% rye, plus whatever else you fancy. Then be casked in charred oak barrels. And if it’s aged for at least two years, it gets to be labelled ‘straight rye’.

(National pride aside, at the time of writing there is actually only one 100% rye whisky being made, and that is Alberta Premium . . . from Canada.) The difference between them in flavour is that using a lot of rye imparts a dry, fruity flavour, whereas Bourbon, made from predominantly corn, is noticeably sweeter and tends to be fuller bodied.

So there we have it. And now you know!

Rob De Wet

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Come and enjoy our unique dishes, many of which you won’t find elsewhere on the island, in a relaxing atmosphere. An experience to truly complete your holiday.

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