Fodor's Travel Talk Forums

Fodor's Travel Talk Forums (https://www.fodors.com/community/)
-   Asia (https://www.fodors.com/community/asia/)
-   -   Bangkok Food Tour Recommendation (https://www.fodors.com/community/asia/bangkok-food-tour-recommendation-918198/)

yestravel Jan 5th, 2012 11:35 PM

Bangkok Food Tour Recommendation
 
Just a quick note to compliment a great food tour that we went on today. Based on comments here and on TA we booked with Bangkok Food Tour for their Historic Food Tasting and Culture tour. It started about 10 am and ended around 1 pm. Made arrangements via email about 3 weeks ago. They were very responsive and easy to deal with. The tour cost ~$30 USD per person. We hit five different tasting sites, sampling regional and ethnic Thai cuisine. Along the way to the various sites, the guide provides information on Thai cultures and local neighborhoods. Guide was personable and knowledgeable, food was excellent...highly recommend this tour.

simpsonc510 Jan 6th, 2012 02:41 AM

Glad you enjoyed your food tour. I hope your day with Tong (or one of her reps) went well also. We are back home in Illinois. Enjoy your S E Asia adventure! Glad we got to meet up in BKK.

yestravel Jan 6th, 2012 03:20 AM

Hi! Glad u made it home uneventfully. Hopefully the weather wasn't too much of a jolt to your system. Enjoyed our brief meeting. We did eat at the restaurant u recommended down the street, Kinnaree, really good food!

Perhaps the timing was off on our tour with one of Tong's guide, but we found the amount of information provided overwhelming. Our guide was sweet, but verbose and kept pushing us along despite our protestations of fatigue. jet lag may have played a role in the tour not being optimum for us.

rhkkmk Jan 6th, 2012 06:24 AM

can you tell us more details about the tour....where did you go and what did you eat??

rhkkmk Jan 6th, 2012 06:25 AM

imo, if a guide is giving too much info, you ask them to cut down on this.... if you need a break or want to slow down, ask again...if this does not work terminate the trip and of course give NO TIP

rhkkmk Jan 6th, 2012 06:26 AM

i would report this directly to tong also...

mr_go Jan 6th, 2012 07:24 AM

I, too, would love to know more about a) where you went, and b) what you ate & enjoyed most.

Kathie Jan 6th, 2012 10:13 AM

I took notes on the original post about this tour by MichaelBKK, as we wanted to visit a couple of places when we were there in Nov/Dec. Unfortunately, no time this trip, but we'll try again next trip.
http://www.fodors.com/community/asia...r-172382-2.cfm

Smeagol Jan 6th, 2012 10:49 AM

I too have this on my radar ( and have "liked" them on facebook for a while now have been interested in their updated. Glad to get direct feedback. Will try and do this when we next go to BKK. Thanks so much for posting.

HappyTrvlr Jan 6th, 2012 02:35 PM

We did the Bangrak tour in October and loved it. Our guide Olive took us( my husband, me and a young Australian woman) to five small neighborhood restaurants. Olive, who is from the Isan region, met us at the top of the escalator at the Taskin Skytrain station. We had Chinese/Thai style roasted duck( less fatty than Chinese), a Muslim spot served curry sauce on hard boiled egg which was delicious,an Isan open air dining place across the river served us crispy catfish and a spicey salad, next a bakery with pastries similar to donuts filled with a yummy cream filling, and finally a traditional Thai, green curry chicken, a beef dish and coconut ice cream. It was well oragnzied and fun. The floods were coming and the Isan place took some effort to get to then, walking wooden palnks, sandbags everywhere( a little up river from the Peninsula.)Olive pointed out temples,shrines, schools and churches as we walked from place to place. Highly recommended, good company to deal with online.

yestravel Jan 6th, 2012 05:31 PM

We had the same food as Happy T. At the bakery (3) we also had Thai BBQ pork bun which was fabullous. Names of places in order of the food listed above r as follows
1- Charoen Wieng Pochana (duck)
2 - Muslim Restaurant (curry lava on egg)
3 - Yum Rod ( yum Pla Dook foo crispy catfish green mango salad)
4 - PanLee Bakery (green custard bun & pork bun, lemon iced tea)
5- Kallaprapruek (Thai curry served on Roti coconut ice cream)

I thought the Thai curry was delicious. My husband liked Yum Pla Dook Foo (catfish) and the salad. In our group the pork bun won as the all out favorite, but the guide said generally the catfish is the favorite followed by the curry. I was least impressed with the roasted duck. curry with the egg was a surprising treat ESP given I'm not a fan of hard boiled eggs.
defintiely an enjoyable way to spend a few hours.

rhkkmk Jan 6th, 2012 07:48 PM

thanks

MaryW Jan 6th, 2012 11:52 PM

We did both the Bangrak and Chinatown tours during July.

We enjoyed both but liked the Chinatown one most,probably because we were the only 2 on that tour where the Bangrak one had 12 people. I did enjoy the variety of food on the chinatown one more because there were a number of things we hadn't experienced before – Guay Jab and Ducks cheeks in particular.

Our Bangrak food was a little different to Yestravel. We had Lemongrass chicken at Yum Rod Sab (over the river) - this was sort of grilled chicken but had a thick topping of fried lemongrass rather like fairy floss. We also had Som Tam at the Cafe de Laos – nice restaurant, nice som tam but very toned down on the chilli as is understandable as many participants had no knowledge or experience of Thai food and still found it too hot. They did make a full on one for someone who asked. We also had Beef Satay at the Muslim restaurant along with the very nice curry lava on egg.

The Chinatown tour included the following dishes – some at restaurants and some on the side of the street.
1. Dim Sum - 4 varieties of dumplings.
2. Old Chinese Herbal Drink
3. Guay Jab (Rolled Noodle in a Peppery Soup) (very nice!)
4. BBQ Pork Bun (I didn't eat this one)
5. Old Fashion Lychee Ice cream
6. Charcoal Grilled Jumbo Prawn with Thai seafood sauce and a stirfry veg similar to morning glory but not it.
7. Succulent Fried Duck’s Cheeks
8. Black Sesame Dumpling in Ginger Tea
9. plus something I've forgotten

Some of the dishes on both tours were a little different from the website list mainly because I have a problem with gluten. I asked the Tour people about this before booking. They were wonderful and substituted to suit me. I can't say enough about how helpful they were.

The Bangrak tour is good – an easy walk and well done but it can be hot of course. They made sure we had plenty of water. The Chinatown one I think could be a little difficult if there were many people as its just so crowded on the street. They supply sound equipment on the Bangrak tour so even if you are a little away from the guide you still hear easily. I don't know if they normally do this for the Chinatown one – we didn't have it but then there were only the two of us with the guide. He was very very good – a lovely young man studying to be a teacher.

dogster Jan 7th, 2012 01:16 AM

I'm totally enthused by this. Thanks yes for reminding me. Perfect timing. Hi MaryW - regards to the 'roo killer. The Chinatown tour sounds grrreat!

Oh, guess where I am.

simpsonc510 Jan 7th, 2012 01:59 AM

Dog, if you are in BKK, Brad is still there until Tuesday. You should get together!

dogster Jan 7th, 2012 06:18 AM

Thanks, Carol. I arrived the day you left. Brad may be errr.. <i>busy</i>. lol.

MaryW Jan 7th, 2012 03:14 PM

Lucky you Doggie.
If you go on the Chinatown tour try and get a night with few participants. Ours was great but the night before there were 12. Usually they say max of 6 but I think it was one big group that night.

You should enjoy gnawing on the duck cheeks - beak and all.

The "Roo killer" sends his regards but stresses the name is misleading as it was closer to the other way around That roo is still out to get him.

Have lots of fun in Bkk.

Doh Jan 25th, 2013 08:55 AM

We went on the Chinatown tour and I'd say it was one of the highlights of our stay in Bangkok (although personally I would have been fine if they had ended the tour before we even got to the restaurant with duck cheeks, mostly because we had eaten plenty-- including 2 desserts-- before we got there).


All times are GMT -8. The time now is 03:46 PM.