For me personally, one of the biggest and most exciting parts of traveling the world is indulging in local delicacies. Unfortunately for me, as I get a little older my stomach doesn’t tend to be the iron clad pot it was when I was younger and nowadays don’t seem to be able to devour anything I like at a whim.
Thankfully for me, after another recent trip to Chiang Mai, I was introduced to the delicious tastes and fragrances of Khao Soi Beef, and it agreed with my belly.
So what is Khao Soi Beef or Chicken and why does everyone rave about it?
Khao Soi Beef / Chicken is northern Thailand’s signature dish, albeit many various do exist even in Chiang Mai. It is essentially a coconut and curry infused, crispy and soft noodle soup, which is almost a religious must for the northern Thailand traveler.
It’s not a simple dish to make by any means, no off the shelf curry pastes here, no! It’s hours of crushing roots, seeds, herbs and many fragrant and fermented products to produce a heavenly and heavily potent curry mix.
Khoa Soi’s profile for it’s amazing tastes is heavily influenced by Muslim Massaman curry. The layers of flavor that titillate your taste buds come from the dry spices and ingredients that are said to be only available in the region.
Being a beef lover at heart, having the meat fall apart with seemingly no force shows you just how long the process takes to produce this fantastic meal.
Digging in, having the flavours explode in your mouth, while challenging your sences with the mixed textures coming from the addition of deep fried noddles is something you can only experience.