Final stop: Ayutthaya Night Market
It’s a night market. And for one, I was already counting what I can bring and what I want.
When I signed up for the tour, there was an option for this market, of which I did not have any second thoughts about. Yes, I’d like to go there. So all of us in the tour group signed up for it, and there we were. Our tour guide Visan gave us an hour until 5.30PM to go about, eat or buy anything we want, and then we finally go back to Bangkok.
Once that talk was done, we were off.
I took a look at the side of the road to “survey” the length. So far, seems that the night market was just starting to come to life – the start of the roadside were the early comers and the end of the road were full of people starting to set up shop. For me, I used my old technique in Yaowarat – walk fully left side, turn around, walk fully right side. I estimated a certain point as my U-turn as I don’t want to be the time straggler. Unlike in Yaowarat Road, I don’t have a time luxury.
As with earlier, I was acutely aware that our tour guide was carefully managing our time so we could be back to Bangkok on time between 7PM and 8PM that night. If that was the case, it was imperative that we left before 6.30PM. The Bangkok traffic might be waiting for us, and that will eat our time as well.
And right off the bat, I spotted a snack I’d buy later – insects. Specifically, grasshoppers. Lovely little critters when fried.
But before that, I wanted to buy other stuff. So I also decided to buy something for my dinner. I already estimated that we will arrive maybe around 8PM in Bangkok, so no more time to do extra legs. So I looked around. Lots of food to eat, but the time-constrained nature of the tour is that I cannot apend 20 minutes to eat at any roadside stall. It will take away a big chunk of my shopping time. So everything will be takeaway, I thought. Eat them later at the hotel.
So I bought some local Thai sausages – again. Last time I did buy some, but they were tiny and maybe this one is of a different taste. I just saw one that was big and long and smelled strongly of aromatics. Definitely provincial. I had to buy one. Or four. Just for 80 baht! Very cheap.
The chicken snacks intrigued me, because in true provincial fashion, no part of the bird went to waste. Everything edible is usable. Heck, the bones could’ve been used by another vendor as soup stock. Same in the Philippines – if we kill an animal for food, we also use all the parts they could provide. Head-to-tail. So this vendor had chicken skin, chicken cartilage (the soft part between joints) and chicken tendon, all fried and likely yellowed with something like turmeric marinade or batter. I bought 40 baht each of the cartilage and tendon in separate bags, but I had little alertness to notice the vendor sprinkling cheese powder to them in the bags. Oh well, still good. The cartilage was likely cooked a long time to soften, as it had a soft crunch like a crackling, and good enough for a beer. The tendon was also soft, good snacking food.
I spotted one of my favorite YouTubers, Mark Wiens, near my planned U-turn. I liked him because his love and appreciation for Thai food was infectious. He loves his work deeply. It seems he’s filming something in Ayutthaya, and he was engrossed with the uncle cooking some omelette-ish food. I didn’t want to disturb him while he’s on a groove, so I left and let him do his thing well. I look forward to watching Mark’s video on the place too.
Next thing on my mind – those iconic Thai joggers. I soon found a vendor that sold me XL size ones for 340 baht (original 360 but I asked for a discount).
I later bought more stuff for dinner later – pork and basil in rice with fried egg, and chicken legs grilled with Thai spices. And while walking, I snacked on another grilled meat on a stick, I was sure that’s beef. But there was one dish I very much wanted to buy and eat, but out of concerns and time limitations, I had to painfully walk away from.
It was called tom sab, and the vendor has both pork and beef variants with offals and innards mixed in a soup that clearly had taken in a lot of the animal smells and tastes. The smells were so intoxicatingly familiar. Aromatic, too. It looked and faintly smelled like papaitan. My nose got interested. So I really wanted to take one serving with me to eat later. However, the beefy offal-ish aroma scared the crap out of me too. For one, the flimsy bag the vendor used for takeaway was no bueno for an hourlong trip in an enclosed vehicle. The aroma might escape the bag, and worst of all, it might get punctured or the heat might make holes. I’d rather loudly fart than to have that burst inside an enclosed vehicle. Also, I noticed the oils. It will definitely harden once slightly cooled down. If I reheated it inside my hotel room’s microwave or stove, I’d have a room that smelled of cow juice all day. It was decidedly something you’d have only one choice to eat – outdoors, nearby the stall. I had no viable choice. I didn’t have much time to eat or enjoy the time in eating it. And I wasn’t going to risk a vehicular smell accident. So I moved forward in the other direction and walked away. Maybe someday I get to cross it out. Hopefully.
So I reached the start area again, with a bagful of joggers and another bagful of meals, wrapped tightly with extra bags so no smells escape in the trip back to Bangkok. Now I can buy the grasshoppers. With another bottle of cold water.
The insects were smaller than the ones my former Burmese housemate Myat gave to me. But similarly tasty. Hint of white pepper, soy sauce and chili powder. Very crunchy, no off-putting squishy stuff whatsoever like insect juice. Just crunchy. And that’s good. I also bought a cheap 30 baht bag of silkworm pupa, and while they were passable, it was alternating between crunchy and “oh there’s a juicy one, pfft”. I’d need a beer to wash down that one. The grasshopper will be my only recommendation. I finished a 100-baht bag (got a small discount) of grasshoppers with no issue. Like eating a bag of chips… if chips had bug heads and legs.
Once we all gathered at the start area around 6PM, our tour guide called the driver, and he promptly arrived, eager to drive us back to Bangkok. And us as well. We all were happy and content, but the long day left us wanting our hotel break now. Time to go back to the city.
Water bottle count: 7
Briathrail // Albert 2MNG 
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