Cooking Pleasure - Travel & Food: What To Eat in Chiang Rai

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

What To Eat in Chiang Rai - Night Market Street Food

Location - Thanalai Road, from Tung Garden to Chiang Rai Vocational College, Chiang Rai
Opening Hours - 16.00 till midnight [every Saturday evening]

Unlike Chiangmai’s markets, that’s full of mass-produced items made specifically for tourists, a lot of what you can buy at the night market in Chiang Rai are unique items made by hill tribe people such as antique bags, masks, some hill tribe silver earrings, handmade traditional Thai dolls, carved wooden bowl, embroidered bag etc.

Hill-tribes of Thailand produce beautiful products, all unique and of lovely quality. The best places to buy these products are from the stalls the hill tribe people set up by just placing a blanket on the street and selling from there.

Prices are cheap here. You may find the same items elsewhere or in Bangkok but the price may rise to many folds. Another highlight is a string of cultural performances which re-enact scenes from the local way of life and traditions of the ancient Lanna people. There are also live folk music and dancing.

Apart from the inedibles, the night market street food also has a lot of food stalls and most of them offer Thai food that are cooked a little less spicy to cater to tourists’ taste and there’s even live music and dancing girls to keep you entertained while you eat. The stretch of stalls is unbelievably with about 4 rows of stalls along the stretch. Look at the some of the photos here and these are just a small portion of it. Prices range from as low as 10THB for a stick of Miang Kham [5 pieces] or a stick of grilled meat.

10THB per stick of 5 pieces of miang kham

10THB per piece of Crispy Basil Small Prawns Fritters

20THB fruit smoothie per smoothie cup of various combinations, cheapest here in Chiang Rai

You can skip dinner and nib at the various food offered here. They are more than enough to fill your stomach. As you walk along, everything looks so tempting that you love to try. Best of all the prices are very, very reasonable.