South Sathorn street food

[reader]

From Khaosod English

Tourists Still Don’t Know About These Decades-Old Street Food in Bangkok

Just south of Sathorn Road are clusters of back-to-back street food shops who’ve been serving hungry locals and honing their craft for decades.

By paying as little as 40 baht, you could get a dish of noodles and fish balls that someone has spent 40 years perfecting in this neighborhood along the streets of Chan, Saint Louis, and Sathu Pradit.

Plus, they’re largely free of tourists, so you’ll actually be eating what locals eat, not what Instagram influencers/backpackers are snacking on. Ride up and down Chan Road on the following red hop-on-hop-off song taew buses: 1256, 1271, 1279.

Taxi drivers, Grab Bike riders, and bros daring each other to finish multiple huge bowls are just some of the regulars that come to an unnamed shop serving huge bowls of egg noodles since the 1970s.

“One big bowl used to be just 50 satang. My mom wanted to give huge portions to working people who need lots of energy,” said Weera Nopparatcharoeksuk, who took over from his parents about 10 years ago, as he swirls noodles with a stick in hot water. “We can charge cheaply because we make the noodles ourselves.”

The shop’s specialty is Bamee jub gung, literally “coolie egg noodles,” a dish popularized by Chinese laborers in the past, who needed cheap, high-energy dishes.

There are three sizes to choose from: 30 baht, 40 baht, and 45 baht: or in layman’s terms, large, larger, and largest. The noodles have no added color – the light yellow is all from the eggs. We couldn’t even make a dent in the 45 baht noodles (and we asked for extra, free pork rib broth as well), a pile of eggy goodness with thick chunks of grilled pork and homemade pork wontons.

“Most of my customers are men, but I’ve had some ladies come in and finish a 40 baht bowl while a guy couldn’t finish a 30 baht one,” Weera said.

Fun fact: Although the shop doesn’t have an official name. Locals have christened it “Bamee Jub Gung Pa Pranee” or Aunt Pranee’s Coolie Noodles, after Weera’s mom.

Open 9am to 2pm Mondays through Saturdays at Soi Chan 43, Yaek 11.

Continues with more listings, photos, video and map link

http://www.khaosodenglish.com/featured/2020/01/25/tourists-still-dont-know-about-these-decades-old-street-food-in-bangkok/

[pong]

Hm, just today and not at all in Chinatown I saw many prices for bowls of soupy noodles for 30 bt /big or even  25/normal and yesterday even for 13 (but that was chan lek=small bowl) on a night fair. On the Nonthburi market was many years a very big shop selling noodlesoup for 5, then 8 bt, I think its still there (probably 15 r 20 bt now)-boat noodles Ayuttaya style. Traffic was a breeze today-no jams, a trip that would normally even on sunday take 70-80 mins was now 40/45.

These mentioned songhtaews (similar to Pattaya ´baht bus´ but red=the universal colour for BKK, but for newer gas engined thingies now white) start from under Sapan Taksin BTS along Charoen Krung rd. They serve this area as the roads are too small for big buses. Pay cash after getting off to driver -noone cheats though this would be very easy. Besides around 200+ normal big buslines BKK also has around 250 of such lines-many are just short shuttles up/down a sidesoi.

Personally I think all this hype about types of local food is what it is-grossly overhyped. Can hardly taste any difference. Real chunky soup from vegetables and stock in the western sense is very hard to find. Also as a general rule of thumb Chinese never sell for the lowest price-somehow they always charge 5 or 10 bt more, in the past even the 1 bt cup of ice was 2 bt with them. But perhaps thats why they are better bisnismen. Dont grab me over cheapness-I am just quoting prices I saw.