The Thai Fair is here again! From 16-19th July, the Thai Embassy opens its doors to the public to showcase Thai food, culture and lifestyle.
We went early, and found that most of the food stalls were not yet ready. I remembered that the Pad Thai was good last year, so I staked out a choice spot to catch the cooks in action. An unassuming, polite and soft-spoken man was standing beside me, and we started talking to each other. Turned out he is the Thai Ambassador! Well, my jaws did drop a little. After all, I was wearing yoga pants and T-shirt and had just finished an energetic walk at the nearby Botanical Gardens; hardly a dignified outfit or frame of mind to meet a VIP! It was alright, the Ambassador continued to talk while I gathered my poise. I learnt that the elegantly dressed lady manning the Pad Thai stall is his wife and her assistant, a young girl wearing a traditional Thai jacket over blue jeans, is his daughter. The Pad Thai would be cooked by the Military Attache and the embassy Cook together. The Ambassador added that the fair was being held to raise funds to support a charity for Thai workers in Singapore. All the stalls in the middle of the cooked food area are run by the Embassy staff, while stalls ringing the perimeter are run by local Thai restaurants.
The Pad Thai cooks were finally ready. First, minced garlic were sauteed in hot oil and then the dried rice noodles were added to the wok. Meat stock and seasonings were added to soften the noodles. Then the noodles were set aside and the wok cleaned.
The eggs went in first, then the prawns, all doused in more of that dark brown sauce. When the prawns turned pink, the tofu cubes were added and the cooked noodles returned to the wok. Finally the chives and beansprouts got tossed in and the Pad Thai ($2.50) were ready to be sold to the drooling customers. umami was first in line. How did it taste? Very nice thank you, with very generous amount of prawns, I counted nearly 15 in my portion. The beansprouts were too raw for me though, so we picked those out.
We sampled other goodies from the embassy kitchen, like the fried chicken wings, fried fish cakes and fried banana fritters. All fried to golden perfection. The fish cakes were springy, spicy and had a nice crunch from the chopped green beans in its batter. The chicken wings were crispy and juicy, it is no wonder that the queue is always longest for this stall. The banana fritters were coated in a sweet sesame-crusted batter and were the perfect combination of crunch and melting softness that husband bought another packet for himself.
The fair has other attractions besides food. At the other end of the garden, an Isan band was playing. Thai massage was being promoted at a really cheap $20 per half-hour. I got my sore shoulder worked on while my mind half-dozed to the somewhat soothing tunes in the background. In my line of sight was a woman cutting up pineapples non-stop. I saw her at it before my turn with the massuese, and she was still doing the same task after I finished my session. The first thing I did after I got off the massage platform was to buy some pineapples, so I did finish with a foodnote.
