Krabi’s Cheap and Divine Eats


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Last Updated on August 13, 2018 by Audrey Scott

We've often been asked “What's the best food you've had in mainland Southeast Asia?” If forced to choose, we'd opt for an easy way out and vote Thai food as the king of cuisines in the region. And after eating our way through Bangkok, Chiang Mai in northern Thailand, and Krabi in the south, our vote more specifically goes to Krabi.

Krabi offers Thai staples, more spice (if you want it), freshness, variety, semi-exotic but palatable dishes, authenticity and warm smiles – all at staggeringly low prices.

Krabi Food Recommendations: Where to Go and What to Eat

Night market on Maharat Soi 10

Influenced by Malaysian and Muslim curries, the sauces here run electric yellow, orange and red. Choose from pre-prepared but fresh concoctions in metal tubs with combinations of shrimp, squid, fish, pork, beef, or chicken, and an array of vegetables. Southern Thai dry fry curries (without the coconut milk) are also popular here.

Krabi Street Food, Night Market
So many Thai curries to choose from at the night market in Krabi.

Dishes here are incredibly inexpensive, usually running 30 baht ($0.85) for a scoop of rice and your choice of two curries. One food stall makes a point (by way of a sign) to indicate that foreigners and locals pay the same low price.

After you order, most stands will direct you to one of their dining tables, often outfitted with a condiment tray – loaded with fresh long beans, cucumbers, Asian eggplants and a spicy nam prik dipping sauce – which alone could serve as its own meal. Pitchers of drinking water and cups of ice are provided, gratis. We always drank the water and never had any stomach problems.

A vast selection of curries are on offer here, and extend well beyond the red and green curries you are used to seeing at home or on the tourist trail in Thailand. The best approach is to walk around, find something that looks interesting and ask what's in it. Fortunately, the market is fairly self-contained, so you cannot spend hours wandering and starving while you choose. Here are a few highlights:

  • Shrimp with long beans, dry fry curry
  • Stingray curry – if you want to breathe fire, this one's for you. Tasty, but bony.
  • Morning glory with taro in coconut milk – if you are put off by spice, this is a safe bet. Even better paired with a spicy dish – it serves as a cooling agent.
  • Shrimp and sator (stink bean, but don't let the name scare you) dry fry
  • Fish cakes – mildly spicy, a good snack to nosh as you begin your search
  • Curry fried fish
  • Dry fry Panang-style pork curry
  • Grilled, skewered squid
  • Pad Thai – served with a combination of squid and shrimp
  • Spicy green papaya salad – with tomato, papaya, garlic, chili, lime, dried shrimp, and roasted peanuts.
  • Endless varieties of tropical fruit, some peeled and packaged with a chili-salt for dabbing and dipping
  • Mango and sticky rice – Audrey developed an addiction to this dessert. The Krabi version is even sweeter and tastier than Bangkok's.

Khanom Jeen Soup Stand

On the corner of Soi 6 and Krabi’s main street Khanom Jeen, for us, vies for most outstanding food in all of Southeast Asia, along with its Cambodian sister soup, num banh choc. This particular stall was a taste above the rest for its outstandingly smooth curry broth. The fact that it didn't include any stray mystery bits or chicken feet also scored points.

At a khanom jeen stand, you'll be given a small mound of fresh rice noodles and your choice of a ladle of mild yellow curry fish reduction, sweet peanut-based red soup, or both. Our favorite is a combination of mostly yellow with a dollop of red.

Krabi Street Food, Soup
Khanom jeen, best condiments and soup award.

The experience reaches a climax of simplicity as you are directed toward a table adorned with a large “condiment” tray. The tray usually contains some combination of long beans, cucumbers, Asian eggplants, Thai basil, bean sprouts, morning glory in coconut milk, pickled palm hearts, onions, carrots, bitter leaf, and a mimosa-plant looking herb. Heap anything and everything on your soup plate. Dive in.

This dish is the ultimate WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) eating experience. The taste is remarkable, simple, and clean. Your body will love you for it.

Oh yeah, the price. 10 baht ($0.30) a bowl, including all you can consume condiments.

Roti

“Muslim Restaurant”, the large, one-room, cafeteria-style hole next to the Vieng Tong hotel may at first appear bleak (flaking wallpaper, half-peeled sticker images of various mosques), but it delivers. This is the real deal. Once you taste roti here, you'll realize that everyone else (on the streets and in restaurants) is only pretending.

Krabi street food, roti
Krabi-style roti. Delicious!!

To witness the simple, regimented process of roti production alone makes a visit worthwhile. Don't just stop there, though. Order a roti with one of the simple Muslim curries from the metal tubs in back. If curries and spice are not your thing, order a sweet roti with condensed milk. It melts in your mouth.

Rotis here are to die for – a pounded swirl of flaky bits on the outside and moist dough on the inside. The result, whose preparation and frying is aided with various oils but pounded and dried with a towel, is not the typical greasy squished pancake served on the backpacker trails of Bangkok and Luang Prabang.

Krabi Good Dream

If you're looking for an early evening break on the backpacker trail, try Krabi Good Dream. Standard red and green curries are tasty and substantial. Our favorite was a fusion-twist penne pasta with fried chili basil, shrimp and squid. Arrive in the evening (just before 8:00PM) and enjoy the latest pirated DVD movies in English.

Viva

If you mysteriously tire of the local cuisine, Italian-owned Viva on Pruksa Uthit Road offers authentic, fair-priced Italian food, including a tasty homemade ravioli in mushroom cream sauce.

Krabi Travel Information: Accommodation, Food and Transport

  • How to get there: We flew Air Asia from Bangkok to Krabi (about 1 hour). Taxes and fuel surcharges are often the same price as or more than the ticket. We paid around $50 per person for a one-way ticket, including taxes. Watch your stuff at airport security in Bangkok.
  • Transport from Krabi airport: Once you arrive at Krabi airport, you have the choice of a taxi (around 360 Baht) or a bus (90 Baht per person). While the bus from the Krabi airport to Krabi town is cheaper per person, it drops you off on Chaofa Road away from the center of town where several men are waiting to “help” you make reservations at over-priced guesthouses where they have connections. If you already have a reservation, they will drop you off – rather begrudgingly – at the guesthouse of your choice, but they will continue their sales pitch for other guesthouses until the end. Don’t be surprised if they feign both hearing loss and short-term memory loss and ask you repeatedly where you are staying. This is a scam – the Krabi taxi scam – and is a direct result of the Krabi taxi mafia’s corrupt grip on the Krabi airport and the government officials who dole out permits to operate there. Our recommendation: find yourself some people to fill a taxi and split the cost. Per person, the cost will be the same as the bus, but you’ll avoid extra time and frustration.
  • Where to stay: We were welcomed back to Good Dream Guesthouse by owner Bryan Rilinger. The rooms are still a good deal and an additional wi-fi router/repeater means that all air-con rooms downstairs (450 Baht/$14) now get a strong wi-fi signal. The atmosphere and food are as relaxed and pleasant as ever. Address: 83 Uttarakit Road, email: [email protected], phone: 075 622993
  • Where to eat: Krabi knows no shortage of excellent eating options. See above and our previous post, Krabi’s Cheap and Divine Eats.
  • What to do: Check out the nearby beaches and enjoy the laid back atmosphere of Krabi town.
About Daniel Noll
Travel and life evangelist. Writer, speaker, storyteller and consultant. Connecting people to experiences that will change their lives. Originally from the U.S. Daniel has lived abroad since 2001 and most recently has been on the road since 2006. When he's not writing for the blog you can keep up with his adventures on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. And you can learn more about him on the About Page and on LinkedIn.

3 thoughts on “Krabi’s Cheap and Divine Eats”

  1. Audrey and Dan.. you remind me of home soo mucchh:-((.
    I think so far, Krabi and Indonesia (OK, not a precise geographical comparison:-)) share the closest similarity in terms of food. Did you try the sator in the end (the hanging long pea in your video)?

    Reply
  2. If the food in Indonesia is close to the food in Krabi, then we’d be in heaven there! We tried the sator in a spicy dry curry. Very tasty. Hmmm….I’m hungry now just thinking about the Krabi night market!

    Reply
  3. This is a great post about Krabi! You are right, the night market off Thanon Maharat (Maharat road) is the best place to go for an evening meal. One can find so much Thai food variety – even bugs to eat! Didn’t you eat some?

    We really enjoy the pancakes and other snacks there. Down the road a little bit – away from the 7-11 are more stands that focus on kebabs and other meats. Some of my favorites too!

    People in the west know sator as stink bean – yes, and also as “fava beans”.

    Good Dream guesthouse also has free WIFI and the coffee is pretty good (so says a friend from the UK.)

    Great post – will read more here in a few minutes… 🙂 Joy

    Reply

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