Khlong Toei market: What $15 worth of groceries looks like in a wet market
Unless you are a chef, a wet market is probably not all that high on your list of sites to visit, especially one where you can’t really talk to most people without Google Translate. Well perhaps it’s that I have a missed calling as a chef of some sort, or maybe I’m just a little bit of an oddball, but I absolutely LOVE a wet market! And Justing and I have the immense privilege of living only a half hour walk from Bangkok’s largest one (at least the largest one open to the public) - Khlong Toei.
What’s a wet market you ask? It’s a marketplace (often open-air) selling fresh meat, fish, fruits, vegetables, and other perishable goods (and often also non-perishables), but is not a supermarket. They are SO much cheaper than the grocery store and SO much fresher than a grocery store. At Khlong Toei, most (if not all) the fresh goods you see come straight from the farmers and fishers and go directly to the market - nothing frozen, nothing shipped crazy distances, and nothing out of season. Whereas in your local grocery store, more likely than not the produce and meat has been in transportation and storage for at least 1 week, if not 2 before hitting the shelf, losing half or more of its nutrients and flavor. That’s not even counting the amount of time it’s been on the shelf itself. Wet markets tend to be more sustainable and limit waste (kind of - there are a LOT of plastic bags happening, which I don’t love).
I’ve been wanting to go to Khlong Toei since I learned about it (about a month after moving to Bangkok), but hadn’t yet made the time. But no longer! Today was my first time there and I was absolutely beside myself! SO many vendors with so many types of foods! Most I recognized, some I didn’t. Some of it was very *ahem…* fragrant shall we say? (I’m looking at you, stand with nothing but fermented and pickled foods.) For anyone wanting to learn more about the market and its history, I highly recommend watching OTR’s coverage of it on YouTube. This guy spent a full 24 hours in the market, which is bananas (also available here by the way).
So, I spent about 500 baht at the market this time, which is approximately $15. By my calculations (with a little help from ChatGPT), I would have easily spent $50-75 on this at home. Sure, there's something to be said for availability of some of these items (and thus a higher price tag), but considering a lot of what I got is very available back home and the price tag is still so different? All I can say is our food system is broken y'all. Why do we have so many people starving in the US? Does food really have to cost as much as it does, or are rich people just trying to be rich? I'm not saying it should be quite this cheap because cost of living and all, but really? And why are there so many food deserts? Can't we just bring back fresh markets already?
Anyway, here’s a video of my haul. Don’t mind my attempt at the sweat-chic-life look in it. It’s hot and humid here, and I walked the half hour home with a crazy heavy bag full of produce. And yes, I did take a shower immediately after making this video, because ew...
Will this market completely replace the local supermarket in our world entirely? Probably not, because let’s be honest - my Western ass still really likes convenience, peanut butter, and a few other packaged foods one cannot get at this market. But can I see myself going on a weekly or bi-weekly basis? 100,000%
P.S. - for those of you who are wondering, here is what a couple of these items are:
- Rose apples (like a floral, crisp-tasting pear, but not really)
- Khanom krok (a Thai coconut pancake - a little crispy, a little sweet, very satisfying)
- Mango sticky rice
- Birds eye chilis (this is the type of chili pepper you'll find in just about any spicy Thai dish)
- Galangal (kind of sort of like a mild ginger, but again, not really)