The Thai chef Ian Kittichai recalls the early years he spent helping his mother stock up on ingredients for the family food cart. “I would wake up at 2.30 every morning,” he says. He grew up with a lot of responsibility because he was the only son and one of seven sisters. He got up early every morning to take his mother to the market. “I would spend every night of the year sleeping in the market. My mother would wake me up at 5.30 a.m. and I would drive back to the house to help unload the groceries while I slept in the car while she went out and bought all the food for the day.
His mother would continue to prepare meals when he left for school at 7.30 a.m. “I was very fortunate that my neighbor, who was pretty wealthy and had a driver, would take me home after school, which ended at 3.30 p.m. My mother had her own menu and made ten or more different kinds of curries, switching it up every day. When she delivered these, I followed her and pushed cart. After that, my sister and I would sell soy milk after dark.
He relates this tale in the dining area of Bangkok’s Issaya Siamese Club, one of the 15 restaurants he currently owns and runs and one of the brightly adorned Thai eateries that ranks 19 on Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants list for 2016.
“Everyone in the neighborhood would order from my mom, and we would do specialized orders upon request.”
Ian said that when he was younger, he never stopped working and that he always worked on holidays since “those were the busiest times.” Although his strong work ethic is still present now, the type of job he does now is very different from those early evenings spent pushing carts. With 15 restaurants, including four in New York and ten in Bangkok, a cooking school, and several high-profile media collaborations, he has amassed an empire that includes both low-key hangouts and upscale, fine dining establishments.
At Issaya Siamese Club, arguably his most well-known and prosperous endeavor, the chef whips up a variety of traditional Thai meals that have been given a contemporary twist thanks to a strong mastery of cooking methods and techniques. He also enjoys bringing early recollections of street cuisine into the kitchen to be dissected and rebuilt.
“Bringing street food to fine dining is really cozy… Like the dessert we’ve given the term “broken bucket,” which was chosen since it won’t set you back a fortune to eat. We used to have it all over this place, but now it’s hard to find because it’s so inexpensive. It is a delicious coconut-filled delicacy in the shape of a pancake or crepe. By placing the meal on a banana leaf and serving it at the table, we elevate the dish. I considered the concept and gave the name some more thinking. We ask the guests whether they can recall the dessert’s name. As they are contemplating, we throw this chocolate bucket, and it breaks on the table.
“The other is green curry, which we prepare on the table without any heat and is quite popular. We may prepare the dish in front of guests and demonstrate how it is created by heating the bowl to 300 degrees Celsius, bringing it into the dining room, cooking the prawns on top of it, adding the fresh paste, the condiments, and pouring hot coconut milk from a teapot into the bowl. You can prepare a prawn green curry in less than three minutes.
“I have attempted to bring back a lot from my youth. We strive to do the same and create all our own fresh pastes every day,” the author said. “My mother would cook curries perfectly creamy, fresh coconut milk.”
What would she say about the meal, too? Oh my god, I never told you to do it this way, where did you learn it from? he says in an imitation of her voice before returning to his own, “From you mum, you put everything into the cart, everything fresh, made just an hour before, I want to show that type of thing to the customers who come into my restaurants.”
As the first Asia Geographical Indication Ambassador, the chef was recognized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations for his commitment to Thai tradition. In this capacity, he works to have certain Thai ingredients and dishes certified and recognized as being of Thai origin — “It’s like Champage in France,” he explains. Additionally, he is a member of the World Street Food Congress’ founding council, where one of his responsibilities is to select a different street food dish to showcase each year to audiences throughout the world, “last year one of them was oyster omelette.”
He has a genuine enthusiasm and attention for preserving Thai cuisine while firmly moving it into the future. He claims to love his job, but he is also concerned that young Thai cooks won’t carry on the tradition. Many members of the younger generation just want to prepare Western cuisine since it is more exciting for them and represents a novelty to them. I try to encourage all of my cooks to have a strong basis in their own Thai cooking because if they don’t, we’ll eventually lose that. They are bringing in Franchises rather than starting a new eatery. I’m terribly afraid about that.
I have about five of my cooks who are going to submit their applications for the S.Pellegrino Young Chef competition. They get the opportunity to showcase some Thai cuisine and let visitors witness the next generation of Thai chefs.
The young man who once observed his mother selling curries out of a little cart is now a prominent restaurateur, lecturer, and leader in Thailand. A tale that, many years ago, while he was dozing off in the automobile outside the market, not even he would have imagined.
About Ian Kittichai
Ian Kittichai is a Thai chef, restaurateur, and cookbook author. His Bangkok located Issaya Siamese Club is among The World’s 50 Best Restaurants’ Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants…
