My mother inspired me to become interested in food. She was the worst cook in the world. She was nice in many ways but that niceness did not extend to her cooking.
I didn’t start cooking until I was about 18 or 19. I began with western food, a bit of French food.
I came to Thailand on a holiday and became seduced by the country, the place and the people—but not particularly the food.
Then I met Khun Yai, a difficult old woman who cooked divine food. I also met some other elderly ladies who cooked with great skill and aplomb.
They transformed my understanding of what Thai food was, from an easy mom-and-dad type of cuisine—into something dramatically different.
I might be cooking French food now if it wasn’t for that encounter. She offered me gaeng som pla chon tord [sour soup with deep-fried snakehead fish] eaten with dried chili and shallots. I absolutely loved it.
I learned just by looking. What you do is you see what they do, and then use your training as a cook to help unlock the recipes. Then I did some translations of some old recipes from [booklets distributed at funerals]. That helped enormously. And then I learned just by eating. When you live here, you can eat some very fine dishes and then you just have to piece them back together.
Your tongue doesn’t think. You can intellectualize food. You can say what Thai food is or ain’t. But the truth is, if something tastes good, it’s good. There’s no philosophy to it.
The irony of this country is that it has great food culture but it resides in the markets, homes and street stalls. You won’t really find it in restaurants. And the fact that people can eat on the streets or can afford to make good food means they tend not to eat Thai when in restaurants. That’s kind of a shame.
Having people citing me as an influence makes me feel older than I should. I’m bloody 50. God help me. But I think those who know me really well would rather not use my name or use me as an example of what not to do.
Good Thai food isn’t about following the recipes precisely. Good Thai food is about personal taste. It’s about your tongue. It’s a whimsical cuisine, by which I mean you follow your own wishes, your own will, your own sensibility.
I think there’s a certain incredulousness and doubt from Thais when they hear of this farang cooking Thai food. And it’s understandable. Because how many bloody white boys can cook Thai food? But after they taste my food, I hope they think that maybe I might know what I’m doing.
I’m not going to be able to convince everybody. But I’m not too concerned anymore. I used to be, but not so much anymore. I do believe what I do has some integrity.
New ingredients and new dishes make me excited. Sometimes when you come across a very old recipe and you can revive it, that’s really something. That’s almost miraculous.
Ingredients are more important than the chef, without question. Far more important. With poor ingredients, you can’t cook good food.
My cookbook is meant to just be a guide. Do it in your own way. I always say that in the introduction of my books.
Some people look at me devotedly, which makes me very nervous. Others look at me angrily because they’ve been trying to make a curry paste from my cookbook and wonder what the f*** happened. That amuses me.
It can get pretty intense in the kitchen. But I try to deal with the problems rather than commanding things to occur.
Waiters are the crucial part. They are the face, the mouth and the ears of the kitchen. A good waiter is as important as a good cook, sometimes more so.
Good service means doing it professionally, happily and diligently. But then that’s what a good cook is about too.
A Michelin star isn’t very important.
“Not bad” is as good as it gets. It’s already a compliment because nothing is ever perfect.
Now that I’m getting older, I cook less because cooking is a young man’s job. So from doing 10 hours a day, now I might cook five hours a day.
I never cook at home. Never. Why would I? You can go out to restaurants or if you’re in Bangkok on the streets.
