Northern Thai vs Southern Thai

The Thai food that I’ve eaten for many years has always been spicy: the proverbial Tom Yum soup, the green and red curries cooked with galangal ginger, lemongrass and Thai coconut milk (a smaller varietal of coconuts, but extremely fragrant). I was quite surprised when I visited Chiang Mai in northern Thailand and found that the Thai food in northern Thailand is actually quite different from the south that we as foreigners are most familiar with. I later learned that the north used to be a separate kingdom, fought with the south for many years and was later united with the south to form modern day Thailand. I recall the food in Chiang Mai to be noticeably milder, less spicy (i.e. heat) but rounded with more spices. It reminded me of the differences in Indian cooking between northern and southern India. Chiang Mai is also part of the golden triangle, a poppy growing region bordering Myanmar and Cambodia. I wanted to visit Mae Hong Song, to see the long-necked Karen, the Paduang tribe. A cruel act to the untrained eye (since the neck bones are forcibly extended and would fall apart if the rings are ever removed), the long neck with rings is meant to accentuate the beauty of these girls. I also remember the Albino buffalo (see picture), the wife of the ‘regular’ buffalo, busily eating the grass in the hotel grounds of the Regent Hotel in Chiang Mai. I have often wished that I could cook Thai dishes. I have always been fond of them but somehow the myriad of ingredients seem complex to me. Well, perhaps one day I shall take up this challenge…