Pride of Thailand Takes Front Stage at Gourmet Market

Presented by GOURMET MARKET

 

Do you like to cook – or, for that matter eat – delicious, world-class gourmet food? Of course you do.

So you’ve been wondering. Nay, you’ve been hoping against hope that with the explosion of shopping destinations across Bangkok that there’d be that diamond in the rough – that magical supermarket upon which you can swoop, tossing in your basket France’s best cheese, Spain’s best Iberian ham, Italy’s best balsamic vinegar, the seven seas’ best seafood, the world’s best cuts of beef, Thailand’s best produce, the best… take a breath… the best food in the world!

Well guess what: that shimmering gem has been cut, and it’s the Gourmet Market at the newly opened Emquartier luxury shopping complex at Promphong BTS Station, which last week hosted the “Gourmet Market World’s Best Taste 2015, The 7 Wonders,” an invitation only event offering a sampling of the newly-opened market’s goods.

The event showcased food items under seven different themes: “Award-Winning Tastes,” featured 5J Iberico ham and gold-medal-winning EMMI Gruyere cheese (the real-deal, Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée cheese); “Legacy Gourmet” featured yet more cheese, and Italian balsamic vinegar aged for 25 years; “Innovative Creations” gave us a pearl-shaped balsamic vinegar “condiment” from Italy; “Wealth of the 7 Seas” put out exactly what the theme implies – the best seafood from around the world; “Best Breeds Above the Rest” (impressive to this humble omnivore) sampled Argentine, US, Aussie, New Zealand and Japanese beef (Japan’s three top Wagyu varieties, to be specific); “The World’s Finest Fresh Produce”; and “The Pride of Thailand.”

More than a delicious mouthful, to be sure, and the market certainly has something to offer to anyone from anywhere with any taste for any kind of food. But what truly stands out are The Pride of Thailand selections.

These include agricultural products that have been accepted internationally for flavor and quality, and one that is simply a marvel of modern technology – I’ll get to that shortly.

First, let’s talk rice. Thailand, as we all know, is one of the world’s largest producers of rice for export, the bulk of which is run-of-the-mill jasmine white. But those with their ear to the ground – taste-buds on the scene – may be hip to the latest trend of high-quality nutritious rice being produced in certain parts of the country.

You’ll be keen to check out the varieties on offer at Gourmet Market, namely the Sang Yod rice grown in southern Thailand, around Songkhla Lake, Patthalung and Krabi. This stuff is sublime – a whole new world of rice. Not only is it uniquely colored thanks to its reddish skin, but the oval kernel is fragrant and perfectly chewy (a result of it being grown near saltwater). There are few places in which this local delight can be found, so it’s good to see Gourmet Market putting it on shelves.

Now for that aforementioned marvel of modern technology. Imagine a coconut. Imagine it cold, with the delightful promise of replenishing coconut juice within, taunting you from the grocery store shelf. Imagine the panic when you realize you’ve left home without your three-pound cleaver.

The juice! How do I get to the juice? Scenes of Tom Hanks in “Castaway”, maniacally bashing coconuts against a cliff play out in your head. But you are at Gourmet Market. You take a closer look and you see, these coconuts are not like the rest – they are Coco Easy Coconuts. That’s right, some beautiful genius spent over five years designing a laser-powered method to cut through the shells of coconuts and preserve the taste as if they were freshly picked, and you just need to pull the tab and enjoy – like a soda can.

The meat! The coconut meat! How do I get the meat? Calm down, another beautiful genius has figured out how to carve the meat out of the shell, without puncturing it and spilling that glorious juice, so you can just peel open the wrapper and eat the whole damn thing.

Maybe it’s just the child in me, or the glutton, but that product alone sold the place on me. So, the ham, cheese, seafood, meats, produce and everything else is a sideshow – a wonderfully resplendent sideshow. Thank-you Emquartier for fulfilling my life so!



Reader Interactions

Leave A Reply


BECOME A COCO+ MEMBER

Support local news and join a community of like-minded
“Coconauts” across Southeast Asia and Hong Kong.

Join Now
Coconuts TV
Our latest and greatest original videos
Subscribe on