Naris Charaschanyawong
Bangkok: Matichon, 2024.
Reviewed by: Thanat Preeyanont (PhD Candidate, National University of Singapore, HYI Visiting Fellow)
Naris Charaschanyawong’s Tamrap sang (rot)chati is the latest publication on Thailand’s food and culinary history. The book traces the history of cookbook writing in Thai society, searching for the first published cookbook and examining changes in recipe writing over a century, from the late 1880s to roughly the 1980s. With a great spirit of antiquarianism, Naris has unearthed and included in his book the earliest written evidence that mentions several world-renowned Thai dishes today, such as phat thai, kaeng khiao wan [green curry], and phat ka phrao [stir-fry meat with basil leaves]. Written in an accessible manner, along with intriguing side stories, Tamrap sang (rot)chati is enjoyable and engaging for a wide variety of readers.
Reading from cover to cover, Tamrap sang (rot)chati presents a narrative of how palace cuisine became predominant in national cuisine during the post-WWII period. Four out of six chapters address this historical process. Chapter 1 charts and distinguishes the early cookbooks published in the late 19th century by the Western-style printing press, which we recognize today, from those compiled in traditional palm-leaf scrolls. Unsurprisingly, the authors of these cookbooks were Siamese elites who had contact with foreigners through education at missionary schools or within the bureaucracy. The following chapters explore how culinary knowledge was transmitted among palace ladies responsible for cooking, transitioning from oral traditions to text-based formats, and examine how preparations of palace dishes proliferated as former palace ladies sought to preserve their culinary expertise after the 1932 overthrow of the absolute monarchy by publishing cookbooks that flaunted the “palace cuisine” heading. The main storyline of palace cuisine concludes in chapter six, where the author discusses how the post-WWII revival of royal hegemony in Thai politics contributed to the rise of palace cuisine in the national culinary landscape.
Chapters four and five diverge from the main narrative. Chapter four examines the historical development of Bangkok’s dining-out culture, tracing the notable restaurants in the city from the late 19th to early 20th centuries and highlighting the significance of Chinese cuisine in the consumption patterns of Bangkok’s elite. Chapter five looks into how soya milk became popular in Thailand. Employing a Foucauldian perspective, it contends that the state promoted soya bean consumption as a means to enhance the protein intake for the Thai population.
The author’s effort to track down a significant number of under-researched old cookbooks and incorporate them into his analysis makes Tamrap sang (rot)chati a must-read for scholars and antiquarians interested in Thai food and culinary history. In the appendix, Naris provides a chronological list of 101 essential cookbook titles published in Thailand from 1889 to 2023, facilitating future researchers in identifying their sources. Furthermore, the general audience will equally appreciate Naris’s engaging narration, which features many anecdotal stories.