Street food

Street food is seasonal, specialised, speedy and as its name suggests, eaten on the street from a truck, a cart or a stall.  For you it could be an elderly lady hunched over a pot of hot oil, frying cheese empanadas in Quito, Ecuador.  Or maybe it’s juggling piping-hot arancini on the cobbled streets of Palermo, Italy. Are you sitting on the side of the road in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam, greedily slurping a bowl of pho?  Or are you in a busy intersection in New York City eating a pretzel or a hotdog or something more nouveau like a Korean burrito or kim chi fries – neither of which I’ve tried but they sound facinatingly awesome. I instantly thought of a silhouette behind a cloud of smoke roasting chestnuts in Chinatown, Bangkok. And for my husband there’s really nothing better than mango sticky rice – at any time of day and from any region in Thailand.

Street food is my favourite kind of food.  You know that whatever is being sold is the specialty of the day because often it’s the only thing on offer – perfect for someone like me who struggles to make a decision.  This month we share with you a selection of our favourite street food from our homes and from our travels.