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extras

As it was a boring Sunday in town, we decided to burn a few hundred baht on petrol and headed to Don Wai Market.

It's located on Phuttamonthon sai 5 Road, Nakhon Pathom. People often call it Don Wai Floating Market, but it ain't floating like the one in Amphawa or Damnoen Saduak. In fact, this market is just on the banks of Tha Jeen river. Apparently, more than 100 years old now the market is.



We got there around noon. Quite hungry now, so we made our way down the market.



Didn't look too busy on the way in. We spotted these massive mangoes..



Cute?



When we were finally at the market, we decided to have lunch first. We picked this restaurant.



The place was VERY busy.



And here came our lunch..

crab with curry



Fish..



And squid..



Fish was the best of all three. Squid wasn't too bad. And the crab was the worst. Shame, that's always my favourite. We ordered another fish and a tod mun goong to take home. The bill was about 700 baht.

Now it's time to explore the market.



There's lots of food here.



More fish.



The usual stuff.



Thai sweets.








This seems to be ancient Thai sweets that are difficult to find these days.



Making our way deep into the market. Still having fun buying food and sweets for people at works.



And we got stuck!!



Now, we realised that it wasn't a very wise move to come to the market at lunchtime. It's way too crowded.

The market is famous for their boiled ducks. Got quite a few of these along the way. That's a lot of ducks being murdered.



I almost ran out of my patience by now as I don't do crowded places very well.



Some more sweets for the youngest girl in the family. She loves this stuff.



So, we bailed after this one. The market is pretty long. 300 metres of food stalls. You can go on a short boat trip also. But we got things to do back in town, so couldn't get on it. Next time!

__________________
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Fabian

Makes sense to order seafood when the restaurant advertises grilled duck.
So what actually is special about this market to make it worthwhile to drive tehre?

Thanks for the pictures anyway.

kingwilly

looks great mate, I used to often get a boat ride to Taling Chan markets, but i'd have more than one or two beers!

extras

The market's famous for the ducks, they're everywhere. But we're not that into ducks, so went for seafood instead.

Have to say they got lots of yummy stuff. Especial the traditional Thai dessert that is hard to come by these days. Cheap too.

Skydisc

I wonder how they murder the ducks because they are complete with head.
Animal protection is not an important subject in Asia.

sunderlandstephen

Kiddies sweets cutest things i ever did see

sabang

My guess is they do it the Chinese way- put the chicken or duck into a wire basket with a rope or chain attached, and lob it into boiling water. This may sound cruel, but it isn't really- the bird is dead very quickly.

The Chinese like this way for three reasons- no blood is lost, so the flesh stays moist while being cooked, and it is much quicker to pluck a slightly parboiled chicken or duck- plus the skin also crisps up better in the oven, if it is roasted. Practical people those Chinese, and their roast duck and goose is second to none imo.

In contrast, the way they do it in Isaan is totally different. The feathers around part of the live animals neck are plucked- not very pleasant judging by the sounds. It's throat is than cut, and the blood drained out- thus you end up with no annoying small feathers in the blood. The blood and carcass are used seperately for cooking. I prefer the Chinese way.

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racefan

Yea boiling something alive. Not cruel at all!!

sabang

But plucking an animals feathers from a sensitive part of it's anatomy, and then slitting the animals throat while alive and conscious and bleeding it to death is of course so much more charitable.