Phitsanulok Food and Markets: Noodles, Rivers and Night Stalls
Phitsanulok eats well and eats early. This is a noodle city, a river city and a market city, and most of its best food costs less than a Bangkok coffee. Budget ฿40–70 for a bowl of noodles, ฿60–120 for a rice dish with curry, and ฿150–300 a head for a sit-down river dinner with fish from the Nan. The Noodle Capital Habit Boat noodles and clear-broth kuay teow shops fill the streets around the clock tower and the railway station. The local habit worth copying is kuay teow hoi kha — "leg-swinging noodles" — eaten at long counters on floating rafts and riverbank shops where you sit with your legs dangling over the Nan. The most famous raft noodle shops sit along the east bank near Wat Yai; a bowl is typically ฿40–60 and the river breeze is free. Markets to Know Phitsanulok Morning Market (Talad Tai / South Market area) — the city's big fresh market near the station: fruit, vegetables, curries in bags, sticky rice and fried snacks from about 04:00. Come before 08:00 f...