The Chinese tradition of eating vegan style food - where no chillies, animal products or members of the onion family are traditionally welcome - is strong in contemporary Thai culture. But cultural diffusion has resulted that Thais of Chinese decent have been tempted for over two hundred years by the pleasurable intoxication of the nation’s beloved chilli, with the result that many have ventured over to the hot side. While retaining the devotional integrity of a diet predominantly free from animal products, Chinese-Thai vegan cuisine has gradually been infiltrated by the spicy demands of traditional Thai cuisine.
Buddhist and Taoist Thai Vegetarian Food
The Thai transliterated word for Chinese vegan style food is ‘jay’ (jia chai in the original Southern Chinese dialect). The tradition of ‘jay’ cooking was introduced to Thailand in the early 1800’s by Taoist Chinese immigrants. Migration from China to Thailand was intense from 17th century onwards, resulting that today Thai’s of Chinese decent makeup a large percentage of the population (estimated at 14%). Many Thais and Thais of Chinese decent follow the tradition of eating ‘jay’ food and consequently there are hundreds of ‘jay’ restaurants throughout Thailand and an annual countrywide Jay Festival which promotes eating ‘jay’ food.
Chinese and Thai ‘Jay’ Vegetarian and Vegan Food
Pure Chinese ‘jay’ cooking is strict in enforcing adherence to the rule that, in addition to excluding all animal products (including eggs) from ‘jay’ dishes, garlic, onion and chillies are also forbidden. Chinese ‘Jay’ products also – rather curiously - tend to include a massive array of meat substitutes that are made to resemble the original meat ingredients, for example; ‘jay’ pig’s intestines, ‘jay’ beef steak and ‘jay’ tuna chunks are all common Chinese-Thai ‘jay’ products. In slight contrast to pure ‘jay’ cuisine, ‘jay’ culinary diffusion into mainstream Thai cooking has produced what is known as Thai ‘jay’ food, which has closer ties to western vegetarianism.
Thai ‘Jay’ Vegetarian food
Thai ‘jay’ vegetarian food includes dishes both with and without chillies, and also includes onion and garlic and often egg derivatives, all essential requirements as the majority of Thai ‘jay’ dishes are meat free adaptations of the original Thai dish. Thai food, in general, is meat light, with fish and seafood being the prevalent meat attribute of many traditional Thai dishes. As a result, adapting many original Thai dishes to be vegetarian can be achieved easily, while maintaining the integrity of the original dish.
Examples of Thai ‘Jay’ Vegetarian Food
A typical Thai ‘Jay’ menu will include dishes such as:
- Vegetarian Pad Thai (fried rice noodles)
- Vegetarian pad grapao (fried holy basil),
- Vegetarian yam wun sen (spicy glass noodle salad),
- Vegetarian nam phrik num (chilli and eggplant dipping sauce)
- Vegetarian larb (northeaster Thai appetizer)
All the above traditional Thai dishes are easily adapted for vegetarians by substituting fish sauce for light soy sauce (or vegetarian fish sauce) and meat for tofu or textured soy protein. Since the integrity of each original dish depends more on the balancing of sweet, sour, spicy, bitter and salty flavours, than it depends on the original meat flavour, these, and many other traditional Thai dishes, can be adapted for vegetarians while maintaining the essential flavours of the original Thai menu.
Chinese and Thai ‘Jay’ Vegetarian/ Vegan Restaurants
Traditional Chinese ‘Jay’ restaurants and Thai ‘Jay’ restaurants are both common in Thailand, with the difference being indicated by the restaurant sign. All ‘Jay’ restaurants have a yellow sign with red lettering. Thai ‘jay’ restaurants have only Thai lettering, while Chinese ‘jay’ restaurants (in Thailand) carry both Thai and Chinese lettering. In addition to yellow being the colour of ‘jay’ restaurants, ‘jay’ food packaging that comes from China and Thailand will also feature a yellow label with either Thai red lettering or Chinese red lettering.
For more information on Thai cooking and Thai vegetarian cuisine, take a look at the following related Suite 101 article:
- Thai Vegetarian Cooking - Contemporary and Historic Influences on Thai Vegetarian Cuisine
- Vegetarian Pad Thai Recipe- Veggie Thai Noodles With an Authentic Thai Flavour
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