Morning Market · Herbed Rice Salad

Khao Yam (Southern Herbed Rice Salad)

Photo: Takeaway / Wikimedia Commons · CC BY-SA 4.0

Some vendors colour the rice blue with butterfly pea flowers, just like nasi kerabu, its close cousin across the border in Malaysia's Kelantan.

Cooked rice is served with a dozen or more finely shredded herbs and vegetables — lemongrass, kaffir lime leaf, pomelo, bean sprouts, dried shrimp, toasted coconut — and dressed with nam budu, a sweet-salty southern fermented fish sauce, then mixed by the diner. It's a common quick breakfast or lunch across southern markets, sold from carts stacked with small bowls of each component.

Why it's made this way: The dish reflects the south's produce-heavy, herb-forward cooking style, shaped by the region's proximity to Malay and coastal trading communities distinct from central Thai cuisine.