Food
Marielle Descalsota
- Gen Zs in New York City have been obsessed with a 41-day-old potato leek stew.
- On the other side of the world, in Bangkok, a family has been cooking bovine stew for over 50 years.
- The Thai perpetual stew is the best soup I've ever tried, and is worth flying to Thailand for.
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In New York City, a 41-day-old soup is all the rage among Gen Zs.
Annie Rauwerda first cooked a potato leek stew on June 7 — and now, over a month later, the stew is still simmering, according to a report by The New York Post. The stew draws in dozens of young New Yorkers every weekend who say they're curious about the unusual dish.
Indeed, this seemingly neverending broth — aptly called perpetual stew — is fascinating. The dish has roots in medieval recipes which detail a pot of soup that's never emptied and continues to boil every day, with the goal of making it last, well, forever, according to a 1994 article by The Lewiston Tribune.
On the other side of the world, in Bangkok, Thailand, there's a family that's been cooking their version of perpetual stew for over 50 years. As an avid traveler and Gen Z myself, I'm always looking for unusual food to try around the world.So last year, in late July, I took a 13-hour-long train ride from the northern city of Chiang Mai to Bangkok, and then a 40-minute cab ride for a taste of the stew.
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Wattana Panich, a roadside restaurant located in the heart of Bangkok, serves a Thai-Chinese stew that's simmered for over half a century. Nattapong Kaweenuntawong, the restaurant's owner, told me the family business has been running for three generations.
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"We never make it new, instead, we store it every night, and we add new ingredients and water to it every day," Kaweenuntawong said in Thai, adding that his mother and wife often take turns cooking the soup.
The stew comprises bovine, buffalo, goat, and other meats in an herbaceous, flavorful broth — and it was mind-blowingly delicious. It's made with ingredients like lemongrass and local chillies, as well as Chinese herbs. Despite using many ingredients in the recipe, a bowl of soup costs just 150 baht, or $4.40.
The soup's meaty, umami flavor was unparalleled, even in a city like Bangkok, where over 320,000 restaurants compete for diners, according to a 2020 report by The Bangkok Post. Food is one of the major draws of Bangkok's booming tourism and Thailand at large, with the local restaurant industry's market size amounting to 400 billion baht, or $11.8 billion, per the report.
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Wattana Panich isn't as popular with tourists as other restaurants in the city. The fluorescent lighting, metal stools, and the hot dining area — the soup is cooked just an arm's length away — contribute to the local, artisanal feel. The majority of its diners appeared to be people who live around the area. But the stew was well worth going out of my way for — it was so good that I returned six months later for one more bowl of Kaweenuntawong's family's stew.
So if any Gen Zs from New York City find themselves halfway across the world in Bangkok, I suggest you try the hearty stew. Trust me when I say you'll never look at soup the same way again.
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