the wander geek

idk what im doing | earthmix and pondphuwin brainrot 25/8

[chaismarkji]

Okay but hear me out, unless William and Est decide not to, we will more than likely have a 2026 series. And all I’m saying is, I would absolutely love to have a series where Est is the dominant one and William is….well William. All is awkward/clumsy/dorkiness.

[lakemichiganbaby-moved-deactiva]

btw being excessively nonconfrontational is NOT a positive trait. it does not mean u are “too nice” or just too kind to hurt people, it means u have a problem communicating and you need to work on it.

[mallk-z]

There are people in the notes saying that the alternative reason is that they’re doing it because of trauma and i gotta say that

1) same. I did have this same problem and reason for doing it.

2) this is not actually an alternate reason. You guys also have a problem communicating and while you can trace exactly WHY you have trouble communicating that doesn’t mean it’s okay to treat everyone like they’re potentially your former abuser and that you DO still need to work on this.

[queeranarchism]

‘This behavior comes from trauma’ and ‘This behavior is harmful to you, to others and to your relationships with others’ are two truths that can co-exist, and that do co-exist quite frequently.

[twotrenchcoatsinaguy]

ppl will say "demisexual and demiromantic apply to literally everyone why is it a label" and then play smash or pass, see people on the street and comment to their friends how attractive they are, meet someone at a bar and ask them on a date, start talking to someone in the hopes that it will end up sexual/romantic one day

like bro. an actual lack of attraction until a serious connection has formed is not the same thing as wanting to get to know someone before you have sex or date them.

[thebroccolination]

THE EXPERTLY LAYERED WRITING IN THAMEPO'S FIRST EPISODE

My dudes.

The last time I was this jazzed about a series from the very first episode, I was watching Be My Favorite, which went on to become my favorite Thai series. Some of that was because of Krist's talent and charisma as Kawi, some of it was the chemistry between Krist and Gawin, some was the music, some was the production value overall, but most of it was the writing.

SO LET'S TALK ABOUT THE WRITING IN THAMEPO.

While I was watching the premiere of ThamePo yesterday, I messaged @hallowpen to rave about the script. "It has stakes!" I wrote. "A time limit! Character arcs!" Then they asked me who the director was, and when I told them it's Mui (Aticha Tanthanawigrai), they essentially said, "That makes sense."

Because Mui isn't only a director—she's primarily a scriptwriter.

And she definitely seems to know what she's doing.

The first episode has to do so much right to hook an audience and create a solid foundation for subsequent episodes.

It has to introduce the protagonist in their normal circumstances, then quickly endear them to the audience, establish what they want, show the obstacle(s) in their way, and give people a reason to keep watching. Do this while avoiding the traps of info-dumping or weighing down the narrative with too many characters at once. You have to build just enough of a structure to pique curiosity, but not so much that people can guess where the story is going.

ThamePo did all of that, and beautifully.

In the first scene, Po is interviewing for a creative job so he can return to his passion after spending three years helping Earn, his ex-boyfriend, achieve his goals. This interview shows us that Po is earnest and honest to a fault, which is helpful for endearing him to the audience, but a well-written scene is usually doing more than one thing. At the end of his short interview, the interviewers tell Po that his reason for taking a break was off-putting, and they advise him not to be quite so truthful in the future.

I'm curious if Po learning how to use his natural earnestness effectively will be part of his character arc. Because later in the episode, Po decides to embrace a mild level of dishonesty to get the job with ONER. He reluctantly agrees to give them a resume that his friend edited to sound more flattering, and in his interview, he…embellishes the truth.

This is the first time we see a flashback to the one time Po went to a MARS event to take photos for his friend, and it's fairly unremarkable on the surface. Just a quick shot of him in the crowd—one of many—and then a shot of him editing the footage at home.

No sign that this is setting up some fantastic layering in the script.

Now, before I go on, I just want to say that, y'know, stakes and character arcs and obstacles and time limits are all extremely basic facets of a story. The reason I'm excited that ThamePo has them is because a lot of the queer Thai series I've seen throughout the past five years…haven't had them. Especially in the onslaught of hundreds of BL and GL series produced in the past two years, the vast majority of them just seem to have been slapped together. A rough first draft kicked onto a smoking conveyer belt bleeding text and plot points.

But Be My Favorite is as good as it is in part because Waa campaigned for more time to work on the script. And ThamePo was apparently in the works for five years before Mui found the cast she wanted.

Good stories take time to create, so I'm glad that there are a small number of series actually getting that time.

Okay, so!

Let's talk layering.

Thame's first words to Po are, "Are you a sasaeng?"

For the uninitiated, sasaeng fans are an ever-growing concern in celebrity spaces, and given how much leeway GMMTV has given to sasaeng behavior in the past, I'm surprised and glad to see them allowing them to be a negative plot point.*

*Truthfully, I don't think you can tell an authentic story about modern-day celebrities without at least mentioning the horrific effects that sasaeng culture have on them.

Later, we find out that Thame saw Po at the fan meeting, and Thame gives Po the options of quitting on his own or being fired after Thame exposes the footage he's found.

So now we've seen this fan meeting twice: once from Po's perspective as a job he did for a friend, and now from Thame's perspective noticing some guy in the crowd.

We're incrementally getting more information as it becomes relevant.

And then, finally, after Po convinces Thame that he isn't a sasaeng or even a fan, Thame reveals the part that matters most to the story going forward:

The reason he remembered Po is because, in a crowd of people screaming to get his attention for their own sake, Po was the only one trying to help someone else. And I think that's another hint at Po's character arc: Earn took advantage of his earnestness and his selflessness and hurt him deeply, but he shouldn't have to give up that gentle side of himself to be happy.

This third layer shows us the most important detail of this moment and why the episode keeps coming back to it: this brief memory meant something to Thame.

I think the reason Thame was so aggressive to Po in the office when they met for the first time wasn't just that Thame suspected Po was a sasaeng.

Look at Thame's face in that last screencap: it touched his heart to see someone he assumed was a fan helping a younger, smaller fan. In a cut-throat industry where fame is mercurial, the public is vicious, the media poisonous, and fans fickle, little moments of genuine humanity and kindness must be priceless to the celebrities at the center of it all.

So, from Thame's perspective, recognizing that same "fan" at his workplace? Thinking that fan was intentionally filming a vulnerable moment between him and the CEO? It probably spoiled that precious memory. Maybe even introduced the possibility that Po just used an innocent child that day to manipulate Thame's emotions.

How little does Thame have in his life? We don't know yet, but maybe little moments like that are all that's propping him up anymore.

And we can garner all of this from the gradual layering of one scene.

That one fleeting moment from their shared past shapes everything for Thame and Po going forward. For Po, he was doing a favor for a friend and added an offhand gesture to a child. But for Thame, it was a ray of sincerity in a dangerously murky world he seems to feel strangled by.

One of my favorite directing and character choices in this episode is that Thame is soft-spoken in both anger and vulnerability. He's so tightly controlled at all times because of his public-facing job, and he's in such a low place emotionally, but he hasn't lost his kindness, either. Once he knows Po isn't a threat to him or his fellow members, Thame compliments the work Po's done, and he asks Po to continue his documentary work.

Thame isn't Earn. Po projects that onto him and quickly learns he's wrong.

(I really hope earnestness ends up being one of the main motifs in this series, because it suits both characters so well, and the world they're both in now makes living earnestly extremely challenging.)

All in all, the first episode exceeded my high expectations. I loved the teaser, I loved the trailer, and I'm delighted with the first episode. I hope the rest of the series lives up to this level of quality, but I'm not worried.

Judging by the writing, I think this series is in good hands. <3

[maybe-boys-do-love]

Mix Sahaphap gets to perform (and has the performance chops to perform) in a style that I’ve never seen any other male actor get to embody. Mix gets to unironically play the #strongfemalecharacter. The Beatrice, the Elizabeth Bennett, the Jo March. Strong-willed, emotional, kind-hearted.

Not only do the plot points line up, but Mix, more than any BL actor I’ve seen, fully leans into the embodiment of this archetype. In his roles, he rolls his eyes, pouts, banters flirtatiously, softens his posture and expression at small details. He doesn’t over-exaggerate and imposition other characters but his face also doesn’t hold back his character’s thoughts and judgments. And when the moments arrive, he lets all the hurt and anguish pour out in shatters of tears and visible heartbreak—the star-counting scene, anyone????—in a way that harkens to the operatic emotionality of well-done melodramas, soap-operas, and their contemporary Thai equivalent of Lakorn. It’s only that these have never been men’s roles in those.

It’s no surprise that one of Mix’s roles—Cupid’s Last Wish—is explicitly a gender body-swap, and Tian in A Tale of Thousand Stars is (albeit explicitly denied within the show) heavily connected to gender body-swapping. What Mix specializes in as an actor, and does exceptionally well, has been defined as feminine. To depict a kind of queer expression in this style is novel because it’s not camp, it’s not okama, it’s not a soft or femboy, it’s not a BL twink (Mix has been mostly excluded from the schoolyards and quads of the BL universe except for a role as a senior crush in Fish Upon the Sky). It’s too sincere and too adult for any of that.

In Moonlight Chicken we get to see, without the pretense of gendered mysticism, this performance style’s seduction, warmth, wit, and explosiveness within the framework of a general gay form of expression. It says that this kind of femininity might just be a gay thing. Not all gay men exhibit it, obviously—queer men aren’t a monolith. Still, it gives us something to consider about how we observe performance of queerness on screen, especially in front of an audience that puts so much more emphasis on ships, heat, and pairing chemistry to assess how well they perform a BL role. Could we look for other features to judge performance of queerness instead of how well they kiss?

Seme and uke roles would be the major performance style categories loyal BL fans assess actors with, yet even within the archetype his character’s fill within BL narratives, Mix’s performances differ from the typical uke depiction in BL because he really doesn’t perform them as passive. Rather, Mix’s characters and his portrayal of them are dynamic and demanding. It certainly fits certain stereotypes of ukes (Gilbert!) and their gay stereotype equivalent of bottoms as pillow princesses and brats. Mix’s characters, though, have more drive, agency, and compassion than that, and he plays them with all of those currents running underneath.

We certainly have openly gay writer/director Aof Noppharnach to thank for writing this kind of queer character for Mix to play in Tian and Wen. But for Mix’s specific commitment to the performance starting off with his (debut!?) role in ATOTS, we first have Earth to thank for believing in Mix’s ability and recommending him to portray the role of Tian, and then Aof’s acceptance despite his differing initial expectations for the character. Mix, Earth, and Aof have all been open about how Mix in his personal life and nature holds a lot of similarities to both his role as Tian in ATOTS and Wen in Moonlight Chicken. Some people might knock points off his performances because he’s like them. But his relationship to the characters, rather than dampening my enthusiasm for Mix’s performances, helps me appreciate his willingness to give an authentic performance in a style that hasn’t been encouraged on screens previously. It’s made more impactful that he chose to risk vulnerability to bring something personal that had previously been excluded from screens because of its gender deviance (and in broader society explicitly condemned). This doesn’t make a claim on Mix’s actual identity, but simply shows his willingness to understand and perform the expressions of his queer characters with an effort at empathy that many other actors would feel challenged to bring.

Some actors are chameleons, but some actors have a gift of a type within which they can explore depths and range that no one else can best. For me, that’s what Mix does in his work when directors and casting understands his talent. There’s a BTS video of Mix actually fainting during a scene while in Earth/Phupa’s embrace on the mountain that immediately brought to mind the wildly famous final scene in the film Camille where Greta Garbo as Marguerite dies in her lover’s arms.

For Mix, it was a serious incident due to regrettably extreme conditions and requiring the on-set paramedics, but these levels of theatrics, for me, are emblematic of what Mix is capable of as a performer, as well. After all, he had to faint in Phupa’s arms multiple times on purpose. It’s the kinds of Old Hollywood and heightened sentimental romance realms Mix takes his performances to! Then he can turn around and make it look easy to take that same character into grounded quips or dedicated everyday tasks. It only takes writers, directors, and audiences willing to see that men can feel this way and act this way. Mix has paved the way.

[ordinarysandy]

“do you regret losing your powers?"

“i’d regret not loving you”

same, karan. cuz i would've swooped them into my arms and give them all i am if the one i've been waiting for all these years said that to me.

[talkingbl]

Why I Dropped Never Let Me Go (NLMG)

I dropped NLMG at Episode 10. Here's why.

Expectations

NLMG promised art, acting, and a story progression that eliminated filler and raised the stakes. And overall I expected a tight mystery where every action could have been foreseen with just a little attention to the right details. What I got fell shy of some things and, for other things, never delivered in the first place.

First, what I liked

The mise en scene (particularly the shot composition, cinematography and settings). Just look at some of these shots:

You could frame so many scenes from this show.

PondPhuwin still have some of the best chemistry in BL. Seriously, one of my favorite all time scenes from a GMMTV BL was early on in Episode 2 or 3 where Neung pulls Palm around a corner as he's being chased by bullies, and Palm creates this very palpable tension as he ogles Neung. It was so well done.

Let's move on.

Minor Gripes

I didn't need ChopperBen's storyline. Because it was only tangentially connected to the main plot, it made the story seem overly long and made it difficult to readjust to PalmNeung/the overall plot.

I wish GMMTV would stop trying to sell us stuff. I get that they have to make money but some things just felt too shoehorned in. And because this show is supposed to have a serious tone (we'll get to this later), it just pulls you out when you can tell an item is just there to sell products.

The inconsistent tone. For this show to deal with such a serious subject matter, it definitely had moments that seemed to belong in something more like My School President. I know this is something GMMTV likes to do a lot but I could never tell what we were going to get in a given episode. Don't get me wrong, I don't think the show should've been depressing the whole way through, but there was so much levity at times that it made the serious portions unbelievable and lose stakes.

Major Concerns

Pond's acting has improved...but not by much. All the parents were okay. Chimon was decent and Perth was excellent. But Pond and Phuwin? Honestly, I was a bit disappointed in the performances we got. Pond, while having improved since FUTS, had virtually no life behind his eyes. In some cases, this isn't a problem, but Palm is a very emotional character. There's this melancholy underlying Palm's sense of self that Pond couldn't quite grasp. Other than the scene where Palm blew up at his dad at the hospital, it was like he was acting like Pond playing Palm instead of just being Palm. His strongest scenes were when he first began discovering his crush on Neung. Everything else left a lot to be desired (with the hospital scene exception).

Phuwin's acting actively regressed. I'm not sure what happened with Phuwin between FUTS and now but I feel like the promise I once saw with him is all but gone. His acting is not acting, it's overacting. He's hitting dramatic beats like he's on broadway or playing a parody of Neung. I don't want to be too harsh--he's still only 19 after all--but it's wild to see given how much potential he showed in previous works. And I would chalk it up to discomfort in this particular role but his acting also seemed to have the same issues in The Warp Effect. My guess at this point is either he doesn't work well with Jojo or he needs to hit the acting classes a bit more.

Poor pacing. The switch pre-Thanya getting shot and post-Thanya getting shot was wild... We went from consistent story beats and a stable/logical distribution of screen time for different elements of the story to entire episodes dedicated to high school hijinks without actually advancing any meaningful plot point. There were episodes that consisted of 40% filler, episodes where a lot happened but nothing happened at the same time, etc. This completely killed any momentum the story built up during the first few episodes.

Ill-planned and meandering plot. All I have to say is Thanya getting shot felt unearned and unpaid off. I know that it's supposed to poise Neung to take the throne, but I don't think the thought behind the beat was well-executed. It didn't help that Neung seemed to only be effected by it for all of 10 minutes and we only learned she survived off-screen. Also, what kind of hitmen don't ensure that they've finished the job? Anyway, the whole going to Palm's mom's plot was strange and introduced more issues than it resolved, I think. Plus, those episodes were like one big beach episode.

Sketchy character writing. Chanon made no sense as a concept. He had more loyalty to Neung's dad than his own son, only to turn around and pretend that he's putting Palm in harm's way for Palm's own good. What sense does that make? Also, not a single character developed over the first 10 episodes outside of Chopper and maybe Neung. Like I should've also had some better insight into Palm that felt substantial. Instead I had no clue about who he really was deep down. What's the point in learning about someone (or their parents in this case) if we're never going to get inside their head to connect the dots? And even for characters we knew a lot about, they stopped making sense like immediately after Thanya was shot (i.e., Neung). I could really get into this but this post is long enough as-is.

In short, this story could've been amazing but it chose style over substance. Not sure if I'll ever finish it but open to being convinced.

[embodimentofwtf]

I know we are well acquainted with Dr.Mix Sahaphap's incredible acting skills. The man's performances are through the roof this early on in his career. It just keep getting better and better every time.

BUT

I feel the need to point out how absolutely beautiful his portrayal of adoration is. Like there is something so sacred about whoever is on the receiving end of that adoration. Like he's giving out so much love that it's draining him too.

He has the kindest baby cow eyes that always show so many emotions. Acting or not he puts the weight of his entire being into a single gaze when he adores someone and it is absolutely captivating. It will keep the receiver pinned while they feel the entire weight of that love almost bordering on worship.

It's truly beautiful.

[nakajimaatsushii]

My only motivation to study is "the faster I finish this chapter, the faster I can read fics about my fav ships"

And my only will to go to give exam is "the faster I come back from the exam, the faster I can read fics about my fav ships"

Try this method people, it works

[ordinarysandy]

THIS IS SO ME

[chicademartinica]

The title card was “Life” but damn the episode screamed greed and poverty ROT EVERYTHING. Betrayal, gambling, debt collecting, forced prostitution, extortion, P’Jojo did not play. Nueng solved this problem as his old self, with his money and status and this will be this action that will suck him back in. The I love yous and the delicious release of sex came AFTER he went back to being a triade heir.

[respectthepetty]

Do you think that maybe Palm took the alcohol away from Nueng not just because of his allergy but because he was afraid Nueng would lash out again?

Because that night started out exactly the same as the dance night with Palm happily watching Nueng play the piano only for Nueng to publicly belittle Palm.

Do you think about how Palm probably asked if Nueng had been drinking partially because he was worried but mostly because he believed Nueng would never touch him so tenderly if he was sober and clear-headed?

Because up until then, Palm had initiated most of their touches, and the times Nueng did touch him, he did so begrudgingly.

And do you think because of these previous experiences, Palm, who already loves Nueng, will always doubt that Nueng could like him let alone love him?

That Palm will never believe that Nueng would willingly want to be with a dog, a lackey, a servant who he didn't even want to be around before?

Do you think that's why Palm will easily believe Nueng when he pushes him away and yells this at him?

Or are you normal?

[ordinarysandy]

okay where are the english subs...

[ordinarysandy]

Everyone's talking about the rooftop kiss. But my mind is still stuck in the roti sai mai scene. Peak Southeast Asian teenage romance scene. Perfection, really. There is something with how Palm asks Nueng's preference on the quantity of stuffing and the latter replying, "Just make it the way you usually do." There is something with the hesitance (Palm) and confidence (Nueng) present, along with genuine acceptance and understanding creeping in slowly as they get to know each other. It's only a matter of time before it morphs into sheer passion and jumps out. Platonic kind-of sweet enveloping and complementing the even-sweeter romantic sweet, just like sweet roti wrapping the cotton candy.

[respectthepetty]

There is something about the show beginning in a restrained purple

And Nueng and Palm mainly existing in the purple...

You know what? Never mind! It's likely nothing! It's probably just the lighting for nighttime. Let's not be excessive.

but...

when Nueng thinks about Ben at night, he is lit by red.

Possibly because Ben brings more of the same normal red Nueng is usually surrounded by to Nueng's life

Well, at least until thoughts of Palm start to creep in

Because Palm gives blue

and takes red

And the purple appeared in the background during the daylight when Nueng was watching Palm while playing piano

Well, until he saw Maggie playing around with Palm. Then, Nueng blocked the purple

And he tried to cover it up with red by drinking into the night

While Palm remained highlighted by blue

The whole time Nueng was yelling at Palm, the purple was stifled, and the purple wouldn't appear again

Until Nueng called out for Palm

And it began to creep onto Nueng as he reached out to Palm

After the fight, Nueng woke up in the blue

And his mother showed him love in the purple

Something he has been missing from his mom since his father's death, and only gets from Palm

So he tried to apologize to Palm by buying Palm the shoes he wanted, but Palm was strictly in the muffled blue and not willing to take any red

But after Nueng was bullied at school, and Nueng verbally apologized to him, Palm was willing to give color love

But when they got home, the purple faded (pay attention to the color as they walk in)

As Nueng worried his mom would be disappointed in him as she sat strictly in the red

But, as before, she surrounded him with purple love

So maybe purple is love because we know blue boy + red rascal = pair purple and pink

Why else would the credits be in the spectrum of blues and reds making pink and purple?

Or it could all mean nothing.

Maybe cinematographer Rath Roongrueangtantisook who worked on 3 Will Be Free and A Tale of Thousand Stars just really likes purple. Maybe he likes it so much that hints of it were included in the OST. Maybe...

[aprilblossomgirl]

When I wrote about my favorite scenes of this episode this early morning between 2-4 am, it was easy to skip the obvious most favorite that is this specific of the finally eating together scene. It’s about Nueng saying he already had someone to prepare the Roti sai mai that he declined the uncle’s offer to help him. It’s about Palm willingness to prepare as many portions of roti as Nueng wants it. But it’s also about Nueng asking Palm to prepare it just the way he usually does, the way he likes it, for him to give it (back) to Palm for Palm to eat it together with him. And his face of absolute delight when watching Palm eat the roti (even at his request), was everything.

NEVER LET ME GO | ep. 2

Do you want a big or small stuffing? / Just make it the way you usually do. … Do you want to eat it? / It’s okay. / Why? Don’t you want to eat it with me?

[waitmyturtles]

Alright, happy Monday! As previously promised during my review of A Tale of Thousand Stars: in preparation for the eventual release of Moonlight Chicken, I would love to share in a long manifesto my love, my passion, the GOSPEL, for what I think may be the unsung hero and character of that show, without even seeing an episode – the actual dish of Hainanese chicken rice itself, which is known as khao man gai in Thailand.

(LONG POST! TL;DR: this post is going to contain a quick explanation of why it is SO BOMB that there’s a THAI BL that focuses ON THIS DISH, a description of the dish itself, a diasporic history of Hainanese chicken rice, links to a few recipes, and a list of places where I’ve had Hainanese chicken rice in the States.)

Borrowing a photo from Mark Wiens! Let’s get started.

Girl, why exactly are you going off on all this?

Why, oh why, you may ask – why should Mama Turtles wax POETIC about the seemingly simple dish of chicken rice? The simple name of the dish belies a deeply cultural symbol of so much – of the roles that particular dishes play in Southeast Asian cultures, of how such a dish can be so difficult to make AND to relate to, and at least most importantly to me, how immigration and diasporas created the complicated and diverse foodways and cultural fabrics that we see in this part of the world. 

(For the record, I’m part Malaysian, and have spent significant time of my adult life in Malaysia and Singapore. While these areas are not Thailand specifically, there’s tons of shared food preparation, culture, and appreciation from Thailand, down south to Penang and the Malay Peninsula, and down to Singapore.)

Why is khao man gai such a big deal vis à vis Moonlight Chicken?

Before I talk about the details of the dish itself, I want to set the context of why is it SO MOTHERBLEEPING LOVELY that there’s a Thai BL (with our DARLING Earth and Mix starring in it, with the DARLING First and Khao in supporting roles) that is ostensibly centered on a man making khao man gai. This is deeply heart-warming, soul-settling, feel-good shiz to me, and I think that a lot of Thai BL fujoshis who are obsessed with food, like me, would feel the same way. 

Hainanese chicken rice/khao man gai is made of the most humble of ingredients – chicken, rice, water, salt. 

The fact that there would be a queer series centered around a queer man making khao man gai and selling it to others – it means that a dish that is totally, utterly accessible to EVERY SINGLE PERSON in a country is being centered in a show focused on queer relationships….the kinds of relationships that should also be accessible to EVERY SINGLE PERSON who wants this kind of a relationship in an Asian country. 

This will make even more sense as I continue writing about the dish, but suffice to say, while it’s complicated to make, Hainanese chicken rice is about the most egalitarian food there is – and the freedom to love whoever you want should also be as egalitarian as that. 

What is Hainanese chicken rice/khao man gai, and what is the big bleeping deal about it?

Before I jump to Wikipedia, maybe I should have Earth himself explain the dish.

That last screenshot is truth.

Obviously, the easiest place to find a background on this dish is Wikipedia, and what I actually didn’t know before starting to type this up is that khao man gai literally means “chicken oily rice,” which totally sums up this dish. While it seems simple, it’s a very rich and filling dish, but also healthy-ish, because you’re still eating chicken, which is not the richest or fattiest of meats.

The dish consists of rice that’s first been sautéed with aromatics like ginger and garlic, and (in many, but not all cases) also sautéed with rendered chicken fat. (If you’re from the East Coast of the States or are part of a Jewish community, you’ll know this ingredient as schmaltz.)

That fatty sautéed rice is then steamed in chicken broth, ideally in chicken broth that you yourself made while you were boiling the chicken that you’ll use in your khao man gai. As far as that chicken goes, you’ve cleaned it, prepped it, maybe you rubbed salt on it to get rid of any impurities on the skin, and boiled it until it’s cooked, but not overcooked. If you’re in Thailand, you might just let it cool; if you’re in Malaysia or Singapore, or elsewhere in Asia, you might give that baby a dip in ice water after it’s done cooking, to tighten up the skin and give the skin a jellied texture that is beloved by many. You also might rub some sesame oil on your chicken after the boiling process, which is done in some, but not all, places.

You also might go wild and serve your rice not just with the boiled chicken, but also with roasted chicken, or fried chicken, or a combo of boiled/roasted/fried chicken. You ALSO might WILD OUT MORE and ALSO serve your chicken rice with, say, crispy siu yuk, which I’ve had, and like…. ooooommmmfffffgggg. It sends shivers down my spine, it’s so good.

You’ve also made the broth perfectly with aromatics, and possibly simmered either daikon or winter melon in the broth to serve alongside the composed dish of chicken and rice.

AND, you definitely best have made some side sauces. Garlic-ginger-vinegar sauce, maybe, or ginger-scallion oil, or red chili sauce, or all of them. In Thailand, a sauce that features taucu, or fermented yellow soybeans, seems to be an absolute must – and it is goddamn pure heaven to put on your khao man gai. If you’re in Malaysia, a small dish of vinegared chili, known as chili padi, is a must must. Depending on where you’re eating this in Asia, you’ll put a bottle of dark soy sauce on the table for drizzling over all your rice, but – you might not always see that at every place where you’re eating chicken rice.

In OTHER WORDS: this dish is a bit of a beast to make. The simple LOOK of the dish – white chicken on top of white rice, with some sliced cucumbers to the side, and a bowl of broth next to it – is totally disingenuous to the work you need to put in to make it taste great. Your broth, for instance, might be made by boiling chicken after chicken after chicken in it. That broth gets more concentrated and powerful over time as you’re putting in more and more aromatics in it. Your store is defined by your broth; by how perfectly each grain of rice is individually coated in a sheen of chicken fat, salt, and other seasonings; by your one-of-a-kind sauces that hit and accompany the chicken and the rice perfectly, and most importantly, by how all these components come together. If your soup, chicken, rice, and sauces are ALL PERFECTLY MADE, then you’ve hit paydirt, my friends. 

It’s VERY RARE to find a shop that does all these components perfectly, or at least at the same level of tastiness. 

Alright, so I get that this dish can be a motherfucker to make. But why is it such a big deal, culturally? Why would a Thai BL be focused on a guy making this dish?

So for this part, I first want to say that I think it’s very important for a Western audience to understand that this dish is deeply loved in MANY countries in Asia and Southeast Asia. I’ve eaten this dish with groups of Westerners in SE Asia – actually exclusively white folks, now that I think about it – and to a tee, I’ve heard complaints by them that this dish is boring and they can’t see what the big deal is about it.

I mean, American pork chops can be fine, or they can be boring, too. 

The fact that chicken rice spans multiple countries and foodways should tell a Western audience that there are qualities about it, as I listed above, that are far beyond the sum of its parts. For instance – the way to get each GRAIN of rice coated in fat and flavor takes years of experience. Y’all, I still can’t get perfect rice in my rice cooker, and I’ve been making rice for my family for more than 10 years. These things take time to perfect, and not everything one eats in Asia is going to be bombastic, like, say, Taiwanese stinky tofu or a gorgeous omakase at a high-end sushi bar.

Part of the reason why this dish is so beloved is because it IS very ubiquitous from the China-to-Southeast-Asia diaspora. I can mostly speak for Malaysia (I apologize for not knowing more about immigration patterns in Thailand), but MUCH of the fabric of Malaysian cuisine comes from specifically regional immigrant diasporas, namely from the area of China that is now known as Fujian, but that’s not a hard and fast historical rule. Well-known populations from this area in China that settled in Malaysia include the Hakka and Hokkien populations (you may have seen Hakka mee or Hokkien mee on Malaysian restaurant menus), and they also include the Hainanese population, which brought a style of boiling chicken in broth to the areas where the population settled – which include Thailand and Malaysia, and eventually Singapore, as Hainanese descendants moved farther south down the Malay peninsula. 

(By the way, if you’re ever curious, you need to read up on populations that were literally created after the first waves of Chinese immigration to Southeast Asia. The well-known Peranakan population in Malaysia, for instance, was literally created through interracial marriage of Chinese immigrants to native Malay populations, and a deeply important culture, including foodways, were born out of those marriages and population growth. It’s fascinating history in a world that often seems so hyperfocused on far right movements wanting “racial purity.” What cultural beauty comes out of populations and diasporas meeting each other and creating new cultures together.)

Back to the discussion: as Malaysian cultures and populations developed over time due in part to the influence of Chinese immigration through Southeast Asia, so, we assume, the same was happening in Thailand. (We can see deeply the effect of the influence of Chinese culture in a show like Big Dragon, which was centered around the telling of Chinese Buddhist myths through a Thai lens.) And as these immigrant populations from China traversed the Thai-Malay peninsula, their food habits stuck and were adopted by the native Southeast Asian populations. It’s no wonder that chicken rice became as beloved and ubiquitous as it did – in part because rice is a staple food across the whole region, in part because it’s such a comforting dish (like congee, like juk, like okayu porridge), and in part because the individual ingredients themselves are humble and easy to find for your everyday home cook.

I want to just quickly touch upon the point of rice as a staple food. It seems so super obvious to us Asians, but especially for fans of QL that may not be Asian and/or may not have rice as a central and everyday food – to make a dish like chicken rice perfectly, to have it center on the particular way in which you PREP and COOK the rice, for the rice to be all oily and salty and chicken-y – the dichotomy of how humble rice is with how GLORIOUSLY TASTY and filling the final result of chicken rice is, can really move you. There are thousands of other rice preparations out there that are just as beloved as chicken rice – from the Malaysian nasi lemak (literally “fat rice,” or rice cooked in coconut milk and served with delicious accompaniments) to Indian biriyani, to Japanese takikomi gohan or tamago kake gohan, to Korean bibimbap or gyeran bap – you get the point. Dishes that center on rice are just beloved. They just are, because rice is so fundamentally egalitarian and important to our everyday way of being and eating. 

AND, the way in which you EAT chicken rice – by mixing up the accompaniments throughout the eating process, dolling up each bite of rice with a different sauce, having a sip of soup, taking a bit of meat – that whole process of making each bite taste different allows you to have a whirlwind experience of eating with, again, very humble ingredients that end up being far more than the sum of their rice-meat-and-veg parts.

And so. When Chinese populations were immigrating throughout Southeast Asia, they brought with them, and adapted over time, a style of making rice with chicken and fat that, again, seemed so simple, but was so full of a kind of quiet and comforting flavor, that it HAD to be adapted by every country and population in which the Chinese immigrants had settled. The love for rice in the whole region was going to lead to a guaranteed adaptation of this dish for generations to cook and enjoy. 

Finally, regarding Moonlight Chicken once more – without having seen an episode yet, I want to offer some conjecture that I think (or hope) that the plot reflects the simple-but-complicated nature of the dish of khao man gai with whatever happens in the love triangles of Earth, Mix, First, and Khao. There might very well be love parallels that what seems to be simple is actually a beast to make, both in food and in relationships.

And regarding a cultural love for rice dishes, and the fact that this dish and a khao man gai establishment is at the heart of this show: it fills me up with so much comforting happiness that a khao man gai joint is what’s being used to center a theme of where people go to kick off the show. If you know of a great khao man gai joint – you go to it, people flock to it. The trailer shows drunk people stumbling around. If you’re drunk and hungry, you want to go to a place that gives you comfort, right? That might be a McDonald’s, a taco truck, a diner, a 24-hour Korean restaurant (ugh, anju at 2 am while you’re nursing your eventual hangover…memories). 

Khao man gai IS COMFORT, and IS comfort food. Earth’s character providing that comfort…I’m just saying, there HAS to be parallels between khao man gai and the storyline of Moonlight Chicken. THERE MUST BE. Let a girl dream!

Damn, girl. You went OFF. Take some Altoids. Give us some recipes!

Yes, this is definitely a manifesto of manifestos of an amazing dish.

These recipes mark the cultural landscape of this dish. I’ll note where the recipe comes from. I encourage you to review these recipes and check out the small-and-large differences in how this dish is made, depending on where in Asia the recipe is centered. (For instance, many of these recipes call for that ice bath that I mentioned earlier; that’s not ubiquitous in Thailand.)

Also, I want to note that as far as the side soup goes, I’ve only seen that Thai preparations of khao man gai GUARANTEE the soup on the side. I’ve seen some places in Singapore offer the side soup, but not all. The addition of daikon or winter melon to the soup, in Thai preparations, gives me the shivers, it is so good. So if/when you’re making this at home, keep in mind that you can choose to serve the broth/soup on the side.

Two last notes – this coming from me, a mom and busy home cook. I sometimes do a very bastardized version of this dish for my kids, where I poach chicken in aromatics, but I don’t sauté the rice beforehand – I just chuck the rice in my rice cooker with my poaching liquid. When I do this, I always freeze a half-quart to a quart of broth. Then, when I make the dish again, I take out that frozen broth, add it to my pot with my new chicken and water, and start poaching again. Having that base of previous broth really DOES help make my future chicken and soups taste that much richer. 

AND – while I have daikon available in my supermarket (thank you, big cities!), I often use turnips as the veg that I serve with the broth. I LOVE turnips in soup, y’all! Turnips in chicken soup are oniony without being overwhelming, and I love how translucent and creamy they get. They totally hold the flavor of broth beautifully. Next time you’re making soup, don’t leave the turnips behind, they’re great! (Oh, and also, a tip I learned from the Kinou Nani Tabeta mangas – I also use leeks as an aromatic in my soup, along with garlic and ginger. Leeks are AMAZING in soup! They can help take away any gaminess you might get from poaching chicken or other meat.)

Okay, recipes!

The Woks of Life (China)

Food 52 (Thailand)

Mark Wiens (Thailand)

Rasa Malaysia (Malaysia)

Adam Liaw (Singapore-ish recipe, note the use of sesame oil for rubbing on the chicken after the ice bath – not all recipes call for this)

Kwokspots (maybe we can call this a ubiquitously Asian recipe? I actually just love this dude on IG, I’m gonna hype up his recipe)

Um, this is a lot. Where can I order this dish?

In my post about A Tale of Thousand Stars, I referenced Eim Khao Man Gai in Elmhurst, Queens, NY (see footnote below). I unfortunately only know places to eat Hainanese chicken rice/khao man gai in either NY or SoCal, but I ENCOURAGE you to please seek it out wherever you live. 

Over the years, even while I’ve lived thousands of miles away from New York, Eim Khao Man Gai is my restaurant par excellence for khao man gai. It’s all they serve, and they do it SO well. Eim Khao Man Gai also does their chicken three ways – steamed, roasted, and/or crispy. You guys, it’s just heavenly, and their side sauces are to die for.

In SoCal, Savoy Kitchen was the first place I heard of that specialized in chicken rice, and it’s incredible here. As well, I love Side Chick at the Westfield Santa Anita mall in Arcadia. I’ve eaten a bunch at Ipoh Kopitiam in Alhambra, but I haven’t tried their Singapore-style Hainan chicken rice yet – it looks amazing, and many reviews say that it’s currently best version in the San Gabriel Valley. 

Back to New York for a second – if you’re looking for a place more local to you that isn’t in Queens, just look at Yelp. If I lived in NYC now, I would be in tears with how much more available this dish has gotten over the years.

Wherever you are in the States – the Bay Area, Texas, anywhere where there are significant Asian populations – or wherever you are in the world, please seek out Hainanese chicken rice/khao man gai.  Again, it may not LOOK exciting on the menu. But you’ll get a taste for the kind of comfort food that really hits home for so many of us Asians.

Holy shit. You must be exhausted!

WOW WOW WOW, y’all. If you’ve gotten THIS FAR – bless you! Thanks for going on this road with me. Please make, buy, and/or eat Hainanese chicken rice/khao man gai. Appreciate the differences of the dish from each of the cultures that you’re eating it from. Please give big hugs to GMMTV for focusing a BL on this most humble, beautiful, delicious, soul-satisfying dish. I’m hoping for all the food/love parallels. I’m dying to see Mix just snarf on a big plate of khao man gai to kick the series off.

Moonlight Chicken is gonna be SO GREAT! And chicken rice is just the best dish ever. Please enjoy it!

* * *

If you have the energy to read a little further, one more urge from your devoted food mom here. @secretsfromwholecloth​ noted in a comment on my ATOTS review that ae and aer friend had actually hit up Eim Khao Man Gai, which was SO RAD to read. If you have never visited NYC before, and you’re plotting your itinerary of the usual tourist stops – I beg you to please save at least an afternoon to hop on the 7 train and head out to Queens. Queens has some of THE BEST RESTAURANTS in NYC. From Indian and Tibetan in Jackson Heights, to Thai and Filipino food in Elmhurst and Woodside, to Greek in Astoria, to Korean in Bayside and Flushing, and the monolith that is Flushing’s Chinatown – Queens is the happiest and fucking coolest diverse place in the world. Don’t be afraid to leave Manhattan for an afternoon or even a whole day. Eat everything during the day, hit up Flushing Meadows Corona Park for some exercise, check out the Queens Museum and the awesome Noguchi Museum, unwind at a cocktail bar in Long Island City or Sunnyside at night. Queens is totally the unsung best borough in NYC, one of the most diverse counties in the States, and I’ll stand up for Queens County every minute of my life over Manhattan.

[tinnchan]

Earth Pirapat and Mix Sahaphap as Jim and Wen in Midnight Series - Official Teaser