Summary
Netflix series Street Food offers nine locations, giving the audience fascinating insight into different cultures and food.
Often when I watch a documentary about food, it’s usually early morning, when I’m hungry, and a tad moody, and I make my life even more miserable by watching steaming hot and tasty looking food on my screen. I made the same mistake with Netflix series Street Food Season 1. As I crammed a few segments of oranges in my mouth, I had a sudden urge to open up my Uber Eats app and order less-quality food. I’m British after all.
Due to my English city upbringing, I usually associate street food with what I see on the random market stalls that are put out a few times a year, or when the famous Christmas Markets arrive at Manchester. Recently, I went to the Trafford Centre, and near the food court, there are a few restaurants that claim they sell “street food”. When you watch Netflix’s Street Food, you realize the experiences you are missing out on, unless you travel to the right areas.
In the opening episode, you are introduced to veteran street food chef Jay Fai in the streets of Bangkok, Thailand. Jay Fai is the type of person to admire when it comes to work ethic; she works through tiredness, and her entire business has been built upon sleepless nights, and the independence of cooking on her own, ensuring that each dish is done to perfection. Street Food gives us that realism of what an actual vendor looks like on the street; a few pots and pans, and a single stall with queuing customers. Not a pretend street food restaurant you’ll find with digital till and fobs you’ll find in a shopping mall. Street Food wants to show you how street it is, and the cultural windows it provides are fascinating.
The Netflix docuseries is easy-on-the-eye, but it serves as a warning that it’s not recommended that you watch this hungry. At times I could not believe how delicious some of the simple dishes looked. Once the Netflix series visits Thailand in the first episode, it moves to Osaka Japan, and then Delhi, India. You are served nine different locations, with different, but similar stories and upbringings. If there is an understandable takeaway from Season 1, it’s that street food is all about pride.
