When Ussanee “Au” Sanmueangchin moved to Berwyn nine years ago to study English, she missed the taste of sticky rice and black beans in sweet coconut milk. She grew up eating this dessert in Bangkok, but in Chicago khao niao thua dam was nowhere to be found. She asked her mother for help, and found some recipes online, but it just wasn’t the same.
De Pinha developed a number of now classic desserts based on Portuguese antecedents, such as khanom mo kaeng, an eggy coconut milk and wheat flour custard topped with crispy fried shallots; and foi thong: golden threads of yolk boiled in syrup, one of nine “auspicious” sweets served on special occasions. Many of these yellow-colored eggy desserts form a branching family of variants frequently designated with the prefix thong, meaning golden.
“Some of these are very old-fashioned desserts that are rare in the U.S. and becoming rarer in Thailand too,” says Punyaratabandhu. “They can be found more easily at fresh markets in rural areas. In a city like Bangkok, you have to zero in on a few stores that specialize in traditional Thai desserts. It’s a dying art.”
Maybe the most labor-intensive sweet on the menu at Habrae is the khanom chan, blossom-shaped steamed cakes ideally built in nine layers of alternating colors. It’s one of those nine auspicious desserts, and it’s particular fun for kids to pull apart layer by layer, according to Prasitporn. At Habrae Cafe, he says they really only have time to make khanom chan with three layers, but with proper ordering you can make the math lucky:
