Aunty Nok's meatballs in front of the Burirum train station
The whole area filled with Stand and Eat meatball stalls
I quite liked this one shop.
A few different types of meat balls to choose from.
Meatballs and Thai style small hotdogs.
Some shop served in a plastic bag
Meatballllllss
Heard of Blackpink? a super duper famous South Korean girl group that one of the girls, Lisa, is actually from Thailand. Yeah, I was a little surprised too.. but no, that's not the point. This Thai girl, Lisa is from the province in Thailand called Burirum which I happened to visit recently.
Why Stand and Eat MEATBALLS (ลูกชิ้นยืนกิน)?
Here'e the story, to be living away from home for so long, some reporters ask her what she misses most about Thailand and she answered, 'I miss the Stand and Eat meatballs by the railway in Burirum, my hometown'. That one sentence makes things gone wild! All Thai people suddenly want some of those meatballs and it became popular and famous overnight! They talk about it on the news, people go to Burirum to try it, and a lot of Stand and Eat meatballs popped out here and there now they have like, 10+ of those by the railways.
How do I know you ask..? I have just visited!
What's the Stand and Eat MEATBALLS anyways?
ลูกชิ้นยืนกิน Pronounce 'Look Chin Yuen Kin' means Stand and Eat Meatballs
It's exactly like it sounds. You buy those meat balls, you stand right there and eat them! The unique way of eating is that you get one skewer, eat it, get another skewer, eat it.. on and on till you're done. A seller then count the skewers and charge you accordingly. That's where the fun is, I guess.
Other than that, it's also unique in term of the taste. Normally, this kind of meat balls come with a specific sweet and sour sauce (with a little spiciness from chilli flakes). Here in Burirum, they make it a little special by putting some smoked chilli sauce in it as well. Now it has such interesting smoked scent and flavor as well. That's a charm of it.
Stand and Eat MEATBALLS (ลูกชิ้นยืนกิน) in real life!
We went to Burirum. Nope! Not because of the thing but when we're there, I just realized it's there so we went straight to the Burirum Train station to find it and most likely give it a try.
When we arrived to the train station, I was like, 'OMG, what is this!!'. I imagined it was just a small street food stall or something but this, turn out it's a whole area with its own tent with various stalls (10+ !) with this big sign on top of it 'Stand and Eat MEATBALLS (ลูกชิ้นยืนกิน)'. I mean, it's crazy huge and that's not what I expected.
Anyways, we asked around to see which one is the original one but no one dare to answer that question. I then look it up online and see which one exactly, still a few different answers so I remembered a few good names and them gives a few stalls a try.
$0.03 per skewer. You heard that right!
This is another surprise. One skewer costs 3THB ($0.03) and 7 for 20THB. All stalls set the same prices. That's such a number to make us buy again and again easily so yes, we kept trying different ones.
Honestly, I think the meatballs probably are the same and if it's different, it's just very slightly bit that you can't even tell. Though, what makes they are distinguished from one another are their own sauce recipes. Every place got that smoked chilli sauce in their sauce but the tastes are different as per other ingredients.
I think we quite like the shop 'Aunty Nok' right at the entrance. She serves the meatballs in a bowl, topped with the sauce and with a few kinds of veggies. Quite good.
Talking about meat balls though, because of how inexpensive the meatballs are, just don't expect them to be 100% made of meat. It's a lot of flour and other things. BUT, is it delicious? I think it is! Goes so well with the sauce and veggies all together too. I can imagine it's a great snack after school, during lunch break or for that rush hours before taking a train ride. No wonder why Lisa, the Blackpink girl named this thing out of all the million things she could have named.