hello, i'll be going to thailand next year for a year studies and i was wandering how much does it cost for a meal around bangrak, bangkok. could someone tell me the average cost so that i could make a budget ?

You can eat street food for around about 25-30 baht a meal. You can get it cheaper, say 20 baht and more expensive, around 40-50 baht, but thats about average for noodle dish or rice dish.

If you eat at slightly 'better' places than off the street, say a basic Thai restaurant (nothing too plush) you might be paying 70-150 baht for a meat of fish dish with serving of rice at 5-10 baht on top of that.

It depends on how much you eat but I can eat quite easily for 100 baht a day, though often I choose not too coz at the end of the day it can be a bit monotonous and I'm sure like me you'll have to at some point eat a bit more farang style food, your potatoes, breads, cheeses etc.

Best thing to do is to get some basic cooking untensils, you can buy an electric wok for 300-400 baht and do quite a lot with them. Or a set of hotplates is useful, set you back about 600 baht. Foods cheap in the supermarkets and street markets and its easy to learn a few basic recipes especially if you want to eat some cheap farang food.

I can proudly knock up a couple of chicken kievs with mashed potatoes all with a single wok for about 70-80 baht!

Beefs cheap as well, so steak and mash can be done for a simlar price. I suppose a lump of steak sized meat will cost you about 50 baht, not the best flavoured meat in the world but if you have a bit of flare you can flavour it up nicely.

Its easy when budgeting to think your gonna go 'commando' and live on 100 baht a day for food, but its not always that nice to eat like that everyday and have to restrict yourself all the time.

If you are trying to make a real cheap food budget then at least chuck a 100 baht a day on top of it just so you can get those extra foodstuffs that you WILL want from time to time. Be generous with your food budget, and if you dont spend it all, money saved aint it. More for the beer!

Hope that helps dude.

hey thanks a lot. it really helps. before this i don't even have any idea how much it will cost. thanks cheers

Great post bkkmadness! Like you I have moved a bit more towards cooking myself. A couple of chicken breasts, some mashed potato or pasta and a decent sauce and one has a great filling meal cooked in a few minutes. Cheers!

Very good post bkkmadness. You come up with some gems at times.