Shat Jam is a very popular kind of rice salad, a mixture of rice, meat, chilli, phatphae (a plant which is good for the digestive system) and pepper.

CITIES and countries can be as well-known for their food as they are for their sights. While Myanmar is synonymous with mohinga, Italy (pizza), India (chapatti) and Japan (sukiyaki) are all examples of countries that are renowned for their food.

This could be because food is strongly linked to memory; a bad experience while eating a particular food (food poisoning, for example) can create a taste aversion that lasts for a lifetime. Good experiences can bring back a flood of happy memories every time you tuck into that pizza, burrito, block of chocolate – whatever it may be.

It’s not surprising that a country as ethnically diverse as Myanmar has a host of interesting and delicious foods. Here, we recommend some well-known Myanmar dishes from all corners of the country. If you take note of which dishes suit your particular taste, it shouldn’t be difficult to enjoy a meal wherever you are travelling in Myanmar.

Kachin Food
Kachin foods are rich in herbs and spices and the tribal people believe their dishes are particularly good for health. In most of their recipes, Kachin use either kyauk gin (a type of ginger), magrant (a kind of bark), thittone kat hmo (a type of mushroom which grows on logs) or ngarhnyiyweik (a kind of plant which is good for blood circulation) as seasoning. Most of the curries are spicy and hot but it’s not surprising given Kachin live near icy mountains.

Shat Jam is a very popular kind of rice salad, a mixture of rice, meat, chilli, phatphae (a plant which is good for the digestive system) and pepper. If you suffer from loss of appetite, you can’t help eating it due to its combination of herbal flavours.

Bamaw fish noodles is another dish almost every Kac-hin person loves. The rice noo-dles with fish curry, fried tofu, fried ground chick peas and fried pounded fish are served with salted bamboo shoot.

A good place to try Kachin food in Yangon is Malikhu, on Myaynigone Zay Road in Sanchaung township.

Talabaw soup is an all-time favourite of Kayin people.

Kayin Food
As most of the people in Kayin state are farmers, they often cook very simply. They pick whatever vegetables are in season and cook them in a particular Kayin style.

Talabaw soup is an all-time favourite food of Kayin. To cook talabaw, you put all the ingredients – eggplant, onion, garlic, raw fish, bamboo shoots and grilled rice powder – into boiling water. You can also add your favourite vegetables. Pepper and parsley are also added to the thick soup to give a better taste. If you can feel your mouth watering while you’re reading about talabaw soup, you can enjoy this delicious soup at Padonmar Restaurant on Inya Road in Kamaryut township.

Another famous meat curry is tarhaepho, a watery and greasy curry with meat, peas, chilli, garlic and lemon grass. It is a little spicy but it goes well with warm rice.

Spicy papaya salad is a popular Rakhine food.

Rakhine Food
As Rakhine generally live along the coast, they commonly use seafood in their traditional cooking. They rarely use oil but shrimp paste and chilli are commonly associated with Rakhine food and often the dishes are spicy and salty.

They often eat fresh seafood like prawn, crab, octopus and fish without any spices or seasoning powders, leaving a natural kind of taste.

Rakhine moteti is an extremely popular dish that features rice vermicelli, eaten either with condiments or a soup prepared from shrimp paste and fish. Some use ready-made vermicelli but most prefer freshly-boiled vermicelli.

Sanae thoke is a vermicelli salad with boiled fish, shrimp paste, tamarind juice and chilli.

All the famous Rakhine foods are available at Minn Lan Moteti, a Rakhine food centre in Yangon that has been open for more than nine years and has an extensive range of seafood cooked in the Rakhine style. Minn Lan Moteti is located at the corner of Parami Road and West May Kha Street in Mayan-gone township.

Mon Food
Thingyan rice is a particularly popular Mon dish of rice boiled in flavoured water and served with mango salad and crisply fried shreds of dried fish. If you are getting bored of plain rice, thingyan rice will certainly be something a bit different to try.

If you like to combine distinctive flavours, than ngabaung doke is the dish for you.

Made from steamed mixed vegetables, fish and prawn, ngabaung doke is served wrapped in both a morinda leaf and banana leaf and is served hot.