Southern Thailand's Food Capital — the street food crossroads of the Thai-Malay border, where Hat Yai fried chicken is a national institution
Hat Yai is the commercial capital of southern Thailand and one of the country's great street food cities — a city where Thai, Chinese, and Malay food traditions intersect in night markets, hawker stalls, and dim sum shops that run around the clock. Hat Yai fried chicken (gai thod Hat Yai), crisped in shallots and served with sticky rice and sweet chili, is the city's most famous dish and has become one of the most recognized Thai comfort foods. The Lee Garden walking street, Kim Yong Market, and the Wat Hat Yai Nai temple with its massive reclining Buddha draw visitors from across Malaysia an…
Hat Yai's rapid growth is largely a 20th-century story. The town was platted in 1917 to service the railway junction on the main line south to the Malaysian border, and grew as a transshipment point for rubber and tin. A major Chinese business community established itself around the railway, creating the commercial district that still defines the city center. The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami impacted the southern Thailand coast, and ongoing political tensions in the four southernmost provinces — where Hat Yai sits in the buffer zone between central Thailand's authority and the pre…