How To Say Delicious In Thai: 21 Plus Ways
Original blog post: https://ling-app.com/th/delicious-in-thai/ (with audio🔊)
Thailand is known for its incredibly tasty food. So when you’re in Thailand and want to compliment the chef at a restaurant, you’ll need to know how to say delicious in Thai!
Like in English, there are different ways to express how delicious Thai food is, and everyone has their preference for why the food tastes good.
People in Thailand find these flavors particularly tasty; spicy, sour, sweet, bitter, and salty. While you might not agree, you find locals expressing how the food is especially tasty in Thai.
Most of the time, Thai people openly express that food tastes good. You’ll rarely hear anyone outright say that food tastes awful or isn’t delicious, as that’s considered rude in Thai culture.
It’s considered rude! Privately if someone knows you well, they might warn you that something isn’t delicious, but it’s polite to try it anyways.
Alright, let’s learn all the different ways to say delicious in the Thai language.
The Best Word For Delicious In Thai You Can Use In Any Situation
In the west, people tend to reserve delicious for really tasty, mind-blowing food, but in Thailand, the word is used to describe practically any meal.
One of the most common ways to say you like the dish you’re eating is:
Delicious in Thai: อร่อย (aa-raawy)
To express this statement properly, you must add a particle at the end of the word. For females, the term is ค่ะ (kha), and more males, its ครับ (khrap).
This particle is required at the end of every sentence you speak in Thailand, so be sure to remember it!
With the added particle to say delicious in Thai would be:
อร่อยค่ะ (a-raawy ka)
อร่อยครับ (a-raawy khrap)
Degrees Of Deliciousness In Thailand
As mentioned, it’s quite impolite to say that food in Thailand isn’t good, but there are situations where you would give your opinion such as to a close friend.
There are also different levels of deliciousness just as there are in other languages, and here they are:
Quick Thai Grammar Lesson
In Thai, the order of nouns and adjectives is reversed. So instead of, ‘The food is delicious (noun + adjective) in Thai, you would say, ‘Delicious food is’ (adjective + noun).
Therefore:
- อาหารอร่อย (aa-haan aa-raawy) — Delicious food
How To Say The Food Looks Delicious In Thai
Sometimes you may want to comment on food you see or at a friend’s meal.
People always do this towards a meal they want to eat or simply think it looks good to eat another time. These are the best ways to comment on how food looks in Thai:
- น่ากิน (naa gin) — That looks like it would be nice to eat
- น่าอร่อย (naa aa-raawy) — That looks like or smells like it would taste good
How To Ask If The Food Is Delicious In Thai?
As a tourist or someone who hasn’t tried many Thai dishes, you may want to inquire whether the food will taste delicious.
Fair enough, but be aware that no one will tell you it doesn’t taste good. Here’s how you can ask anyways:
- อร่อยไหม (aa-raawy mai*) — Is it delicious?/Is it good?
*ไหม (mai) — is a Thai question word used at the end of a sentence to turn a sentence into a question.
Typical responses:
- อร่อย (aa-raawy) — It’s delicious / It’s good
- ไม่อร่อย (mai aa-raawy) — It’s not delicious / It’s not good
How To Express That The Food Smells Good In Thai
Thai cuisine is packed full of flavor. Thais love spicy food and use lots of sauces to make your mouth water as you pass by food at local food markets.
As you pass by, you may want to say, ‘That smells so good!’
To talk about the smell in Thai, all you need is one simple Thai word to express all scents, and it’s:
- หอม (hom) — smells nice
You could also say this phrase, although it’s less common:
- เตะจมูก (dteh-ja-muuk) — Smells good
The Five Thai Flavors
Along with Thais loving to eat spicy food, they also love 4 other flavors, which may or may not be your liking.
Sugar is the main ingredient in many restaurants, and you’ll find the food you’re used to not being sweet are overly sweet here in Thailand. The same is true for salt. Thai people love salty-tasting dishes!
Another interesting preference they have is to eat bitter and even sour food.
Here’s how to can say the 5 main Thai flavors:
1 — Spicy/Hot
- เผ็ด (ped)
2 — Sweet
- หวาน (waan)
3 — Bitter
- ขม (kom)
4 — Sour
- เปรี้ยว (ppriao)
5 — Salty
- เค็ม (kem)
Well, There You Have It!
You’ve learned many words and phrases to express deliciousness in Thai when you visit Thailand or even a Thai restaurant in your home country.
There are plenty of other useful vocabularies for you to learn Thai, such as Thai numbers, so you know how much to pay for your food.
You may also like to know the various ways to say hello in Thai so you can greet waiters or food stall cooks to let you know you’re ready to order.
Ling app is a great language learning buddy that you can have in your pocket at all times to help you practice your Thai.
You’ll learn the meaning of many more words, and speaking even just a bit of Thai will get you far here in Thailand.
What are you waiting for?! Get learning Thai right now!
