In this case, you should just avoid eating Asian dishes, as combining seafood with various meat is common practice. What you are criticizing here is culture, not careless or amateur chefs, especially you are talking about street food. As others has pointed out, fish sauce, oyster sauce and shrimp paste is used in many dishes, from Thai, Vietnamese to Chinese.
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So a Ribeye steak made at a high end hotel in Bangkok seared in a wok previously used for prawns is perfectly ok and professional behaviour and part of a Thai culture, that I should respect 100% ?
Hmmmmm………I can build on that thought and transfer it to Danish food culture and in the back of my head hear voices calling out how only danish moronic amateur chefs would not know how to handle foreign food cultures……
For higher end restaurant, that’s an interesting question. If a dish isn’t a mixed protein, they need to think of allergy problem, they should use separate woks. In theory, that’s why there is a cost to be a 2 stars Michelin. Although in reality, I wonder how closely a restaurant will respect this, even a higher end one. Also, need to check if the chef has used fish sauce to marinate the meat.
On the street food level, I don’t think they are capable to accommodate this request, I believe they will just tell you to eat somewhere else.
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Not related to your Asian food OP. I see a recent trend of higher end more creative French chef mixing proteins with the theme terre et mer.
In France, I see in many places (actually usually lower end ones) when they are making wonton dumplings, separated into pork or shrimp options. Originally this Cantonese dumpling consists of both pork and shrimp and the broth has fish as ingredient. I believe the large population of Muslim’s not eating pork is the main reason of this change.
Hi Claus. I just want to be clear. Are we talking about the unintentional addition of seafood into dishes (like not thoroughly washing and cleaning cookware) or are we talking more about intentional additional seafood ingredient like using fish sauce for flavoring or adding dried shrimps in making stock?
For the first kind of issue, that problem will be much less in a higher end restaurant. For the second kind of issue, I think the restaurant and you will need better communication and understanding. To me, the usage of seafood as seasoning is pretty common in Southeast Asia. So much so I may even put it in the same level as use of soy sauce in Chinese and Japanese cuisines, or use of turmeric and chili for Indian cuisine.
This got me thinking that cross contamination is tough to avoid in certain cooking. For example, deep frying can be a tough one. A restaurant may not able to separate shellfish, fish, chicken, pork, potato into many deep fryers.
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A few thoughts come to mind…
(1) if it’s a common experience in Bangkok perhaps it can be attributed to
Thailand-izing the dish like restaurants in the west do by adding flavors more familiar to that market. **
(2) maybe we should be questioning the Michelin standards
(3) in my experience - street food is, well, street food everywhere. Locals grab it on their lunch breaks or on their way home for their meal or for just a quick snack.
**A partner owns a Bangkok restaurant who adds a few drops of fish sauce to their chicken soup just before serving. Maybe they’re on track for a Michelin star!! woot woot.
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I’m talking about the unintentional addition and unintentional mixing of seafood and pork/chicken in stir fry noodle dishes.
I’m fully aware of dishes where seafood and other types of meats are mixed into each other.
My problem is when I order a chow mein/fried noodle dish with chicken I don’t want the dish prepared/cooked in a wok, that moments before has been used to make a dish with seafood.
Same applies to the ribeye steak I was served at a fancy restaurant in Bangkok. It tasted of prawns and it was prepared in a wok, that moments before had been used for a dish with prawns in it.
That’s sloppy amateur behaviour by the so called chef.
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Curious, did you complain? Also, did you precise when you placed your order for no seafood?
We once went to a restaurant in Paris, it was a one-star at the moment of dining, but became 2-stars a few months later, it served carte blanche menu. The server asked if we had allergy or food we didn’t eat. H said truffle. I don’t know if the server thought my husband was joking or what. Every dish had truffle in it.
Another time, we went to a bib gourmand (or 1 star?) place for French Chinese fusion food with a few friends, same question asked by server for allergy, friend replied pork. Then came the dim sum with PORK. I noticed it right away but didn’t want to create a scandal at the table as friend has eaten everything already. I went to backroom to complain to maître d’, she apologized profoundly. Obviously, the first server didn’t transmit the message to the kitchen.
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Or… perhaps your narrow world-view leads you to question practices that are common in other cultures?
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I wouldn’t expect someone selling street food would have access to a place to wash woks easily with clean water in some parts of SE Asia.
Is some of the wok hai is a result of the seasoning of the wok? I have no idea.
One wouldn’t wash an iron skillet with dish soap between fried seafood and bacon. Many people never use dish soap on skillets because it damages the seasoning that the skillet builds up. (I clean mine with dish soap then oil it)
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When you order a Ribeye steak at a restaurant you don’t need to specify that you don’t want it to taste like prawns in my part of the world.
Unless it’s specified on the menu card, that their ribeye steak is infused with a wonderful prawn/seafood taste, the restaurant should stick to the common basics and sear the Ribeye steak WITHOUT infusing it - deliberately or not so deliberately - with a seafood flavour.
On top of that I ordered the steak medium and it came seared to well done. And this was at a high class Michelin restaurant in Bangkok.
This thread is not made to talk fusion between seafood and other type of meats down. On the contrary, you can then expect the dish to taste like a blend or fusion of these flavours.
This thread was made to point out how commonly you can expect street food places and even restaurants to unintentionally to mix and blend seafood flavours into dishes where seafood flavours have no place.
This happens if you for instance deep fry prawns in the same deep fryer using the same batch of oil as you would later prepare deep fried chips.
It’s that behaviour I call sloppy and amateurish.
If you can’t wash your carbon steel wok between servings of different dishes or at least have two separate carbon steel woks at hand, one for seafood and another one for non-seafood, I would avoid that restaurant or street food place at all cost.
It’s unprofessional sloppy INTENTIONAL lazy amateur behaviour to make all types of dishes day long in the same wok.
The people selling street food don’t have the facilities, time or money to wash woks between orders.
They are street food professionals. They aren’t making tons of money- they’re trying to make a living, and the profits are marginal for street food vendors in most parts of the world. They aren’t running restaurants because they don’t have those sorts of resources.
Most people who enjoy street food lower their expectations in terms of cleanliness, compared to a Michelin star restaurant kitchen.
I’m sure Denmark, like Germany, Sweden, Austria, has very clean restaurant kitchens relative to other parts of Europe and other parts of the World. When one grows up in a very clean spotless culture, it’s probably difficult to accept when some cultures allow more chaos into their restaurant and streetfood culture.
A Dane would go broke trying to sell street food while washing woks between orders in SE Asia. 
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Perhaps so, but it’s still not an excuse for sloppy amateur behaviour.
I’m allergic to certain types of shellfish and if I order a dish with chicken and noodles, I hardly should expect the dish to taste like prawns.
You’re coming across as a fussy, judgmental person.
People who have allergies to seafood, peanut, sesame and garlic, and severe dislikes/ religious beliefs/other beliefs that prohibit pork or shellfish have to be careful with Asian restaurants.
Anyone with a sesame or shrimp allergy knows this.
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Using culture as an excuse for sloppy lazy amateur behaviour in a professional kitchen setting is hardly the proper argument here.
“Dear guest, here’s your unintentionally prawn infused ‘well done ruined’ seared Ribeye steak - you did ask for it to be Medium, right !?!”
I just simply found the reason why I don’t like the taste of most Asian street food - they intentionally flavour everything with seafood because they could not be bothered with using 2 separate woks for separate servings - because they have more respect for making fast money instead of trying to avoid mixing flavours, that should not have been mixed in the first place.
I think I found the reason why my own home made stir fry chow mein noodle dishes taste better than anything else out there.
I have the time, heart, proper technique and dedication to actually care about the taste of what I prepare.
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I think this is why Asian restaurants alter their foods to please their non-Asian clientele, and often have a separate menu for Asian clientele.
One relatively horrible Thai restaurant run by white people in Toronto had a checklist, so people who dislike cilantro, dislike tamarind, dislike peanuts, dislike shrimp and/or dislike garlic could order Pad Thai and other Thai dishes without those ingredients. The restaurant is no longer in business.
I have been to restaurants where I, as a white woman, ask for a certain dish, and I’ve been told I’m white so I won’t like that dish.
At dim sum one time, I asked for crystal wrapper dumplings with seafood and chives , which I prefer to har gow, and the woman pushing the dim sum cart told my friend I was white so I would like the har gow. Apparently while people generally love har gow, unless they hate shrimp.
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