Six years ago, Som arrived in Pai. Now, after making the small mountain town her home, she has put her name above the door of a new bar and restaurant.
Sort of.
Because while the sign outside says The Orange, the name is rather more personal than it first appears.
“Som means orange in Thai,” she explains. “So I suppose I named it after myself.”
That’s true, as far as it goes. Som’s husband used to be a redhead — a proper ginger, before the years and the Thai sun did what they do to a hairline — and whenever the couple are back in London, one of their regular stops is The Orange, a pub in Pimlico. An orange wife, a former ginger husband and a favourite pub half a world away: put them together and, apparently, you get The Orange. It was either that or The Bald Farang. Som won the argument.
The Orange opened its doors at the beginning of October and, a few weeks in, is beginning to find its feet. The idea is simple: good food, cold drinks, good music and somewhere people actually want to spend time, in a space built for lingering rather than passing through.
For Som, it is the latest chapter in a life she has built in Pai over six years. She already runs Buddyfluff, a small business selling products for dogs, but opening a bar and restaurant is something altogether different — though anyone who has seen how she looks after a dog will have some idea how she looks after a room full of people.
The menu gives a good indication of what she has in mind. At its heart are pies, with a line-up that runs from minced beef and steak and onion to chicken, leek and mushroom and, inevitably, Guinness beef, alongside a Cornish pasty. Have one with gravy, or make a meal of it with mash or chips and peas or baked beans. It’s uncomplicated food, which is rather the point.
The Guinness beef pie isn’t the only tribute to Ireland. The Orange has installed a Guinness MicroDraught system — a compact unit that serves Guinness without the traditional keg-and-cellar setup, and the first in Pai. Getting it there was something of a mission, and Som is rightly proud of it. There’s a proper Irish coffee on the drinks menu too, no shortcuts taken.
Beyond the pies, the menu is deliberately short: beer-battered fish and chips, bangers and mash with Cumberland sausages, chilli beef fries and a 250g Australian or New Zealand steak. For smaller appetites, or those who only meant to stop for a drink, there are locally made sausage rolls — including a Massaman version and a vegetarian one — and The Newbury Egg, The Orange’s take on a Scotch egg, which makes its way up from Jonnie’s Bar in Chiang Mai. Pudding keeps things equally straightforward — warm apple crumble or pumpkin pie, both with vanilla ice cream.
It is comfort food, and Som makes no apologies for that. The aim isn’t an enormous menu trying to cover every cuisine in the world, nor is The Orange trying to transplant a British or Australian bar into the mountains of northern Thailand. Instead, the menu reflects some of the food, places and people that have become part of Som’s life, brought together in Pai and given a home of their own.
The same thinking extends beyond the kitchen. Som wants The Orange to be the sort of neighbourhood bar and restaurant where somebody can come for dinner, somebody else can stop for a drink, and neither feels they are in the wrong place — a spot for people who live in Pai as much as those passing through it.
Rugby is the exception to the chilled-out rule, with a dedicated sports area, a big screen and a fondness for international matches — the framed shirts on the wall offer a clue. Som is happy for people to settle in quietly with a pie and a drink, but when the game is on, the soundtrack changes.
Perhaps that’s what makes an independent place in Pai interesting. Travellers arrive and leave, guesthouses and shopfronts change hands, and the town reinvents itself every high season. But the businesses that become part of its character tend to be the ones that acquire regulars: people with their usual table, their usual drink, who eventually stop needing to look at the menu.
Whether The Orange becomes one of those places remains to be seen.
But Som has already taken care of one important detail.
She won’t forget the name. She named it after herself, after all — and, in a roundabout way, after her husband too.
THE ORANGE
The Orange Bar & Restaurant, 82, 1 Moo 1, Mae Hi, Pai District, Mae Hong Son 58130
Maps: https://maps.app.goo.gl/LZsAzsksj6uSPxqL9
Open Tuesday to Sunday / 2pm to 10pm
Facebook: @theorangebar · Instagram: @the_orange_pai
