From Maha Sarakham to St Albans: How Kat's Food Found a Home in Hertfordshire
Updated: Sep 28
Every dish at Kat's Oriental Cuisine starts a long way from St Albans, on a family farm in Maha Sarakham, in the heart of Thailand's Isan region.
This is where Kat's cooking began, long before Kat's Oriental Cuisine existed, and it's still the reason the food here tastes the way it does.
Mornings on the Farm
Kat grew up on her family's farm in Maha Sarakham, waking before dawn to prepare fresh Thai and Isan dishes. The ingredients came straight from the fields around her, herbs picked that morning, vegetables pulled from the ground, everything as fresh as it could possibly be.
Before school, Kat would sell what she'd cooked at the local market. It meant learning, from a young age, how to balance the flavours that define Isan cooking: sharp chilli, zesty lime, aromatic fish sauce, and fresh herbs, all working together rather than any one flavour dominating.
That balance, chilli against lime, salt against sour, is something you either learn by doing it every day or you don't learn it properly at all. Kat learned it at a market stall before most people her age had started their school day.
A Childhood Passion, Carried Forward
What started as a childhood routine became something bigger. That early experience, cooking with real ingredients, learning to balance bold flavours, understanding food as something to be shared, shaped the way Kat has cooked ever since.
Kat's Oriental Cuisine exists because of that foundation. It's not a menu built from recipes copied out of a book. It's built from years of hands-on experience, starting in the fields and markets of Isan and carrying through to a kitchen in Hertfordshire.
Bringing Isan and Thai Food to St Albans
Kat's Oriental Cuisine set out to bring a genuine taste of Northeast Thailand to St Albans, alongside the classic Thai dishes most people already know. That means dishes like:
Papaya Salad, an Isan classic made the same way it would be at a market stall in Maha Sarakham
Isan Spicy Fusion Curry, blending Isan boldness with classic Thai curry
The full range of Thai favourites, Green Curry, Pad Thai, and more, made fresh to order
Every dish is still built on the same principle Kat learned as a child: use real ingredients, balance the flavours properly, and make sure the food is worth the time it takes to cook it properly.
Why This Story Matters
It would be easy to open a Thai takeaway using shortcuts, pre-made pastes, frozen ingredients, recipes designed for speed rather than flavour. That's not how Kat's Oriental Cuisine works, and it's not how Kat learned to cook.
The care that went into cooking on a family farm in Maha Sarakham is the same care that goes into every order at Kat's Oriental Cuisine today. Fresh ingredients. Balanced flavours. Food made properly, not rushed.
Taste the Story at Kat's Oriental Cuisine, St Albans
Kat's Oriental Cuisine is proud to have been named St Albans Food & Drink Retailer of the Year 2026, recognition for bringing genuine Thai and Isan cooking to Hertfordshire.
Explore the menu or browse the Dish Guide to try the dishes behind the story, and get in touch if you'd like to know more about where any of it comes from.
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