Order vegan food in Thailand: Thai phrases and เจ
Thai food looks like paradise for vegans — vegetables, tofu, rice, fruit everywhere. Then you learn how many dishes quietly contain fish sauce. The good news: with a handful of words and a little caution, ordering vegan in Thailand is very doable. Here is what we tell friends who visit.
The one word that does most of the work
เจ — pronounced “jay”, sometimes written “jeh” — is Thailand’s own plant-based food tradition. Saying “gin jay” (กินเจ), literally “I eat jay”, tells a cook everything at once: no meat, no seafood, no egg, no dairy, no fish sauce, no oyster sauce, no shrimp paste. Jay is actually stricter than vegan (it traditionally also skips garlic and onion), so any cook who understands it will serve you food that is automatically vegan.
Phrases worth memorising
| Thai | Say it | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| กินเจ | gin jay | “I eat jay” (vegan-safe) |
| ไม่ใส่น้ำปลา | mai sai nam pla | no fish sauce |
| ไม่ใส่ไข่ | mai sai khai | no egg |
| ไม่ใส่นม | mai sai nom | no milk / dairy |
| ไม่ใส่น้ำมันหอย | mai sai nam man hoi | no oyster sauce |
| ไม่ใส่กะปิ | mai sai gapi | no shrimp paste |
Thai is a tonal language, but do not let that stop you: say it slowly, point at the menu, and most cooks will meet you halfway. Showing the Thai script on your phone screen works just as well.
Where animal ingredients hide
- Fish sauce (น้ำปลา, nam pla) is the default seasoning in most savoury Thai dishes — soups, salads, stir-fries, fried rice. If you only learn one phrase, make it “mai sai nam pla”.
- Oyster sauce goes into many stir-fried vegetable dishes, including the innocent-looking stir-fried morning glory.
- Shrimp paste (กะปิ, gapi) is usually pounded into curry pastes and into the dressing of som tam, the green papaya salad — which often gets dried shrimp on top as well.
- Egg is normally scrambled into fried rice and pad thai unless you ask otherwise.
- Condensed and evaporated milk sweeten Thai iced tea, iced coffee and many smoothies.
None of this appears in menu descriptions — it is simply how the dishes are normally made. Hence the phrases above.
Look for the yellow เจ flag
Street stalls and market stands that cook jay food fly a small yellow flag or sign with the character เจ in red. During the annual Vegetarian Festival — nine days usually falling around October, with dates that shift each year with the lunar calendar — these flags multiply across the whole country. Year-round jay places exist too: many food courts keep one เจ stall going in every season.
Apps help
HappyCow is the standard tool for finding vegan and vegan-friendly places in Thailand, and a plain “vegan” search on Google Maps works well in tourist towns. Read a few recent reviews — they usually reveal whether a kitchen really understands “no fish sauce”.
If you are ordering to a hotel instead of walking in, check whether the restaurant explains delivery clearly. Our own vegan food delivery page keeps the GrabFood status and delivery-area guidance in one place.
And a note from us
At our cafe, the whole menu is plant-based: no fish sauce, egg or dairy in the recipes, every day of the year. For severe allergies, still tell the team your needs before ordering because we have not published a verified cross-contact protocol. Come practise your “mai sai nam pla” on us — we will smile, because fish sauce is not part of our menu.
The full menu with prices is online, and if you are an early riser, so is vegan breakfast.