This thesis investigated food sold at Ban Haw Market in Muang district, Chiang Mai province, in the following issues.
The first issue was concerned with the understanding of ethnicity and identity that were expressed via the tastes of pickles with cultural assimilation from a long journey of the Yunnanese from China to Thailand. It was found that the Haw pickles had been through diverse cultural spaces that changed the tastes according to particular consuming cultural spaces. However, the tastes were still unique to the traditional Yunnanese. Therefore, they were a combination of the original taste and those of people in various cultural spaces. Meanwhile, consumers took their traditional or familiar tastes into consideration when buying pickles. It was found in the purchasing process that ethnic and religious identities had become fluid. For instance, the Yunnanese Muslims wishing to have the original tastes of the pickles with a mixture of whiskey were obliged to relinquish their religious principles.
The second issue was related to a survey of food routes in the case of Kang Pao beef. It was revealed that the beef was an Indian culture, journeying through Myanmar and Thailand.These people were keen on cattle raising and liked to consume beef until there was a cattle trade route from India, Myanmar to Thailand. On this route, there were interactions and negotiations among the Pashtun Indian Muslims, other ethnic groups and frontier state officials, and ultimately the cattle were sold at Kad Ngua (Cattle Market) in Chiang Mai. To produce the Kang Pao beef, a cow or an ox must have undergone the slaughtering ritual of Islam and the beef was for sale at Ban Haw Market. The beef is an identity of Muslim food with a combination of Indian and Yunnanese cultures.