Thai cuisine places emphasis on lightly-prepared dishes with strong aromatic components. Thai cuisine is known for being spicy. Balance, detail and variety are important to Thai cooking. Thai food is known for its balance of the five fundamental taste senses in each dish or the overall meal: hot (spicy), sour, sweet, salty, and (optional) bitter.

Although popularly considered a single cuisine, Thai food would be more accurately described as four regional cuisines corresponding to the four main regions of the country: Northern, Northeastern (or Isan), Central, and Southern, each cuisine sharing similar foods or foods derived from those of neighboring countries and regions: Burma, the Chinese province of Yunnan and Laos to the north, Cambodia, Laos and to the east and Malaysia to the south of Thailand.

Among Thai dishes are:

• Chok - a rice porridge commonly eaten in Thailand for breakfast
• Khao khai chiao - an omelet (khai chiao) with white rice, often eaten with a chili sauce and slices of cucumber.
• Khao tom - a Thai style rice soup, usually with pork, chicken or shrimp.
• Khanom chin namya - round boiled rice noodles topped with a fish based sauce and eaten with fresh leaves and vegetables.
• Khao khluk kapi - rice stir-fried with shrimp paste, served with sweetened pork and vegetables.
• Khao man kai - rice steamed with garlic, with boiled chicken, chicken stock and a dipping sauce.
• Khao phat - One of the most common dishes in Thailand, fried rice, Thai style. Usually with chicken, beef, shrimp, pork, crab or coconut or pineapple.
• Khao phat kai - fried rice with chicken.
• Tom kha kai - hot spicy soup with coconut milk, galangal and chicken.