On Lok Yun

On Lok Yun has been serving Bangkok breakfast since the 1930s, and stepping through its Charoen Krung shopfront is the cheapest time travel in the city: original terrazzo and tiles, ceiling fans, marble-topped tables, and waiters who have worked the room for decades. The menu is the Sino-Thai coffee-shop canon — kaya toast with the coconut jam made in-house, soft-cooked eggs eaten with pepper and soy, French toast, and American-style egg breakfasts that predate the term — washed down with sweet Thai coffee or milky tea in patterned cups. It is less a meal than a ritual, and half of old Bangkok seems to share it: elderly regulars, students, and travellers en route to the Grand Palace district a short ride away. Prices remain resolutely old-fashioned. Good to know: mornings are the show — the room hums from opening and the queue on weekends forms early; it winds down by mid-afternoon. Cash is safest. It pairs naturally with a wander through the old town and Sao Chingcha area, with K. Panich's sticky rice and Krua Apsorn's crab omelette both nearby for the greatest old-city food morning available.