Thai Food Spice Levels: How to Order It Mild or Not Spicy
There is no single answer to how spicy Thai food is, because the heat is added in layers and every kitchen adds a different amount at each stage. A curry can arrive gentle and creamy or fierce depending on how much chilli went into the paste, and a noodle dish that starts out mild can turn hot the moment someone reaches for the condiments on the table. Thai food spice levels are really a range, not a fixed setting.
You do not have to guess. A few Thai words, a rough idea of which dishes usually run hot, and a clear request when you order will get you close to the heat you want, including no chilli at all for a child.
Where the heat in Thai food comes from
Most of the heat in Thai cooking comes from chillies added at several different points, not from one single fiery ingredient. The chilli you will meet most often is the small bird's eye chilli, known in Thai as phrik khi nu, which measures roughly 50,000 to 100,000 Scoville heat units, many times hotter than a jalapeño. It shows up whole in stir-fries and soups, crushed into salads, and sliced raw on the side of many plates.
Curries are often hot before they even reach the wok. A traditional red curry paste is pounded from dried red chillies together with aromatics such as lemongrass, galangal, garlic and shallot, and green curry paste uses fresh green chillies instead, so a curry's base heat is set long before anyone adds extra chilli at the table.
Then there is the table itself. Most Thai restaurants keep small bowls of condiments within reach, and the most common is prik nam pla, fresh chillies steeped in fish sauce and lime. It sits on the table the way salt and pepper does elsewhere, which means a dish that arrives mild can end up considerably hotter once a diner spoons on the condiments themselves.
Why "mild" in Thailand can still catch you off guard
Ask for a dish not spicy and it should arrive that way, but "mild" is a judgement call made by whoever is cooking. What one kitchen calls a gentle version of a dish can still carry a real kick for someone who rarely eats chilli, so it pays to be specific about what you mean.
Which dishes tend to run hot, and which stay gentle
These are general tendencies from Thai cooking as a whole, not a promise about any particular plate. Every cook's hand with the chillies is different, so treat this as a starting point for what to expect rather than a rule.
| Often hotter | Often gentler |
|---|---|
| Papaya salad (som tam) and larb-style salads, traditionally made with fresh bird's eye chilli | Stir-fried noodles such as pad thai, built on a sweet and savoury tamarind base |
| Tom yum, a hot and sour soup served clear (nam sai) or creamy (nam khon) | Tom kha, the coconut-milk version of the same soup, with a milder, sweeter taste |
| Red curry (gaeng phet), whose Thai name literally means "spicy curry" | Yellow curry (gaeng kari), usually one of the mildest curries, with turmeric and a slightly sweet coconut base. Not to be confused with the southern sour curry, which is also yellow and is not mild at all |
| Stir-fries made with whole bird's eye chillies, such as pad kee mao | Grilled satay skewers served with a peanut sauce, and plain fried rice |
Coconut milk softens a curry, but it does not make it mild on its own: green curry is also coconut-based, and tends to be hotter than red curry, not milder.
Thai phrases that get you the spice level you want
You do not need fluent Thai to control the heat on your plate. A handful of short phrases, said clearly when you order, are usually all it takes.
| Thai script | Romanization | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| ไม่เผ็ด | mai phet | Not spicy (may still have a little chilli) |
| เผ็ดน้อย | phet noi | A little spicy, on the mild side |
| ไม่ใส่พริก | mai sai phrik | Don't add chilli; best for children, though it can't remove chilli already in a curry paste |
| กินเผ็ดไม่เป็น | kin phet mai pen | I can't eat spicy food |
| เผ็ดมาก | phet mak | Very spicy, for the other direction |
Adding "khrap" (for male speakers) or "kha" (for female speakers) to the end of any of these makes them sound more polite, though staff will understand you perfectly well without it.
Practical tips for ordering the heat you want
- Say your spice preference when you place the order, not after the food has already arrived at the table.
- Ask for chilli on the side rather than cooked in, so you add as much heat as you want.
- Order a side of steamed rice; it will not cancel out the heat, but it makes each bite easier to manage and stretches a spicy dish further.
- For children or anyone with very low spice tolerance, ask for no chilli at all rather than "a little", since even a small amount can carry real heat.
On our own menu, dishes show a spice level of mild, medium or hot where one is set, so you can get a rough idea before you order. When you order online, you can add a short note to any dish in your cart, for example less spicy or no peanuts. A note is a request, not a guarantee that a dish can be changed, so if a spice level, an ingredient or an allergy really matters to you, call us before you order rather than relying on the menu or the note alone.
If you have a food allergy
A mild preference and a genuine allergy call for different levels of caution. For a preference, a clear note when you order is usually enough. For an allergy, especially a serious one, CDC travel health guidance suggests telling restaurant staff about it, asking whether they can safely accommodate it, and carrying a chef card that explains the allergy in the local language. It also helps to name the allergy itself, "peanut allergy" rather than "no peanuts please", so it is not taken as a taste preference.
More guides for eating on Koh Samui
Heat is only one word on a menu line. If the rest of it is opaque too, how to read a Thai menu explains how the names are put together. If you are working out a rough food budget for the trip, our guide to what a meal typically costs around Koh Samui is a useful next stop. And if you are paying for food with a Thai QR code for the first time, our PromptPay walkthrough for tourists explains how it works.