For the past 20 years, since the height of the BSE scare (otherwise known as mad cow disease, when British beef was plagued with a neurological disease transmittable to humans), Thailand has banned beef from cattle bred in the UK. The disease has been all but eradicated for a decade but it's only now, thanks to a joint effort between the British Embassy and luxury food importer Gourmet One Food Services, that it’s coming back to our shores.

That makes it one of the few options for European beef available in Bangkok, as well as one of our only choices for grass-fed rather than grain-fed beef. This, according to Gary Rhodes, a British celebrity chef in town as part of the British Embassy’s promotional efforts, is something we should all be very happy about.

“It has a different strength,” he says. “The flavors of Aussie wagyu and USDA Prime are wonderful, but they're grain-fed and what we offer from the UK is grass-fed beef. We have a reputation for having a wet climate, but of course that does nothing but enrich the flavor of the grass, and as the cattle are feeding from that it adds another dimension to that finished product.”

But the British have a hard sell. Compared to far more intensively reared Australian beef that dominates Bangkok’s imported beef scene, you’re probably looking somewhere at around double the price, according to Gourmet One co-founder Patcharin Hemeunggull. 

For now, your options for challenging Gary's claims are pretty limited. In fact there's only one place in town that's added British beef to its menu, the Landmark hotel's Rib Room & Bar (138 Sukhumvit Rd., 02-254-0404, priced starting at B1,800). But Britain's campaign is in its early days. Expect to see names like English Longhorn and Lincoln Red on a steakhouse menu near you soon.