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ES Arch - Enrico Scaramellini - A wardrobe in the landscape, Madesimo 2010. Photos © Marcello Mariana.

Los Angeles is home to the largest Thai community outside of Thailand. This week, Thai-Americans are celebrating the traditional three-day water festival called Songkran to mark the new year. And many of them regularly shop at the landmark L.A.’s Bangkok Market, the first Thai food store in the U.S.

Here, you can buy temple bells and alms bowls for monks. But there’s so much more. The aisles are stocked with rows of fresh Asian produce, noodles, and fish sauce. There are coconut milks, curries and sriracha imported from Si Racha, Thailand. And there are astonishing varieties of rice: brown, black, purple, jasmine, even so-called “forbidden” rice — forbidden, explains chef Jet Tila, “because only the royalty in Asia could eat it.” At Bangkok Market, you can buy a five-pound bag of it for $4.

Tila shows us around the market he grew up working in, before he became a top chef. For four decades, his family’s store has sold inexpensive ingredients that are key to Thai cuisine. He says many of California’s best chefs have shopped there.

The Family-Run Thai Market That Feeds L.A.’s Eclectic Food Scene