Category: Thai

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Thai

Tay – Rosebery NSW Restaurant Review

Social media darling Tay has been tearing up the feeds for a couple of months now, and a recent wifeless weekday off provided the opportunity to put their gai yang Thai roast chicken ($20) to the ultimate test – my parents.

The chicken was pretty good, and importantly dissimilar to anything I’d had before. The marinade was sweet and slightly spicy, with a strong pepper flavour to it. Though roasted, the skin was not crispy, likely the result of the drenching of marinade. The meat was adequately juicy, though not extraordinarily so, and overall well received by both my parents as well as my wife (reheated in the microwave that night).

The small chips ($6) were freshly fried and crispy, seasoned with chicken salt. Only about half of these brave potato soldiers survived the drive to my parents’ place.

Notes – parking around the restaurant is not that plentiful, though the Botany Rd clearway is not in effect between the hours of 10AM-5:30PM and that might be your best bet. Limited numbers of chickens available per day however means that if you’re going to rock up after 10AM it would be best to pre-order via text message earlier in the day to avoid disappointment.

Tay
781A Botany Rd, Rosebery NSW 2018

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Thai

Bangkok Snap – Northmead NSW Restaurant Review

2021 was a peak food ordering time for me, and as a year probably set us back significantly in terms of our finances and ability to purchase a house. To this day I am still finding photos from delivery meals that we ordered and consumed in our little apartment in Wentworthville 2145. It’s quite strange that whilst I often forget the quality of meals eaten some months back, I seem to still remember the taste and mouthfeel of these particular items that I will briefly describe below. The pricing is going to reflect 2021 prices (pre-post-COVID inflation, but inclusive of delivery app markups).

I can’t believe I literally just said I could still remember the taste and mouthfeel of this meal, because I really don’t have anything memorable for the BBQ Pork with Sticky Rice ($19.90).

Luckily I do remember these Potato Prawn ($10.90), which were all eaten by me because my girlfriend at the time was not a prawn fan. I thought that they were crispy, though underflavoured, with the ratio of potato to prawn too high. The sweet chilli sauce was an absolute neccessity here in helping the potato go down. I think these were even worse the following day.

I love a net spring roll ($9.90), and these were no exception.

I actually really enjoyed this pineapple fried rice ($19.90), even though it was served in a plastic takeaway container and not a half pineapple. The balance of lightly spicy curry powder and sweet pineapple flavour was just right, and I’m craving some more now. Man food is yellow, and it’s delicious.

For a place so close to work, I’m surprised I’ve never been in person. And now that I’ve found these photos and written this post, I’ll probably never have to.

Bangkok Snap Northmead NSW
100B Briens Rd, Northmead NSW 2152

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Thai

Thai 44 (50% Sweet 50% Thai) – Sydney NSW Restaurant Review

This restaurant appears to have two names, “50% Sweet 50% Thai”, as well as “Thai 44”, and is where we ended up having a spur-of-the-moment unplanned dinner on our wedding night, following a less substantial fried chicken snack at Chicken Number Five. I mention the circumstances, because despite the timing, it was not somewhere we had planned to go to specially, we just found ourselves hungry past midnight in the city.

Ever-being fans of chicken wings, we ordered the Fried Chicken Wings (4 for $12.90), allegedly seasoned with Thai herbs, not that this was evident from their flavour. These wings disappointed us, not by their texture or moisture, but merely because they did not feel different to any other wings, and were they to be served at a different restaurant we wouldn’t be able to pick that they were from a Thai restaurant (or Bangkok, as noted on the tax invoice).

The Grapao Pork Belly with 3 Eggs (pad kaphrao) ($26.90) was, in comparison, excellent. We were disappointed to find that the pork mince version was already sold out by the time we ate, but the pork belly did a fine job, even though it didn’t have the small particle size which would have allowed the mince to be mixed into the rice. The pork belly was some of the best I’ve had at a Thai restaurant in recent times, with crispy crackling skin, whereas other competitors have suffered from softness. The flavour of the dish was really enjoyable, as were the truly perfectly fried eggs, with fully set whites and bulbous soft yolks. Incredible.

Overall
Grapao rice good. Chicken wing bad. Can recommend for your wedding night.

Thai 44 / 50% Sweet, 50% Thai
Number One Dixon Shopping Centre
Shop 44/1 Dixon St, Sydney NSW 2000


Categories
Thai

Monkey King Thai – Drummonyne NSW Restaurant Review

We aimed to replicate our recent meal at Cher Thai with a meal at another highly rated nearby location, to mixed results.

We had again a chicken pad thai ($20.90), an ongoing departure from our usual order of a pad kee mao, and this time without a pad kee mao on another plate as backup. Monkey King’s pad thai was less sticky than Cher Thai’s, less sweet (this is a positive), but overall probably less exciting, though by no means bad. The flavours were more balanced, which is surely a good thing, but for some possibly purely subjective reason it just didn’t hit the same as our first pad thai in probably half a decade. Or maybe it’s just because it was less oily.

The beef Penang curry ($20.90) was pretty OK, with good flavours and a welcome smattering of vegetables. The curry itself was quite watery and would’ve gone down nicely with some rice (we were warned), but we declined the offer, opting instead to share a single roti ($6 with a curry order, otherwise $7). The beef inside the curry was sadly in the form of thin strips, not blocks, as we had hoped (not that there was any indication that there would be, apart from the presence of massaman beef on the menu), though there again was nothing in particular wrong about that.

The roti was pretty good, honestly but I think we would’ve ordered some coconut rice had there been some on the menu, rather than a rather plain sounding ‘Jasmine Rice’ for $5. The fact that the restaurant doesn’t allow leftovers to be taken away (what?!) also meant that we had to be ultra-careful about ordering too much food, and thus the rice had to be a miss.

Monkey King Thai Drummoyne
190 Lyons Rd, Drummoyne NSW 2047

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Malaysian Thai Vietnamese

LEAF (Love Eating Asian Food) in Nowra – Nowra NSW Restaurant Review

As I was preparing to leave the safe confines of Western Sydney for a three month stint on the NSW South Coast my Thai friend and colleague told me about his favourite restaurant in the area, LEAF. This was high praise coming from a guy who has spent significant periods of time living and working in the Illawara, across both Wollongong and Nowra. Love Eating Asian Food, as unusual as it is as the name of a restaurant, does describe me well, as frequent readers of this blog will know. I came here with DTC and my partner for our traditional pre-handover dinner.

These crabmeat siu mai ($9.90) were really not bad. I was particularly impressed by the wrappers, which I can’t confirm but felt handmade. The filling was fine and crabby, and I can actually believe that it was crab.

The Malaysian Nasi Goreng Fried Rice ($18.90), complete with chicken satay skewer and a fried egg, was a completely normal staple. Doesn’t quite hit the mark of Sydney-based specialty Malaysian restaurants, but very edible.

Same vibes about the Malaysian Chicken Laksa ($18.90), though this was quite a difficult dish to share as we were essentially sharing a bowl of noodles between three people eating on plates.

In keeping with LEAF in Nowra’s theme of pan-Asian dining, the Vietnamese Pancake (banh xeo – $18.90) also has its country of origin in its name on the menu. It was not the most traditional rendition, but actually not bad, with good cripsiness of the thin crepe like pancake as well as good flavours and a bright and fresh sauce.

Apparently a staple dish for DTC, the Mango Sticky Rice ($9.90) was something new to me, and actually quite enjoyable. I’ve never had the combination of sticky coconut rice and mango before, and it was quite a treat. A bit odd about the little golden shovels that we got as spoons though, but maybe that’s traditional?

COMMENTS
While I don’t think LEAF in Nowra particularly excells in any one dish when judging by international standards, you could certainly do worse if you’re in the area and looking for a vaguely Asian meal, of any persuasian. My friend GD was right, even if his recommendation was based on his experience as a guy who eats three frozen macro-balanced meals a day. Not bad. Rurality bonus.

LEAF in Nowra
Unit 1 / Building B/111 North St, Nowra NSW 2541
(02) 4402 7286