Tuesday, March 04, 2008

Review: Chat thai

Visited Chat Thai on Campbell Street for lunch today. Good crowd - mix of mostly Asian, some westerners, quite a few thai. Excellent vibes. Seems authentic, but it has a bit of a french influence - e.g. the use of 'consomme' and 'jus' in the menu descriptions

Service staff were lacking, and seemed more interested in taking names for people queueing for tables, and not in actual service. E.g. mains arrived before entrees; mains were dumped on table with no explanation of what dish it was; and mains were delivered without cutlery or serviettes!! Use of wireless pda-style order takers. Design - although it looks pretty, the waitstaff have to push past the queue of people waiting for tables or paying in order to deliver it to the table. Precarious when carrying three or four dishes.

Food good. The Som tum (papaya green salad) was plenty hot and sweet: but lacking in the sour taste. The little dish of chilli sauce that came with the pork skewers - fresh and panfried chillies, coriander, ground rice was a lot better balanced. The snacks - chicken skewers with satay sauce and the bbq pork were disappointing.

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