Season vs Shimizu Part 2

Part 2: A party on the North Shore

Season Thai

780 Pacific Hwy 

Gordon

(02) 9499 9093

Those who know me know that I love my curry, and it's pretty much all I eat when I'm at a Thai restaurant. (well, that and pad kee mao with chicken) but here is a Thai restaurant which managed to entice me away from the usual curry; I would happily not order curry of any form when I'm here. Not that their curry is bad. Far from it, but I found something better to have, and thai curry? I can get that in any of the other hundreds of Thai restaurants littered around Sydney.

Not only is this place great, it's also extremely convenient as it's within easy walking distance from home. And it is without a doubt in my mind, the best of the three Thai restaurants within a 200m stretch. Of course, this also mean that they charge premium pricing. If you want good, cheap Thai, there's always Newtown Thai 1 & 2, and quite a few others. And if you are lucky enough to live out that way, all the better. However, when on the North Shore, one must pay the North Shore surcharge…

Season Thai is part of the Red Spoon Thai Riffic group. I haven't been to any of their other restaurants, so I'm not sure how they rate.

The restaurant can be extremely noisy when full, due to the complete lack of sound deadening material in the restaurant. But then again, they aren't the only ones guilty of this. I can think of plenty of others, but if you want a lively atmosphere, I don't think you'd care. Especially if you're in a big group. If you rather not shout your conversations, avoid the busy nights like Friday and Saturday. We've only experienced one night when it was extremely noisy, but then the big table in the middle was extremely noisy. I think most of them were already quite tipsy by the time they arrived at the restaurant.

Anyway, that's the bad out of the way. Onto the good.

Mango prawn avocado salad- This one is seasonal. Grab it when mangos are in season...

Yok Yor Thai Food Factory

Yok Yor Thai Food Factory
Shop G06, 323 Castelreagh St
Haymarket
Sydney NSW2000
Ph : (02) 9280 0013
Sun – Thu: 1100-0100
Fri – Sat: 1100 – 0200

Yok Yor has one of those misleading type of addresses. If, as I did, you launch yourself up that general vicinity of Castlereagh St, expecting it to be immediately obvious, you’ll not find it. Number 323 is a large well-known building, with frontage on three streets. It is on the Campbell Street side, opposite Chilli Cha Cha, that you’ll find this small eatery, its front completely obscured by building work paraphernalia on the day of our visit.

The first thing that strikes you about Yok Yor is its small size. Not uncomfortably so, as tables are decently spaced, but some furniture rearranging would need to occur if there were a number of  even medium-sized groups dining there.

Situated at the ‘far’ end of the plethora of Thai restaurants in the Pitt and Campbell Streets area, it is open for quite long hours. The space is informal, and the large menu, with most items clocking in at under $10, reflects this.

I met up with a friend for a lunchtime catch-up, and realised that at least three-quarters of the times we meet for a meal, he orders pork, and if there are dumplings involving pork, he’ll order those.

Twas ever thus…his first pork choice was Kanom Jeeb ($4.50), steamed pork and prawn dumplings with fried garlic and soy sauce. They looked rather like Siu Mai to me, but he enjoyed them thoroughly, particularly the sauce, which added a piquancy which lifted the dumplings.

Kanom Jeeb

One of my favourite dishes is the Vietnamese savoury pancake, Bánh xèo. The presence of Kanom Beaung Yourn ($9.50), Thai crispy crepe filled with shredded prawn and coconut, served with cucumber and red onion relish, left me no choice. I had to order it.

Chat Thai Westfield

Chat Thai Westfield Sydney
Level 6, Westfield Sydney
Ph : (02) 9221 0600
Open Mon-Sun: 10am-10pm

The latest addition to the insanely popular Chat Thai chain, now numbering five, this latest outpost, on Level 6 of Westfield CBD, is instantly recognisable, with minor amendments, including the lighting, which is rather dim in places. Oh, and they clearly expect that there will be queues at this branch too...

We were there early, and by the time we were ready to order, there were only three other tables occupied in the entire restaurant. Even during the 'peak period' of our meal, they were only about seventy percent full. I note this because of a recurring theme throughout this meal, a theme that was not confined to us, but which affected at a number of other tables within hearing distance.

The commonality? Perhaps it was down to teething problems, as they had been open for less than a week, but the service was consistently vague. It started when I tried to get an additional water cup, continued on to the drinks not arriving after 20 minutes (a reminder lead to further confusion), followed up with dishes arriving in a random order, and continued all the way through to the wrong dessert arriving. Not to mention the continual difficulties that plagued us in terms of getting anyone's attention.

For the neighbouring tables, in one case one dish out of four did not arrive (the table gave up), and two others found it difficult to get hold of anyone’s attention in order to place their orders.

The saving grace was the food.

First up - todt mun bpla ทอดมันปลา ($10) - dollops of fried fish cakes with pickled cucumber relish.

Sweet Basil Thai Cuisine

Sweet Basil Thai Cuisine
Shop C/D
6/F Lee Theatre Plaza
99 Percival St
Causeway Bay
Hong Kong
Ph : +852 28901993

I had an unexpected yearning for Thai food one night, and somehow ended up at Sweet Basil Thai. Proximity to my hotel and slightly frustrated attempts at finding a good Thai restaurant in the area (namely through Open Rice) were major contributors to this.

Situated on one of the restaurant oriented floors of the Lee Theatre Plaza, Sweet Basil is not only quite large but has the appearance of having exploded beyond its original premises into the surrounding public space. I was curious about this, as surely it indicated that they must be popular?  As it turned out the 'outside' tables, of which there were easily two dozen in number, were mostly empty that evening. The interior could not be seen from where I was sitting, so I'm not sure how much business they did that night.

Mini combination platter (HKD88)

Sheer lack of imagination combined with the novelty value of ordering a "combination" anything was the reasoning behind this choice. If this is the "mini" version, the mind boggles at the larger one, as  despite appearances in this photo, this was actually a reasonably sized starter. Each of the components were quite filling.

Spring roll

These robustly sized spring rolls contained a good mix of some half a dozen types of meat and vegetables. Although not the best spring roll I ate during this trip (that was the one at Sportful Garden), these were hot, crunchy, and pleasant enough.

Stuffed chicken in lotus leaf

Deboned chicken simply stuffed with what appeared to be cabbage, wrapped in skin and cooked in lotus leaf. This may sound odd, but I found this too substantial for me to eat comfortably. It wasn't about the taste, which was really niether here nor there, but all that white chicken meat just seemed to sit heavily on my stomach by the time I made it half way through the parcel. It was at that point that I realised that too much food had been ordered.

iima at Mr B's Hotel

iima

Mr B's Hotel
396 Pitt St (cnr Goulburn St)
Ph : (02) 8080 7727

I do have a fondness for iima, and go there, now and then, when I am nearby and the mood strikes me.  This was one of those times, when I introduced a friend to iima. 

Unagi ($16)

For his inaugural visit, TM's choice was the Unagi set lunch.

A large plate of unagi, agedashi tofu, sashimi, miso soup, takoyaki balls, TM indicated satisfication regarding both the size and the taste of his selection.  As I did not remember to try any of it, I cannot comment, but suffice to say that he was pleased.

Chat Thai - Haymarket

Chat Thai
20 Campbell St
Haymarket
NSW 2000
(02) 9976 2939

First, a health warning. Those of you who have a weak stomach that vomits at the sight of vomit, sounds of someone vomiting (you all know what that sounds like..) or even the hint of someone vomiting, please stop reading now! After a meal at Chat Thai, it did make me violently ill, which I have not done for a long time. No, it’s not because I had food poisoning. And it’s not that the food was bad. In fact, the food was fabulous. I shall explain.

The first thing that contributed to my illness was the long wait in the queue, 97 minutes to be exact.  We had been warned about the queue but it still didn’t quite prepare me for the very long wait.

Once inside however, the speedy service and the smiling waitress made up for the long wait. I really liked the décor with the open kitchen, exposed brick work, dark wooden furniture and dimly lit room with funky light fittings; it is moody but not seedy. The room was filled with a lovely smokey smell from the grill in the open kitchen, and it made me even more hungry than before!

iima at Mr B's Hotel (the old Mandarin Club).

iima
Mr B's Hotel
396 Pitt St (cnr Goulburn St)
Ph : (02) 8080 7727

Situated within Mr B's Hotel (previously the Mandarin Club), iima is an unexpected sort of an eating place, especially for a pub. The menu is divided into separate Japanese and Thai sections, with the kitchen similarly partitioned, and with only one item which seems to cross this divide. 

I have eaten at iima a few times, and at the end of each visit I have been left pondering what to try next time.

Iima Fried Rice ($12.90)

This was I had on my first iima visit, when I was in dire need of basic comfort food. Described as "rice, eggs, crab meat, bbq pork, shallot and onion in light soy seasoning", this is a simple dish that gets it just right. With the combination of the sweet tartness of the lime juice, this was pure simple tasty comfort food. The photo is somewhat deceptive, as this is a large plate and generous serving, perfect for those days when you are in need of the comfort of fried rice, but want one that stands out from the usual Sydney City/ Haymarket fried rice crowd.