Monday, October 28, 2013

Thai Chef Casual Thai Cuisine


Thai Chef is one of the newer as well as only Thai cuisine restaurant other than Thai Garden (which is not very good) in Burquitlam. The restaurant is located in the same plaza along with Japolo, North Garden and Okoman Sushi. The only positive thing about this plaza is that parking is never an issue because of the average or below average tasting restaurants, so there is no need to circle or wait for parking, there's plenty.


The interior of the restaurant has vibrant lime green colored walls and sticks to a color scheme of grey, black, white and lime green. There are black and white photos of flowers throughout the restaurant which is not really Thai related but hey, why not?


CHICKEN SATAYS, PINEAPPLE FRIED RICE, SPICY EGGPLANT AND BASIL, RED CHICKEN CURRY, AND PRAWN TOM YUM SOUP.



PRAWN TOM YUM SOUP, THAI HOT AND SOUR SOUP WITH GALANGAL, LEMON GRASS, KAFFIR LIME LEAVES, TOMATOES AND MUSHROOMS ($10.00). The soup has a slightly barely there spiciness and lemon grass taste. The broth tastes more spicy than sour, and I do not really taste anything from the kaffir lime leaves. I admit, I judged the restaurant as a "casual fast food" place and when I heard the microwave, I wondered if the soup was being microwaved. The soup is made from scratch by the way! The prawns are butterflied which is nice and the mushrooms are pre-sliced.


THAI CHICKEN SATAY, CHICKEN SKEWERS MARINATED WITH COCONUT MILK, THAI HERB AND SPICE SERVED WITH PEANUT SAUCE ($8.00). The chicken satays taste tender and has a mild light curry taste. The peanut sauce has a light creamy peanut taste, as well as a weird aftertaste that I am not a fan of and I am not sure what it is.

PINEAPPLE FRIED RICE, CHICKEN STIR FRIED WITH RICE, PINEAPPLE, ONIONS, BELL PEPPERS, RAISIN AND CASHEW NUTS IN TOMATOES SAUCE ($11.00). The fried rice is properly fused together, tastes sweet from the raisins, and has 7-8 slices of pineapple. The rice tastes more like thai rice and does not have the nice golden yellow color that pineapple rice usually has, the rice looks brown. I am not a fan of the sweetness and it is not slightly sweet, but pretty sweet. Usually pineapple fried rice is a rice you can eat as is, but I needed the curry here because it wasn't tasty. An unfair comparison would be paying an extra couple of dollars for a larger portion of better tasting pineapple fried rice that is served in half a pineapple like Tropika or Banana Leaf, and I rather have any of theirs.


SPICY EGGPLANT AND BASIL, STIR-FRIED MINCED MEET, EGGPLANTS, BELL PEPPERS AND BASIL WITH THAI GARLIC CHILLI SAUCE ($12.00). The eggplant tastes sweet and the ground pork is slightly spicy. I think they cook the pork first and toss the eggplant in later to prevent it from getting mushy. That may also be why the eggplant tastes sweet rather than spicy? Anyways, I find the dish very oily and I rarely say that (I eat at a lot of Chinese restaurants too) so I am not sure if the dish is supposed to be oily? We did not really like or find the dish special, there is not much taste and is overly oily.

CHICKEN RED CURRY ($12.00). First thought, wow you can smell the coconut milk. The curry has a good amount of sliced chicken and the chicken tastes tender. When choosing which curry we wanted (green, yellow or red) I asked the owner what the differences were and I was a bit confused at her answer because she said, "the taste is different," but that is why I am asking. Then she mentions that the ingredients are different but I can read those myself on the menu. Lastly, she mentioned that the red curry is spicy.. but it wasn't really. I do not know much about my curries so it would have been nice for a somewhat informative response but that is what google is for right! The curry has a mild coconut curry taste and is slightly but barely spicy. I wonder why the curry is not red or orange? Usually if you add coconut milk in red curry, it would be orange and not a golden nice yellow. But again, I do not know my curries so I am probably missing something.


The bill comes in a mesh round container with mints. Is that my finger in the photo? I clearly haven't learned how to take photos yet.

POSITIVES
- Family owned restaurant with friendly owners
- The only other Thai restaurant in Burquitlam and they are better than Thai Garden

NEGATIVES
- Averagely priced but portions are smaller than other restaurants

LITTLE THINGS
- I wanted to try the mango sticky rice but mangos aren't in season anymore :(
- Menu gives you options of prawn, chicken, beef or pork in most dishes as well as tofu in some
- I would rather come for lunch since it's cheaper

Food: 2.5/5
Service: 2.5/5

Thai Chef Casual Thai Cuisine on Urbanspoon

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