thai food Archives - Curiously Carmen

Hi everyone!

I’ve been hearing many great things about Longtail Kitchen on social media, and decided that it was finally time for me to try it out.

Longtail Kitchen is a sister restaurant of the very popular and successful Thai restaurant, Maenam. I actually didn’t know that Longtail was a Thai inspired eatery until reading the reviews and their website!

Longtail is located inside the River Market at New Westminster Quay. I haven’t been to New West for awhile, and don’t remember seeing this building the last time I was here… but basically, the bottom floor is like an upscale food court. You won’t find any greasy, old looking stands here (not that there’s anything wrong with that!) but instead more local and new eateries.
At Longtail, you order and pay at the front, then the staff will bring your food to you. This was our first meal of the day at around 3pm, so we were pretty hungry! We sat at a table right next to the window wall (? Is there a specific term for these??) which I’m pretty sure they open up so people are able to sit outside in the summer.

You are able to see a bit of the Fraser River and the boardwalk, but unfortunately I was too short and my eye level hit right where the white window pane was and couldn’t see anything. =( You can see the picture above to understand what I mean.
The boyfriend ordered the green curry with chicken. When it arrived, we could smell the delicacy and aroma of all the spices that went into this dish. The green curry had a strong, rich coconut taste to it. The chicken was very tender and juicy as well. It came with a rice bowl side, we were hoping that it would be coconut rice but sadly it was just plain rice.

For myself, I ordered ‘Mama Cheung’s laksa’, which I don’t see on the menu anymore, so I guess they rotate their menu frequently to ensure freshness of all the food items! The laksa came with a seafood curry broth, chicken, fish cakes, prawns, veggies, and noodles.

I was expecting the curry to have a fishy taste to it due to the seafood broth, but it was very mild. Again, the curry was rich and spicy. The prawns were big and juicy, and had a nice snap to it- a sign of freshness. I saved the tofu puffs for the end so that they would be saturated with the curry! Everything tasted extremely fresh and made with great quality.

The laksa soup was so good that I drank all of it, I wasn’t even thirsty afterwards! That is a wonderful sign and says a lot about how it was prepared 😉
Another cool thing to add about Longtail is that they also offer some Thai cooking products to bring home! We spent some time looking at what they sold, as we haven’t heard of some of these products before.

Needless to say, we found ourselves savouring every single bite and were glad that we made the trek out here! One thing to add though, was that the portions were a bit smaller than what we were used to. But it is understandable, they use quality and fresh ingredients and the prices aren’t bad for how delicious everything was.

Which would you rather order – chicken curry or laksa soup?

Thanks for reading!
-Carmen

Hi everyone!

Thai cuisine always seems to be lacking in popularity, especially in Vancouver. Indeed, there are just as delicious Thai restaurants as there are with other Asian cuisines, but for some reason, I never really hear anyone talk about going to Thai food, which really is a shame!

We came across Sawasdee Thai on Urbanspoon and we were sold immediately due to its high rating and convenient location. So off we went!

Sawasdee Thai is located on Main Street. We decided to go a bit later, just because we thought it would be super busy on a Friday night and didn’t want to wait in line there. The restaurant really stands out from the rest of the restaurants on the block.

When we got there at 8:30pm, we expected it to be quiet and were worried that it was even closed! We went in and were taken by surprise by the fact that the restaurant was completely full, with 2 parties of 4 still waiting to eat! The host asked us if we had a reservation which we didn’t, and I was worried we wouldn’t get a table. However, after 5 minutes, another lady sat us down. Yay!

The door is completely filled with awards which we took as a great and welcoming sign. We sat down, and impressed at how fast the servers were with getting our water and menu despite it being super busy in there.

When we were ready to order, the sever was quick to come to our aid. I really appreciated this because often, when you go to restaurants, servers ignore you when they’re busy, but these guys were really nice and efficient.

Our food came really fast, which was pleasantly surprising. For our appetizer, we ordered Stuffed Chicken Wings ($8.95). We ordered this because it sounded interesting – “de-boned chicken wings stuffed with bean thread noodles, mushroom, and carrot”. I wondered how a stuffed chicken wing would taste….

I instantly fell in love with the flavour of the chicken wings. The noodles were what made this dish stand out, otherwise it would have tasted like normal chicken wings.

The spices in the noodles were really good. I liked how they were generous with the noodles, but not so much that it ruins the actual chicken itself (see picture on the right-bottom is the chicken, clear stuff on top are the noodles/carrots/etc).

The sauce was also light and mild, which is good for an appetizer. It also tasted super fresh!

Next up, was our green coconut curry with chicken (12.95). We ordered a side of coconut rice since it does not come with any sides. There was an abundance of wonderful exotic Thai spices mixed intricately with rich, creamy, coconut milk and chicken breasts.

I loved that it was equal parts spicy, yet creamy, rich, and sweet at the same time. They also give you a LOT of quality, white meat chicken in the curry as well. With every spoonful of goodness you scoop, comes at least 3 pieces of chicken on your small spoon, until the very end of the dish (usually the first couple of spoonfuls the chicken would be gone).

The bamboo shoots that came with the dish were also really soft and sweet. The basil leaf that came on top of the dish was also a really nice addition and detail to our curry. The side of coconut rice (2.95) was also steamed perfectly, and had a generous amount of coconut milk with it.

Our final dish was their pad thai with tamarind sauce (11.95). I am not a big fan of pad thai to be honest, but I thought it tasted pretty good. The flavours were really accentuated and lively, you could really taste the tamarind sauce. There was also a generous portion of prawns that came with the dish. I was really hoping to try dessert but there was no way I could have eaten more there!

Conclusion: Overall, we had an excellent experience at Sawasdee Thai. The staff was very accommodating and managed to fit us in even though the restaurant was packed and we had no reservation. Service was friendly, quick, and efficient. I would highly recommend coming here as long as you make a reservation.

What are some delicious Thai places that you’ve been to in the Lower Mainland? Any thoughts? Let me know!

-Carmen