I love Thai food, and I’m lucky enough to have a Thai neighbour who is a fabulous cook.
Not surprisingly, when I had the chance to check out the new Rosa’s Thai branch in Kingston (close to the Rose Theatre btw, if you fancy a nosh before or after a performance) I invited Jiew to come along with me and help critique the menu.
The Thai 12 Menu
What I hadn’t realised, was that there is a really brilliant offer on weekday lunchtimes where there is a special The Thai 12 menu with eight different Thai dishes available at a special price of £12 each.
The portion sizes are very generous too, which we discovered while chatting with the folk at the next table, who were enjoying their lunch.
Our Lunch
Jiew suggested a number of dishes that we should try, to best appraise me of the range of Thai food style, so we started with an assortment of starters that I learnt are classic Thai street food dishes: Prawn Doughnuts, Green Papaya Salad and Grilled Pork Skewers. Jiew said that these are ubiquitous in Thailand and often served with sticky rice too.
The salad had a delightfully refreshing dressing with strong elements of fish sauce, lime juice and ginger, and was served with cashew nuts – apparently it’s more usual to have peanuts but the rather more luxurious cashews were great.
The doughnuts were light and deliciously ‘prawny’ and the pork skewers had been marinated in honey and soy so infused with flavour. They were served with a tamarind dip.
Main Courses
Jiew was keen for us to taste a good range of her native fare and so we tried Chicken Penang Curry (one of the most popular dishes in Thailand). It’s based on the trademark balance of salty, sweet and spicy with lime leaves, krachai and Thai aubergine. It was very good – tasty, slightly on the spicy side for me, and with a generous amount of sauce.
And we had to have a taste of Rosa’s legendary Pad Thai with prawns. This is Thailand’s national dish and Saiphin, Rosa’s co-founder, has perfected her special tamarind sauce. It was served with chopped peanuts and a wedge of fresh lime to squeeze over. It was fabulous, served with thin noodles, which are more authentic than the flat ones, according to Jiew.
From the ‘smaller’ portions of the special lunch menu we had Stir-fried Aubergine with rice and Chicken Rice. The aubergine was a star of the show in my opinion – chunks of aubergine in a light batter, stir fried with yellow bean sauce, chilli, soy and Thai basil. It was really wonderful. The other lunch portion was Chicken Rice – another classic with poached chicken, served with a light broth, sliced cucumber and a sauce made from ginger, garlic, chilli and fermented bean paste. I really liked this – it was elegant in its simplicity, but the spicy sauce brought the whole dish together – and to life. Jiew gave this a big ‘thumbs up’.
Not surprisingly, we didn’t finish all our main courses, but we had a great selection of leftovers to have packed away for taking home to enjoy later. It was so interesting for me to dine with someone who really knows what she’s talking about with Thai food and felt that Rosa’s Thai is a great place to discover it.
The special lunch menu is also available in the Richmond branch every weekday (except bank holidays) so now I know where to meet friends for a really tasty, great value lunch.
