I was at The Curve last Friday after work with a few friends, since a couple of them has already eaten, we decided to go to some place less lavish and ended up at Thai Express on The Street.

As the name suggest, this is an “express” restaurant that has a limited range of dishes. The interior decoration is simple and clean, without much fuss.

nice looking menu

After looking over the illustrated menu, I decided to go for the curried soft shell crab rice and a glass of Thai Pina Colada (non alcoholic version). Kelvin ordered the BBQ fish rice, while the other two jokers only ordered desserts and drinks as they have already eaten.

We didn’t need to wait long for the dishes to be served. I was more than delighted to see two pretty good size soft shell crabs covered with good-smelling curry sitting right next to the steamed rice. As the taste of soft shell crab (argh i kept miss-spelling it as software crab) is pretty standard, it came down to the curry to differentiate the dish from the simple deep fried soft shell crab, it was not a disappointment. Kelvin’s fish dish was pretty decent as well.

ahh, the soft shell crab rice!

The Thai Pina Colada is basically some mixture of mostly pineapple juice with a big scoop of the excellent ice cream. Then there’s the traditional glutinous rice with mango, red rubies, and more coconut ice cream (sweet temptation) we ordered.

The highlight of the evening was when I looked at Kimberly’s half chewed mango skin, and she explained:
“I was wondering why this mango is a little weird until I saw the skin… “
Basically the girl ate half the mango skin without realizing what she was chewing, this girl never cease to surprise us.

kim with her half-eaten mango SKIN

As for price, the food, while not cheap, weren’t too expensive. The curried soft shell crab was RM 17.90++ and the fish RM 15.90++. However, the drinks are a little pricey at RM 7.90++ for what I ordered, and even mineral water will set you back at RM 2.90++.

A decent place to dine in if you’re at The Curve, but for proper Thai food, I’ll go to De’ Chiengmai at Sungai Buloh.

Address:
Thai Express Restaurant
G50, Jalan PJU 7/3
The Curve, Mutiara Damansara
Tel No: 03-7710 9629

Tags:  damansara,  eats,  express,  soft-shell-crab,  thai-food,  the-curve

Posted by KY | 13 Comments »

The mat salleh suggested that we go to De Chiengmai Thai Seafood restaurant at Sungai Buloh after reading the Malay tomyam place I posted on monsterblog a few weeks ago. Together with Kelvin, we promptly did that the following weekend.

very nice ambience

Getting to there is no trivial stuff, the restaurant is located deep in a kampung at Sungai Buloh. However, with the senior’s memory and a little luck, we finally reached there after only one wrong turn. For the readers here, you guys are lucky, there’s now, of course, a map (see below)

The architecture of the restaurant reminded me of cultural centers and museums more than a place to cure hunger. Nicely decorated and quiet, De Chiengmai offers a good ambience for dining. There are also ample parking space.

tomyam, otak-otak, steamed fish, pandan chicken

We ordered 4 dishes for the 3 of us. A must-order steamed siakap fish (bass), seafood tomyam, otak-otak, and pandan chicken. It didn’t take long before the dishes were served, with the more aromatic Thai rice to go with them.

real charcoal, and super fresh vegetable

The steamed fish turned out to be the best dish of the day. With plenty of garlic and ginger, the fish simmers in a sourish and spicey soup base and being kept warm with slow burning charcoal. Don’t miss out on this dish if you go there. The tomyam was pretty good as well, not overly spicy, but with plenty of squid, prawns, and other seafood items.

The otak-otak, well, is not anything we would call otak-otak in a Malaysian sense. This dish is a mixture of seafood in the otak-otak “sauce”. With plenty of fish meat, prawn, and squid. It was very rich and satisfying though. The pandan chicken tasted as how they should be, and provided a good alternative to all the seafood dishes we ordered.

location map of de’ Chiengmai Thai Seafood Restaurant

The restaurant definately offers one of the best Thai food anywhere, and with the great atmosphere and reasonable pricing (RM 112.88 for all those). It is really hard to beat. Especially now that you know how to get there, there is no excuse not to give it a try.

Do order some vege dishes too (we probably should have), De Chiengmai grow their own vegetables so that all the vegetables are super fresh and of top quality.

Address:
De Chiengmai Thai Seafood
No 34, Kg. Sentosa, Bt. 13 Sg Buloh 47000
Sungai Buluh Selangor
Tel: 03-6206 3225

Tags:  de-chiengmai,  halal,  pandan,  siakap,  sungai-buloh,  thai-food,  tomyam

Posted by KY | 18 Comments »