Founded back in 1975, Kalpapruek is one of Bangkok’s earliest “modern” family restaurants which offers Thai-style dishes, complemented by Western-style cakes from its bakery for dessert. Its cakes were legendary and it’s one of the favourite places for Bangkokians to get their birthday or celebratory cakes. I’d been back to the original outlet of the restaurant in Silom for decades.
This time, during my last visit to Bangkok, I hosted a family luncheon for my Bangkokian relatives there. It’s a popular restaurant, and advisable to avoid weekday lunch-time when it gets really, really busy.
What we had:
Taechiu jui guoi or Thai-Taechiu Chinese steamed jasmine rice flour cupcakes, topped with fried sweet radish, minced pork and crab meat topping, flavoured with salty-sour-sweet beanpaste (“taucheo”).
Khao soi gai (ข้าวซอย)- Northern-style egg noodles with red chicken curry. (Utterly bad photo here, as I didn’t ask my aunt to lift up her noodles & chicken, submerged under the red curry gravy).
Ko mu yang (คอหมูย่าง) - grilled pork neck, served with “nam jim jeaw” (spicy chili dip) and “khao niew” (sticky rice). This was a typical North-west/Chiangmai-style dish.
Still a solid, dependable choice of a lunch spot to hold large family luncheons or dinners. The cooking is attuned to Bangkokian tastes - not as sweet or piquant as Southern flavors, not as bitingly spicy which the Northern palate prefers.
Bangkokians love variety, which Kalpapruek, like its great rivals, Taling Pling or S&P, provides in its extensive menu, complemented by its very popular daily special lunch set.
Simply outstanding food! I actually broke out my button down oxford shirt to take with me so I could put it on before I went in. Very nice dining room, not fancy, just comfortable wood tones and nice place mats, and a ceiling beam that is about 5’6" off the floor just waiting to brain you if you aren’t looking for it! LOL!
They seated me quickly, there were about 6 waitresses and 2 waiters, so it wasn’t like you have to wait long. They gave me the menu, I took a look, turned 5 or 6 pages of beautifully photographed menu items and asked the waitress to bring me a lemongrass juice because it was going to take a while to choose. She laughed and brought me a nicely sweet refreshing lemongrass drink.
I started with the taechiu cupcakes Peter mentioned first. They were delicious, sweet, salty, soft w/ crispy greens.
Then I ordered green curry w/beef and little green chilis. Again, very good, a little more soupy than my favorites, but really good. I prefer not to have the chili stems still on the chili but that was minor.
Finally, I ordered minced pork on wide noodles w/fried egg on top. The egg was still runny and it added even more flavor to an already pretty good dish. Not as good as the green curry, but very good.
Another hit, Peter!
The funny thing is that when I stood up to leave 4 of the waitresses/waiters jumped towards me to remind me about the concrete beam I had to go under to exit. I think they have had a lot of people brain themselves on that thing! LOL!
A fun place run by good people. Well worth returning to.
I just realised that the Thai Taechiu jui guoi has a Vietnamese counterpart, also introduced by the Teochews, called bánh bèo, as seen here in Bà Đỏ, a very popular spot in Hue which serves street snacks, but in a family restaurant setting:
