Lunch at the newest Thai restaurant in George Town - we were at ๐ง๐ต๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ฎ on 5 Prangin Lane which just opened for business on 10 July. It was Day 3 of business for them when we came.
Tharaโs menu highlighted items which reminded me of the offerings of Thai restaurants in Singapore like Thanying, Yingthai and A-roy Thai. Very cool!
We sipped chilled glasses of cha yen (iced Thai milk tea) as we perused its menu. Excellent balance of flavors and sweetness.
Our lunch spread today:
๐๐ค๐ข ๐ ๐๐ ๐ ๐๐ - chicken in a lemongrass-galangal-coconut milk soup. This is my go-to Thai soup since time immemorial. In every Thai restaurant Iโd been, Iโd select this over the more common tom yum goong each & every time.
Tom yum goong - my dining companions wanted to stick with tom yum and were offered a choice of either โwhite tom yumโ or โred tom yumโ. Curious about the white version, which weโd all never tried previously, they opted for that.
It was as tasty as the red one - the only difference, we surmised, was that no red chili paste was used, and the soup got its heat from pulverised green birdโs eye chilis, which were explosive in their heat.
๐๐ก๐ ๐จ๐๐ข ๐ง๐ค๐ - snapper in three-flavoured sauce: sweet, sour & spicy, this was my favorite Thai fish dish back in Singapore, where it is de rigeur in Thai restaurants there. Itโs lesser common in Thai restaurants in Penang, Kuala Lumpur & elsewhere, for some reason. Quite likely, Malaysians prefer their crisp-fried whole fish to be smothered with something robustly-spiced and less sweet like a sambal belacan paste.
Moo tod gratiem - crispy garlic pork. A classic rendition: thin slivers of pork deep-fried till very crisp on the outside, whilst retaining a bit of juiciness inside. These slivers were then tossed in a sauce made from a combination of soy sauce, oyster sauce and fish sauce, and with copious amounts of golden-fried garlic thrown in.
๐๐ค๐ง ๐ข๐ค๐ ๐ฉ๐๐ก๐๐ฎ ๐ข๐๐ฅ๐ง๐ค๐ฌ - Thai-style otak-otak in young coconut. This was absolutely scrumptious: very piquant with lemongrass, kaffir lime leaves, galangal and other herbs and spices, but with lesser chilis - that suit me perfectly as Iโm no chili-head.
My two fave Thai vegetable dishes from back in Singapore (and also in Bangkok) are ๐บ๐ฐ๐ฅ ๐ฎ๐ข๐ญ๐ข๐ฅ (bitter-gourd ferns) and pak liang (melindjo leaves) - both on Tharaโs menu, but unfortunately sold out over its opening weekend. So, we ordered ๐๐ค๐ค๐ฃ๐ ๐ฅ๐๐ ๐จ๐-๐ฉ๐ค๐ง - stir-fried petai beans with shrimps in spicy Thai gravy
Stir-fried water spinach - the Malaysians/Singaporeans call this green leafy vegetable kangkung, a Malay term which was borrowed from the Ceylonese centuries ago. Itโs such a common dish even in Singapore & Malaysia, where we stir-fried it with shrimps in a sambal belacan sauce, that most folks here would automatically order that wherever they see it.
Coming from Singapore, I did not even know the Chinese/Mandarin term for the vegetable was kong xin cai (็ฉบๅฟ่) until I came across it in a Chowhound discussion back about 2 decades back. No Chinese in Singapore or Malaysia would use that over โkangkungโ when they order, even in Chinese restaurants here!
The rendition here is a classic Thai one: gently stir-fried with garlic, whole red chilis and a bit of fish sauce.
Dessert: ๐๐ช๐ ๐ฉ๐๐ข ๐๐ง๐ค๐ - pink waterchestnuts-tapioca flour jewels, and strips of jackfruit in chilled coconut milk
Overall, very authentic cuisine, though not as spicy as in Thailand itself. The two chefs in the kitchen came from .
32-year-old Penangite, Ooi Joe Cherd, is the owner-chef, responsible for coming up with the food offerings, together with his brace of Thai chefs (from Chiangmai and Bangkok respectively). His staff averaged 18 years-old!
Lovely place. We liked the unfussy dรฉcor: sans the ethnic dรฉcoratives, one could hardly tell it was a Thai restaurant.
Address
Thara
5, Lorong Prangin (Prangin Lane), 10300 George Town, Penang
Tel: +6016-411 1400
Operating hours: 12 noon to 10pm daily
