aroy thai, town

really good thai food at the funan shopping mall. we’ve been coming to this restaurant for quite a few years now, and it constantly surprises me that the place isn’t filled to its rafters with people. the restaurant is relatively small, and the tables placed in a rather cramped manner, but service is usually prompt and friendly and the food really good and rather authentic.

they always provide those fried crackers when you sit down, and that’s a nice touch that not many thai restaurants provide any longer. we usually always order the fried prawn cakes and the mixed vegetables – for some reason thais cook vegetables in a distinct and lovely manner. my parents have also recently discovered the seafood salad, which comes generously with al-dente seafood and transparent rice vermicelli noodles in a tangy marinade.

I almost always cannot resist the steamed fish, usually a whole sea bass, that comes on an ornate plate above a some lighted fuel that keeps cooking. the soup is usually a little too tart to drink as a soup, but it goes fantastically with rice, and you can see the bits of herbs that were ground up for the soup.

we finished the meal with ripe mango and fantastic sticky rice, almost as good as the one I had almost everyday in thailand, and the lady boss recommended a new dessert of sticky rice with lychees. I had thought that a bit too strange, but we went with it and it was so good – creamy coconut rice pudding with lychees interspersed throughout. definitely a keeper for subsequent visits.

we haven’t had a bad meal here in the years that we’ve visited, and the people are lovely. oftentimes in singapore, authenticity gets lost in our ever-increasing modernity, or restaurants charge a ludicrous amount for good food, but this place retains a charm and fantastic flavours with reasonable prices. probably our favourite place in singapore for thai food.