first thai

Sharon's colleague Christine introduced her to this Thai restaurant and she swears by it. Being the crazy foodies we are, we wasted no time checking this place out. I've been wanting to go to a proper authentic Thai restaurant to flaunt my Thai abilities after taking a course in Thai. (Alas, I've forgotten the most part of it)

First Thai Food turned out to be situated in an old-school coffeeshop setting. It seemed very promising and I immediately conjured up thoughts of authentic piping hot tom yum soup in cheapo metal bowls. There's a certain rustic charm about these coffee-shops that I cannot resist.

Parking is a problem if you are driving, because there are only limited PARALLEL parking lots. (It's a big problem for me la ok.)

The menu, which is a bit unsettling for me. I'm guessing it's a thai girl there. But she looks nothing like a Thai. in fact, I think she looks almost Indian. I think it's the huge huge eyes.

Mango salad. We ordered it "phet maak dai mai" which means literally means "very spicy, can or not?" (I told you I need to show off a bit right?) Well phet (spicy) it was. Not crazily spicy but with a very satisfactory kick to it. The mangoes were very fresh, and just unripe so they were still very firm and crunchy. Somehow, they weren't very sour as I find mango salads are wont to be. The zest was just right. We were very impressed by this unassuming dish. Very good.


We had a crabmeat fried rice. This was amazing. The crabmeat was sweet and succulent; they were generous with their serving, the rice was perfectly dry and fluffy and individually encased in that adored wok-hei. After the mango salad and this, I couldn't wait for what was coming up!

The tom yum was great. They were so generous with the ingredients that the soup was cloudy with the precipitate. I've never had clear tomyum made murky like this before. The bowl was literally overflowing with ingredients. Very very good.

The soup tasted great. It was very authentic, with that sour-sweet-spicy thing down pat. We spotted occasional chicken pieces (treasure!!) and the chicken was oh-so-soft. The prawns however, were not very fresh. Other than that, it was good.

Chicken fried with cashew nuts. I did not like this. There were more cashew nuts than chicken. More chicken skin than chicken meat. In short, where's the chicken?! It was also way too salty for my liking. I felt like I was chewing on deep fried chicken skin doused in gravy.

The hotplate tofu did not taste very Thai and we were disappointed with this too. I thought it was very average and Sharon thought it was too salty.

There were more hits than misses. I would say this is a good place for some-what authentic Thai food although I think that it is slightly overrated. There must be a better Thai restaurant waiting to be discovered. That's why we call our blog next-stop-ambrosia right?

First Thai Food
23 Purvis Street