More Thai then you can possibly eat..........

What’s better for breakfast then an eat as much as you like Thai buffet, especially with the Mother of all hangovers that me and the hubby had after a friend’s wedding party the day before?

In pain and hungry we wondered in to the city centre towards Thai Edge http://www.thaiedge.co.uk/, a restaurant that we had been meaning to try for ages. They offer a Sunday lunch time buffet for about £13 a head.

We entered the restaurant pretty certain that we wouldn’t get a table – it was so full; and whilst waiting for the waiter to notice us got a good eyeful of the buffet selection. The waiter was unfortunately new, but he was friendly and managed to find us a table. We ordered the house dry wine and a couple of glasses of tap water – the house wine was very drinkable.

On the table was a printed menu explaining the dishes, which appears to change each week. It offered two soups, a selection of starter nibbles, a range of hot dishes, and three salads. To start I went for the tom yam soup, always a favourite of mine, and what impressed me about the soup apart from the dedicated waitress serving it for you, rather then messily serving yourself, was the fact that there was barely any room for the soup around the massive king prawns it was fresh and had a lovely amount of spice to it, very restorative after the heavy drinking the night before. Hubby went for a selection of the nibbly starters, fried chicken bits (not battered and with skin still attached!) tender, fresh and crispy all at the same time, sweet corn cake which was like a fried sweet corn pancake, and some nice samosas and miniature spring rolls, all fresh and enjoyable.

For our second assault on the buffet I chose to try the salads and went for the mixed sea food salad, which was loaded with scallops, king prawns, mussels, crab claws, and white fish it had a crispy clean taste and a lovely chilli hit, the fish salad was very similar but served with coated white fish, and the mango salad with cashew nuts offered fresh slices of mango with a light dressing. Hubby went for the hot dishes, trying the duck with tamarind sauce (which must have been good he went back for a least two more helpings), stir fried fish with ginger and onion which disappeared so quickly of his plate and the buffet that I couldn’t try it, and some very satisfactory massamn curry, he also tried to noodles on the buffet which he thought were sweet but not cloying.

Although stuffed after trying all the salad (and having several helpings of the fantastic seafood salad) I thought I would try the cooked to order pad thai noodles, I ordered them with prawn. They were great a sweet but fresh taste loaded with prawns, a lovely way to finish the meal as we couldn’t face any of puddings.

In total the bill came to around £39 for a great lunch, would again recommend this to anyone after some great Thai food in a relaxed atmosphere on a Sunday lunch time, but would warn them to come early as it is very popular.

Mai Thai

Working until 9.00pm on a Friday normally limits the eating out options in Brum (everything seems to close at 10pm) so we attempt to get into the local curry house, but the queue out the door puts us off. Handily at the start of the alleyway that leads to the curry house is a Thai restaurant that we hadn't yet been to, it’s been on the High Street for a couple of years after replacing a fantastic coffee shop/restaurant.

Looking though the glass frontage it looked pretty empty but was still serving so we thought we would give it a go, walking through the door we were warmly welcomed by a waitress and lead through to the back of the restaurant, all the two person tables were arranged in front of a bench/banquet type seat with one chair, hubby got to share the bench with the other diners.

We ordered a nice house sauvignon Blanc, and tucked into the Thai crackers that were placed on the table. We decided to share starters as there were a nice range but we couldn’t decided which ones we fancied; we went for the chicken satay, wrapped king prawns and a pink grapefruit salad with king prawns. The chicken satay was very light and refreshing not as cloying as Chinese chicken satay can be, the wrapped king prawns were fresh and crispy with a wonderful sweet clear vinaigrette, the prawns so fresh the shell on tails were wonderfully crunchy to munch; the pink grapefruit salad was refreshing but would have benefited from a few more prawns.

For mains hubby went for his favourite massaman beef curry and I chose sliced beef in red curry sauce, and to share a pud Thai noodles and fried fragrant rice. Hubby’s massaman curry was rich and lush, he thought it was fantastic, but agreed that my beef was even better in a smooth but fragrant sauce and the beef incredibly tender. The pud Thai was sweet and fresh tasting with the peanuts served to one side – which for me was great as I’m not the biggest peanut fan ever! And the rice was perfectly cooked clean tasting and with a nice bite to it.

Hubby ordered a pudding of honey and ginger ice-cream, which they served with two spoons – and we both agreed that it was a fantastic way to end the meal it was light and refreshing one of the nicest ice-creams I’ve tried.

This restaurant was a nice surprise we haven’t been there before and were pleasantly surprised by the friendly staff and great food. The price range for the three starters, two mains, two side dishes and one pudding with two bottles of wine was around £70.00 excluding tip!

Would recommend this as a great Thai restaurant for those not looking to head into the city centre.