Your Neighborhood Thai Home-Style
Kopitiam
Talk
Thai to me anytime and I am happy camper! I love the cuisine that evokes all
savory, sweet, spicy and sour flavours and harmonizes them on one plate. Most
Thai restaurants here are pork free so when I heard of Surisit, The Thai Kopitiam who serves pork in their Thai cuisine, I
was ecstatically jumping with joy. Surisit
first outlet in TTDI was a smashing success and has gathered quite a
following for their dishes. Owner Rivon Gill has recently opened the second Surisit in Paramount area, Petaling
Jaya to bring Surisit’s home-style
Thai cuisine to the neighborhood.
With
our ravenous stomachs in tow, we paid a visit to the newest outlet for a taste
of Surisit. The outlet is dressed
with minimalist and focus more on the rustic home-style food through a kopitiam
concept. It is still bright, clean and
neat so it’s a good sign that the owner chose to let their food shine in this
simple no-frill kopitiam. The menu is quite extensive and many dishes are
familiar while some looks to be really authentic plus there is quite a
delicious list of pork dishes which I am dying to try.
We
had quite a good choice of dishes for the seven of us that evening. Thai Otak Otak (Hohmuk Paphraw) is
served in a coconut shell and looks pretty yum at sight. It’s got seafood
steamed in a spice laden thick custard sauce. It’s got a good balance of spices
and coconut cream, rendering lovely savory and moreish flavours with some heat.
The seafood is nicely cooked too with pieces of tender coconut flesh as well.
Though
it didn’t won our hearts, the Prawns
Fried with Long Beans & Thai Shrimp Paste (Thaw Fahgam Phat Khapi Kung)
was still sufficiently decent with its just cooked long beans and bits of
onions with prawns in a piquant Thai shrimp paste sauce.
I
love Thai salads, any for that matter of fact because I love the distinctive
flavours and textures. One of my all-time-favorite Thai salad has to be the Catfish Mango Salad (Yam Pla Duk Foo Ma
Mung). This one is very satisfying with lots of flavours and textures in
tow. The mango salad is fresh, vibrant and filled with lots of sour and sweet
notes while the crispy catfish and cashew nuts gave the salad lots of crunch
factor.
Crispy Fried Pork with Shrimp Paste,
Kaffir Leaves & Chilies (Moo Thod Kapi) is superb in my books. Well-seasoned pork with bits of
fats is beautifully savory and moreish. I tasted the distinctive shrimp paste
taste and thought this dish is pretty much lethal as the pork slices are very
addictive. Pork is moist and tender too. The deep fried kaffir leaves added
aroma to the pork. Super shiok!
The
Fried Prawn Cakes (Thod Man Kung) is
pretty good. Golden breaded prawn cakes have a good bouncy texture with
sweetness from the prawns. It’s crispy and also tender. Dip these in the sweet
Thai chili sauce and it makes great snacks.
Our
Tomyan Spicy Lemongrass Flavoured Soup
(Tom Yam Thalay) soup, clear version, looked deceivingly mild. The sour and
spicy soup actually packed quite a punch in heat. Good dose of sourness and
there is plenty of seafood to keep me happy. Surisit also offers the red
version for a fiery option. I had two bowls of this very spicy and sour soup
and loved it…
The
next dish of Claypot Glass Noodle Prawns
(Kung Op Woon Sen) came with fairly large prawns neatly arranged on glass
noodles. Though it looked good, the glass noodles were a tad bland. The prawns
were good though as they were firm and had a light sweetness. We still enjoyed
this with rice.
Thai-Style Deep Fried Squids with
Salted Egg (Plamuk Phad Khikhem)
rocks! These luscious squid are lightly battered and coated in a sublime salted
egg yolk sauce together with some aromatics of onions, kaffir leaves, chilies
and coriander. The dish has savory and sweetness all nicely balanced while the
squid is pretty tender too. May not be good for the heart but so good for the
soul… must order!
I
have always enjoyed this dish of Minced
Pork with Thai Basil (Phat Krapao Moo Sap). It’s practically available in
most Thai places and is comfort food. Minced pork is sautéed with lots Thai
basil to create that distinctive aroma and flavour. The version here included
onions, spring onion and chili in addition to the usual ingredients. It’s got
lots of moreish flavours and is perfect with steamed rice and fried sunny side
up egg. That’s what I usually order when I see it on a menu because it’s
practically a meal all by itself.
I
hope I got the name for the beef dish right for Stir-Fried Beef with Chilies & Thai Basil Leaves (Neua Phat Bai
Grapao). I didn’t see basil but instead saw it was crowned with kaffir
leaves. The beef is flavourful and has a good firm bite. It is another dish
that one can snack on happily. Surisit
manage to nail their meat dishes with good dose of marinades and also kept
their meat juicy and delicious.
Our
last savory dish was another classic Steamed
Fish with Lime (Pla Nueng Prik Manau). The fish is smothered with loads of minced
garlic, chili, coriander soaked in a pool of lime sauce. This one was less impressive
than the other dishes as there seemed to be some kick missing in the usual sour
and tasty soup. Nevertheless, it’s still
a passable dish which just needed some tweaking of flavours in soup and the fish
was fresh.
Dinner
ended with more classics of Red Rubies
with Coconut Milk (Tap Tim Grop) and Mango
Pulut with Coconut Milk (Khaw Niau Ma Muang). Both are just a perfect sweet
ending to our Thai home-style meal that evening with their lovely and fruity
sweetness. I can never say no to Thai desserts…
I like Surisit for its no-frill Thai
home-style kopitiam vibe. The menu is filled with a long list of Thai favorites
and many are hits despite very few misses. Serving a list of Thai porky dishes
is also another plus point. I am pretty sure many will be sniffing out this
outlet soon following it pursuit of its popular TTDI outlet.
SURISIT,
THE THAI KOPITIAM
No.3 Jalan 20/14,
Petaling Jaya,
Selangor
Tel: 03-7865 7507
Website: www.surisit.com.my
Facebook: www.facebook.com/SurisitThaiKopitiam
Business Hours:
Mon to Fri: 11am – 3pm, 6pm – 10.30pm
Saturday and Sunday: 11am – 10.30pm
I missed their fried pork~
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