Spice, Spice, Baby!!!

Red Spice Road (RSR) is one of my all-time favourites ever since I visited a few years ago. The restaurant serves Thai food with an Australian interpretation and is often compared to the likes of Gingerboy and Longrain. Traditional Thai food has a special emphasis on the use of different spices and herbs to enhance flavours without one overpowering the other. It is this balance that is tricky and hard to capture, but RSR does just that. Here, spice thankfully doesn’t translate to tongue-numbing sensations. Rather, you find yourself unable to resist a third and fourth (if anyone on the table hasn’t rapped your knuckles yet) serving of the delicious and beautifully presented food. RSR is a foodies dream and a dieter’s nightmare. There is a quagmire of temptations and you have to wonder if it is even worth resisting your urges. Afterall, why would your body lie to you? 🙂

For those who enjoy contemporary dining, RSR is aesthetically pleasing. As you enter, your gaze drifts immediately to the large orbs suspended from the ceiling. Delicately spun, they resemble orbs of moon. RSR also has a huge wall-space dedicated to one of David Bromley’s painting that can be an eye-opener for elderly. Don’t bring Nana here if she is the more conservative kind. I don’t think my parents batted an eye-lid when they came here for dinner one night, although Dad was a bit wistful that he couldn’t really see his food. The lighting is fairly dimmed at nighttime to impart a romantic mood, but the trade-off is that it is hard to take photos of the food. So arrive during the day to capture those Kodak moments. RSR is also home to one of the most gigantic red lanterns I have ever come across. I think it lights up at night to create a festive atmosphere and it floats above an equally impressive horse-shoe shape wooden table. I know a few diners dislike sitting in close proximity with their neighbors but I find this aspect of communal dining reflective of South-East Asia. There is enough space that you won’t find yourself knocking elbows with each other. Another plus is that you get to see the different dishes being ordered and you can even strike up a conversation with fellow diners. For those who crave personal space or wish to host functions, there is the option of booking a private room for your enjoyment.

If you need another reason to come and try RSR, here it is: they offer fantastic value for food. Really! Their lunch banquet is very popular and you can’t really argue with paying $25 for an appetizer and three mains of your choice with rice. The dishes are all generously portioned and I haven’t dined with anyone who is able to polish off all the food. For those who fancy themselves big-eaters, there is the $50 lunch banquet or you can order a la Carte. If you are spending a night out with friends in town, be sure to invite them to try the Earlybird special or dinner banquets at RSR as a rollicking good time is almost guaranteed.

During the week, I caught up with a few friends over lunch at RSR to try out their latest offerings. The lunch banquet changes once every two weeks so you won’t get bored – variety is the spice of life eh? To kick things off, we enjoyed the appetizer which was Tom Kha (spicy coconut broth with prawn and chicken) tremendously. Instead of bowls, the soup was served in a tea-cup on a long green leaf. Deliciously creamy with a slight fiery heat to the back of the throat, the medley of spices in this soup would be perfect for a cold Winter’s day. There was a whole prawn and shredded chicken at the base of the cup which we picked up with the chopsticks. We all agreed that it was a great start. For mains, we ordered: (1) Pork Belly with Chilli Caramel, Black Vinegar and Apple Slaw; (2) Beef Red Curry with Potato; and (3) Yum Talay – Prawn, Squid and Barramundi Salad with Chilli, Herbs and Lemongrass. Another dish that sounded interesting was the Chicken with Soup Cart Broth, Water Spinach, Basil, Peanuts and Beanshoots. We hesitated with ordering this dish because we were not sure what soup cart broth meant. Our friendly waitress zoomed off with our orders and left us to trade stories with each other. Service is unobtrusive at RSR as we were for the most part unaware of our glasses being refilled and plates cleared throughout lunch.

I mentioned that the lunch menu changes every fortnight. But the one item that is never taken off is the pork belly. It is one of the signature dishes of RSR and enjoys a God-like status amongst food served at this place. Almost everyone I know who has been to RSR cannot stop raving about the pork belly. They mightn’t remember what else they had, but they always reminisce about this one. As ridiculous as it sounds, squabbles have arisen as to who gets the last piece. It is seriously that good and memorable. Generous squares of the softest, most tender meat sit lazily in a pool of dark honey-coloured caramel. Like hidden treasures, they are covered by crisp green apple slaw which elicit contented sighs when eaten together with the sticky pork belly. A little jug of black vinegar is provided and we drizzle it over the scrumptious meat – elevating it to another level of sweet and sour. I can’t quite taste the chilli caramel but who cares?! We absolutely love the visual appeal and how the skin crackles, and the melt-in-your-mouth fat that surrounds parcels of pork. The fragrance of the entire dish served on piping hot rice is so enjoyable that we now understand the pork belly’s cult-like following. And no, we didn’t fight over the last piece because my friends were nice enough to let me have it. Or perhaps they caught sight of the slight maniacal gleam in my eye, whatever it is, I scored the last piece. Hooray for me!

By comparison, the red beef curry with potato was a little bit of a let down. We didn’t feel that there was anything very special with this dish. The meaty chunks of beef were tender but didn’t carry much of the flavour of the red curry that it was immersed in. We spooned the curry on to our rice and tried our best to finish the dish but we were defeated in the end. It was a heavy dish and so the next one was a very welcome change of scenery for our stomachs.

Initially, we were surprised by the generous mix of prawns, calamari and barrumundi included in the Yum Talay. I thought that there would be small gold nuggets of barrumundi but instead, white barrumundi flesh was stripped and tossed throughout the herbacious salad. My fears of it being fishy soon dissipated when I tried a tiny piece of it – fresh! I think all the seafood was marinated in a tangy vinaigrette which meant that all elements were really tasty. The translucent orange-striped prawns were fairly big, lovely and crunchy. Our waitress even brought over a small bowl for us to discard the tails in – something that we appreciated. We loved the texture of the calamari – it had a soft chewiness that is so different from eating calamari the consistency of rubber-bands at other eateries. There was plenty of cooling cucumber salad to go around and despite us not being fans of coriander – we ate it all even after finishing the apple slaw served with the pork belly! That was how much we liked it.

I would happily recommend RSR to anyone. It is an incredibly versatile place where you can bring friends, family and fellow colleagues. The lunchtime crowd is dotted with plenty of businessmen and women in suits as well as those who want a casual get-together or celebration; so be sure to make a reservation. Currently, RSR is holding a Father’s Day banquet, so bring Dad and the whole family along for an enjoyable meal. Just be prepared that they will talk your ears off about the pork belly for months to come ;).