It’s the time of year when there are r in the months again and many London restaurants are doing special Oyster Festival Menus. One of these is the Patara Thai Restaurant in Soho. Patara is a fine dining Thai Restaurant chain in London serving authentic Thai flavours in their beautifully designed modern Thai interiors.
At a recent meal at Patara, we sampled their Oyster menu kicking off with oysters both fresh and deep fried. Being a weekend evening, the dining room was buzzing with couples on hot dates to big groups celebrating their birthdays.
The fresh oysters were served with a Shallot Vinaigrette or the delightful Thai Vinaigrette with mint, coriander, lemon, served with sweet crispy fried shallots and thinly sliced lemon grass. As a combination of flavours and texture, this was an absolute winner. If nothing else, you need to try this sauce. It’s flavours complimented rather than overwhelmed the sweet tasting fresh Maldon Rock oysters.
The second option was oysters deep fried in soda batter served with bean sprouts and chilli sauce. I thought that this version, after frying and doused in chilli sauce rather overwhelmed the flavour of the oysters and preferred the fresh ones.
For the mains, we opted for scallops sautéed in chilli paste, green curry lobsters and a dish of morning glory with the pineapple friend rice and a bowl of their special gaba rice. Big juicy scallops, perfectly cooked in a not too spicy chilli paste.
The lobster green curry was not your average green curry, the saucing was exceptional which many layers of flavour, balancing the sweetness of the coconut with the taste of fresh spices permeating through the sweet chunks of lobster. The mains are quite large servings and would be a perfect dishes to share.
We ordered some Pineapple fried rice to go with the mains and didn’t expect it to come with so much seafood. This is one dish meal all by itself. It was a delicious combination of scallops, mussels, scallops in a fragrant rice spiked with pineapple pieces. We added a bowl of Gaba rice which is a combination of 4 sprouted brown and unhusked rice, produced exclusively by the family in Thailand and has exceptional health qualities and is considered the new superfood. (Available for sale in Harrods.)
Pineapple Rice
We didn’t have room for pudding and need the evening with some herbal tea. The service through the evening was attentive and don’t forget to sample their cocktails, some delightful concoctions on their menu.
Dinner for two with drinks is about £100 including service.
SlowFoodKitchen was invited to review Patara Soho.
That lobster green curry looks absolutely amazing, I would LOVE to try it. Great photos, you’ve made me long for some spicy food.
That curry was delicious. Not your average green curry.