Meal : Dinner
Loc : Intercontinental @ Marine Drive
Koh the signature restaurant of well known Thai purveyor Ian Kittichai opened its doors recently. I was there with reservations under restaurant week, which has been a great initiative to bring gourmet cuisine to the masses and i hope they have loads of success in the near future.
The space is set up to look unlike most Asian places which have an accent on ethnicity, Koh is very modern in its outlook yet it has a theme of the traditional running through its middle. A lot like the cuisine. The layout is a design success.
Unfortuantely, Koh was quite a dissapointment. To call it a challenger to Thai Pavilion would be extremely erroneous since it does not do what we consider traditional Thai cuisine. There is no tom yum and the focus on pad thai is also diminished. The menu is mostly the Chef''s interpretation of Thai cuisine.. i.e modern. I am all for modern cuisine but Koh falls flat.
The organic Chang Mai was just bland, it did have a pleasant, cleansing effect on the palate but had no real flavour.
The corn cakes served with a side of peanut sauce, again, nothing to write home about. the taste was fairly simple with no real head or tail, the peanut sauce too didnt help.
the jasmine tea infused bean curd, freshly smoked it didnt evoke any strong flavours either. the jasmine tea flavour was very light but there was nothing else, beyond it.
while i enjoyed the bento boxesque presentation of the main course it was again, quite a dissapointment. The asparagus with chilly was interesting but everyone on the table ended up biting into the chilly which burnt our tongues.The green curry had way too much eggplant in it and the jasmine rice was undercooked all around.
The broccoli and shitake though were above average. Since they learned that the rice was undercooked they brought out some pad thai which wasnt too great either.
The dessert platter was not too bad, the ladies seemed to love the flourless brownie while i enjoyed the choc ice cream and the orange cheesecake.Overall, id say the restaurant needs to work out its tastes and its quality on some aspects. Undercooked rice is not acceptable. Not a single dish was memorable and i dont think modern equals bland or uninspired.
To me personally, Thai food is about heavy flavours and heat, this meal was all gas and no taste, i think ill stick to Thai Pavilion for now.
F00d : 4/10
Service : 6/10
Damage 4500 for 4 without drinks
Posts
11 comments:
This is interesting Gaurav. The PR wave have gone ballastic about Koh. In fact there was an article today i the Times on it including on its veg fare. A colleague of mine, a vegetarian, went there and liked it. So I won't say that you had a veg non veg problem. Wonder if they dumbed down for the restaurant week. Which would be silly. Thai Pavillion is my favourite too. Koh says that they go beyond what we 'know' as Thai food. I will check it out and I really hope that they do not mess with my favourite cuisine.
hey KK,
the PR wave has indeed gone ballistic but then Kittichai is a reasonably well known name.
the dishes were mostly served from the regular menu though i was told they way they were served was very different to their normal style.
the interpreation simply failed... none of the dishes would pass muster.. compare that to a Thai Pavilion where very little fails.
while the cooking can be modern or traditional it all comes down to the taste.
A "SUPPORT" I think the restaurant week is not very well followed by the author as it is an experience and you let down the entire experience by making a comparison. My advices next time compare restaurants which are a part of the week and not your favourites. To me it sounds more like a rage.
I tried out a couple of restaurants myself and I feel everyone did a fantastic JOB, and every were it was more than what I expected and the service I felt was not compromised. With the traffic issues my favourite still restricts to Maratha’s Pan Asian and I wish they were a part of RWM never the less between me and my friends we tried every restaurant of RWM I never made is past waitlist for KOH and am sorry I missed the Trident RWM both of which my friends said was a great experience. Hats off to the restaurant week people and I hope this blog has not bought your moral down, am sure Mumbai thanks everyone at RWM.
@ Anonymous- its like your attacking the blogger :P
May be the blogger actually had a bad experience .
Gaurav ,
I am a religious reader of your bolg. I have recommended your blog to most of my friends and they love it too.
I am looking for a good mexican restaurant to go out on my Birthday.
Willing to spend 10k for 4 ppl.
Dear Anonymous,
Thanks for your post. Just for the record the RW folk are dear friends and i have posted about the event at many places, its a great idea and they have ALL my support and more.
i dont think any restaurant would serve a lesser dish just because its part of RWeek.ìt would be very insensible if they were to do so.
All the dishes at KOH were on the menu as well. My dissapointment would not have been lessened had i ordered this off the menu a week later.
It makes more sense to compare restaurants by cuisine (Thai) and style (Traditional for TP and Mordern for Koh) rather compare the overall experience since there is little in common.
Koh has been bandied around as the hot new Thai place, Thai Pavilion is King for now, so the comparison is most likely.
Next time at RW (and there will be more) you can have my reservation at Koh.
Cheers,
Gaurav
Dear Deepali,
thanks for your kind words.
For Mexican with that budget i would recommend Starboard at the Taj. there really isnt anything comprable as of now.
enjoy.
@Anon, we pay for our food and are entitled to our opinions. Just as you are to yours. I think that the post here was on the resturant and not on resturant week.
Gaurav, I went to Koh on Sunday. had a better experience. Was too beat to write yet. Wanted to ask you about how you got such bright pics given that the ambience was dark? Any tips? Did you use the flash?
No competition to Thai Pavillion. I agree
KK, good to hear your experience was better..
i didnt take too many pictures at KOH, the wife did. she says she cant recall about the Flash but looking at the pics i am pretty sure she did.
Post a Comment