04 March 2010

Chonsiam Review ~ Thai - Campbell\Pitt Street Thainatown

There’s a million thai restaurants in Sydney but legit Thai street food is hard to find. Chon Siam in Haymarket is the real deal: it’s tiny, packed with Thai people, and it has sugar in the condiment tray…

If you want Thai food where Thai people eat then head to 'Thainatown.' Around the corner of Pitt and Campbell Streets in Haymarket are a bunch of great little Thai eateries that are as close as you can get to eating in Thailand.

Our favourite is Chon Siam, it's a tiny place with a cheery upbeat vibe and is usually full of young Thai hipsters, and a couple of old fart travel nerds like us...


We come back to Chon Siam again and again for boat noodle soup: a Thai roadside classic consisting of a rich beefy broth, thin rice noodles, beef chunks, unidentified meat balls and some greens. It's only $4 or so and it is absolutely declicious and makes for a great, quick and light lunch. Boat noodle soup is listed not on the menu but is on the specials sign outside.


Often we only have a boat noodle soup each and feel sheepish about paying only $8 for lunch for two.

But tonight we are in late-night feast mode after just seeing cult film maker John Waters speak at the Opera House. We take a punt on the squid salad and are well rewarded.


And we normally never order fried rice but tonight it just seemed to fit, the spicy fried rice is sensational.


This place is so authentically Thai that the condiment selection includes sugar: in Thailand you often see folks dowsing their meals with sugar.


The menu actually looks pretty standard but the Thai folks are eating some sensational looking dishes so we plan on coming back soon, we are sure there are some more undiscovered gems on the menu here.

Chon Siam is on Campell Street in Haymarket, just a little East of the corner of Pitt Street, open lunch time till late.

Chonsiam

1 comment:

  1. Hello There,

    I am looking around to find a Thai restaurant that which to promote their business at no cost by donating your chef's time to teach cooking some Thai dishes on either 24 or 31 August at the head office of Electrolux, or donate ingredients or both.

    This is a charity event where we are looking to raise $ for orphan children in Thailand.
    The organisation is called Hands Across The Water, and the website is www.handsacrossthewater.org.au

    Please let me know if you are interested as soon as you can so I cease the search...:)

    Thank you for your consideration.

    Kind regards,
    Janet.

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for your comment joy - please keep your musings happy - if you want to complain about a restaurant please do it on a restaurant review site (or your own blog) - we're all about celebrating cultural diversity and the great eats that come along with it :-)

Our ethics: We pay for all our own meals and travel (though sometimes Mum shouts us).