Getting all Thai-ed up at Benjarong

I haven’t met anyone who doesn’t love Thai food with a burning passion. I bet my bottom baht you haven’t, too! There’s a lot to love about Thai cuisine — for instance, the blend of the bland, the spicy, the sweet, and the sour is enough to send you to a state of gastronomic euphoria.

There’s a lot more to Thai for at Dusit Thani’s red-hot Benjarong restaurant known for its royal Thai cuisine (or what the king and queen of Thailand eat in the Palace). When he came on board only last year, Dusit executive chef Christian Werdenberg immediately rolled up his sleeves and started innovating the menus of the hotel’s food outlets while retaining the tried-and-tested old favorites. For Benjarong, Werdenberg collaborated with seasoned Thai chef Patcharaporn Noinak to introduce 130 new items on the menu — from appetizer to soup to main dish to dessert.

For a fresh start, try the new crispy kangkong salad (yam phad bung kaew, P340) and spiced salad of grilled pork with grapes (yam moo yang angun, P300) that have been added to the resto’s meaty green offerings that include spicy Thai beef salad (yam nuea yang) and papaya salad (som tum).

Meanwhile, you will love this match made in pescatarian heaven: stir-fried snow pea with prawn (thua lantao phad gungc pong, P420) and stir-fried tofu with seafood, (phad taohu song khueng, P400).

You wouldn’t want to start your meal without soup, would you? Something to stir your lackadaisical taste buds for your hot date with Thai food? Among the souper attractions at Benjarong are the mixed vegetable soup with prawn (gaeng lieng gung sod, P420) and the beef, sweet potato, basil leaves (gaeng tom jiw, P189). Souper delicious!

You will notice in the menu that if the dish is spicy, there’s a little innocent chili beside the name of the dish. Fret not! You can handle it without having to call a fireman to douse your burning tongue.

Now, let’s go to the meat of our story. I’ve always been a fried chicken lover. A nice new twist to a fried-and-tested favorite is the Benjarong’s new boneless chicken, fried to a crisp, with perky fresh turmeric (gai tord khamin, P380) which makes a filling, heartwarming appetizer. Then there’s the deep-fried pork belly with fish sauce (moo sam sham tord nam pla, P315).

Seafood lovers will simply love the fish/shellfish offerings, like the steamed lapu-lapu fillet with soya sauce and ginger (pla nung see-iew, P630), deep-fried whole pomfret with sweet and sour chili sauce (pla jaramet sam rod, P850), steamed fish fillet with crabmeat (pla muan, P700), fried clams with roasted chili paste (hoi lai phad nam phrik pao, P250), and deep-fried whole prawn with sweet and sour sauce (gung ha ros, P500).

But of course, Benjarong spices up its menu with lots of curry dishes. Hot sellers are the roasted duck in red curry (gaeng phed pet yang, P450), prawn in thick curry sauce (choo chee gung miang gorn, P1,050), and whole bisugo in thick red curry (choo chee pla tu sod, P320).

And what’s a Thai meal without Thai rice? Trust Benjarong to rice to the occasion. Although we have pretty much stuffed ourselves, we happily welcome a humongous serving of hot and sour prawn fried rice with roasted chili paste (khao phad tom yam, P380).

Of course, I didn’t forget to leave room for dessert — lots of it! An added cool attraction to Benjarong’s dessert list is the jellied turnip in coconut milk with crushed ice and syrup (tub tim krob, P180), which is a super light version of our halo-halo. Now, that’s a cool ending to a real hot food trip!

So, how do I sum it up? In a word, it’s tan-Thai-lizing!

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For more info on Benjarong’s new offerings that promise to leave diners tongue-Thai-ed, call 867-3333.