NANATHAI

63-64 St Johns Street, Bury St Edmunds, IP33 1SJ

Website: www.nanathai.co.uk

Type of Restaurant: Thai restaurant
Independent family run restaurant

Type of Food: Authentic Thai cuisine

REVIEW

We had another busy day on Thursday and decided to try a Thai in Bury St Edmunds. According to Trip Adviser there are 5 Thai restaurants in the Town but we had a look at the Nanathai when we were in town on Saturday and said that we would try it.

We parked easily in the Buttermarket around 6.00 and walked down to St John’s Street the restaurant is just over halfway down on the right. I am sure when I used to work next door that it was a Kitchen Shop but that was 30 years ago. It has been a Thai restaurant for quite a while now but seems to reincarnate from time to time under new management and a new name.

First ones in, we had a choice of where to sit. It is spotlessly clean and we were given a very warm welcome by a surprisingly very tall Thai waiter. The seats are very low but they do supply cushions to get closer to the food. More people followed us into the restaurant quite quickly giving a comfortable ambience that was initially enhanced by the melodic but loud authentic Thai music. Gladys got fed up with it after a while.

We had a couple of bottles of Chang (£3.75 a bottle). There is a choice of 4 lagers, no Bitter and no Cider, an adequate choice of wine and non-alcoholic drinks. There is however a really interesting choice of spirits including some Thai Rum that I quite fancied.

Some prawn crackers and chilli sauce were brought to the table after we ordered our meal. We both noted that the waiter was very careful in his delivery of the food as it was coming from a great height.

The menu is great with a huge choice of typical Thai food. We eventually settled on KING PRAWN WRAP (£6.50) Chef’s recommended king prawn wrap with crispy pastry. Served with sweet plum sauce and CHICKEN SATAY £6.50 Marinated Chicken grilled on skewers, served with peanut sauce to start.

Although the Prawn Wrap wasn’t how Gladys had expected she really enjoyed the big juicy prawns. I could have done with a bit more Satay sauce with my chicken but it was very tasty.

For our main courses I ordered from the Chef Specials a CHU CHI PHA (£14.50) although it sounds like one of the dances on Strictly, it was actually a Sea bass fillet cooked in a thick spicy rich red curry and lime leaf and was absolutely delicious with fantastic Far Eastern flavours

Gladys ordered the PAD KHAPOW which is a favourite Thai stir fried with garlic, chilli, basil leaf and vegetables she had a choice of Chicken, Pork, Beef, Prawn and Squid but went for the Beef (£9.95). The waiter enquired how spicy she wanted it and she went for the medium hot spices which was absolutely spot on.

Neither of the dishes included rice so we had to order our Jasmine Rice separately (£2.95 per dish)

Decent sized portions and very tasty, so tasty that I had to have another Chang.

A group of three sat on the next table and I overheard the man say “these seats are a bit low”, you wait for a while, I thought, I really want to know if the music gets on their nerves, they were sat right underneath the speakers.

We didn’t stay for sweet although it had some very good options on the menu.

The bill wasn’t really a surprise although I am always a bit wary if it comes to a round figure. It was exactly £60 but included an extra 10% for service on their website it says 10% service charge for 5 or more, I only noticed that when we got home.

When I gave the waiter my card for payment he was able to use his height to get a signal on the card machine which was handy.

The biggest surprise of the night for me was my visit to the gents which had a great picture of Muhammad Ali when he was known as Cassius Clay over the toilet, a real world star.

A very tasty Thai and thoroughly recommendable with good service, served at a good pace.