COCONUTS CRITIC’S TABLE — Did you eat dinner in the Eastern hemisphere on May 20, 2014? If so, I’d like to inform you that my dinner was, without a shadow of a doubt, better than yours. No matter what you ate in Asia that evening, whether sushi at Sukiyabashi Jiro, the finest Cantonese banquet in all of Hong Kong or [Your Favourite Restaurant Here], what I experienced at Nahm, David Thompson’s famed Thai fooderie at the Metropolitan Hotel, was better.
At least that is what some mineral water company reckons. Nahm was recently proclaimed No. 1 in the San Pellegrino Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants 2014 list. If you were cynical, you might suggest that the very idea you can rank restaurants or haircuts or Beatles albums or anything subjective in this way is ludicrous. (Revolver, since you ask.) You might also question the legitimacy of a brand of mineral water to pronounce on such matters in the first place. Why, we may as well ask a tire company what to eat.
But let’s, for a moment, toss out the cynicism. After all, the list was voted on by a selection of “international food critics, chefs, restaurateurs and highly regarded ‘foodies.’” This is not CNN asking Americans where they think MH370 is. And what the experts are collectively saying is that Nahm is, by implication, the best Thai restaurant in all of Thailand. Now, I realise this is a charged topic and a matter of pride for many, given that Nahm chef-proprietor David Thompson – shudder – isn’t Thai. But I think we can all agree that Thompson likely knows more about Thai food than any other non-Thai person on the planet. Having eaten at Nahm before, I sensed this award for what it was: the perfect excuse to eat there again.
As far as hotel restaurant decor goes, Nahm is stylish yet unremarkable. What strikes you most are its brick columns, which conjure the ruins of old Ayutthaya. They’re an elegant nod to Thailand’s past that beats the trite Ye Olde Siam kitsch many gourmet joints favor. The understatement works well, too, because here the dishes are the stars of the show, a fact underscored by the spotlighting on each table, which illuminates some beautiful food. If much high-end cuisine these days resembles modern art – geometry and sharp lines and contrast, or Abstract Expressionist splatters – then this is its naturalistic counterpart: Impressionist blends of shapes and shades as complex as the flavors they contain.
Nahm offers a set menu for THB2,000 a head, which includes a canapé course and allows choice of one dish from each section of the menu: a curry, a relish, a soup, a salad and a stir-fried, steamed or grilled dish. This really is the only way to experience the place, since it ensures the meal has the full balance of flavors, textures, spiciness and cooking techniques that should characterise a Thai meal.
From the very start, the canapés underscore how Nahm edges its competition. I have never been keen on sakhu, tapioca dumplings most commonly filled with minced pork. Yet here, stuffed with richly smoked fish, they made perfect sense: little bites of comfort, at once sweet and smoky and as rounded in flavor as in shape. Likewise kanom bueang, a kind of Vietnamese-style crispy stuffed pancake and another street snack I tend to ignore. Here, filled with prawns and pickled ginger, they became something far more interesting.
A tom yum of mushrooms, prawns and chicken was energizing and homely, with generous sprinkles of roasted garlic. Tom yam kati kai, meanwhile, was a sweet and ambrosial chicken soup, like a savory dessert in the best possible way. It shouldn’t need to be said but, alas, in CP’s Thailand, flavorless chicken is the norm, not the exception – and not only at cheaper places. Not so here, where chicken tastes very much like itself.
The quality of the ingredients and sheer consistency across the menu was impressive. A beef salad with cucumber and mint shone, with its perfectly roasted meat, pink inside and fresh flavors. A smooth crab curry was loaded heartily with fluffy, fresh meat and worked as a creamy counterpoint to a fiery, stir-fried chicken dish, baroque with the flavors of cardamom, chilies and sundry spice. But best of all was the lon. The creamy cousin of the more common nam prik, this unctuous, meaty relish of tamarind and pork and prawns came with braised mackerel, tempura cha-om leaves, a deep-fried quail’s egg and crisp vegetables.
At desserts I became more ambivalent. I would argue Thai food is the equal of any cuisine in the world, but – sorry – the desserts don’t soar to the same heights. It would be nice to be able to at least credit them with being healthy, but loaded with sugar and coconut milk as they inevitably are, you can’t. Nevertheless, durian and sticky rice was about as good as durian and sticky rice can be, which is, I admit, pretty damn good.
I know I’m missing the point of a restaurant like Nahm here, but I’m still going to ask: would, say, a passion fruit panna cotta really be so wrong? I know the answer, of course. Thompson is not about to compromise his vision of running a restaurant flawless in its fidelity to Thai culinary tradition. The spiciness of the food, which left our foreign palates burning and faces embarrassingly soaked, pays testament to that.
So I may as well say it: I’m pretty sure Nahm serves the best Thai food I’ve eaten, anywhere. I also know that as a farang my opinion on this subject probably carries about as much weight with Thai readers as my thoughts on the most beautiful wat or most gripping lakorn, let alone the best way to tie a Honda click to the bed of a Hilux Vigo, but there you have it.
Still, the best restaurant in Asia? To receive such an award is surely a blessing and a curse: excellent for business and the ego, to be sure. But it must fray the nerves to know so many diners will walk in expecting a transcendental, best-ever experience. All you really need to know is that Nahm is a damn fine Thai restaurant. Forget what the water-wallahs say.
Coconut’s Critics Table reviews are written based on unannounced visits by our writers and paid for by Coconuts Bangkok. No freebies here.
Photo: Nahm
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Dinner: 7pm – 10:30pm, daily
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Dan Waites is the author of Culture Shock! Bangkok, a guide to the culture, customs and expat life in the Thai capital. Follow him on Twitter: @danwaites
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