This week we hit Ziu for our weekly Jam Session. Its been on the to do list for a while now and I agreed to going there with a little trepidation as I was travelling the same night to Thailand. Going to eat Thai just before that would be the equivalent of a Thai person eating Indian food right before their flight to India.
Located in the Sangam Courtyard, Ziu is a small restaurant started purely for the love of Thai food which the owner picked up on his extensive travels in that country. This is a feeling I completely share with him. Smaller than it looks from the outside, its a modern looking space with some beautiful wall art and lighting.
This time we had a special guest, from the tea gardens up north, tea sommelier Anamika Singh. We invited her as her exuberant and spunky personality makes sure every time we get together there are bunch of laughs. Additionally she is usually full of some saucy gossip which we wanted to partake in.
Once seated we asked the manager for recommendations on what would be the best things to order and ofcourse we gave him our preferences too. I do not like Lemongrass or Kaffir Lime in my food so they made the selections accordingly. Started with soup and while the others had Tom Yum, I went for a clear chicken soup and I am glad did. It was flavourful and full of fresh vegetables along with the chicken.
Next up was the Som Tam salad, but this one had a twist. It was done in an air frier leading to a wonderful crunchy texture to the familiar Som Tam taste. This is fusion done right when the bottom line is to deliver a great tasting dish. The roasted chicken served on rice crackers was another fine dish. Meant to be eaten in one go it also combined a nice crunch with the flavourful chicken on top.
There were a couple of other things we ordered that can be seen in the pictures but one of the surprises were the stir fried vegetables. Something we would normally not order but am glad we did and will certainly order it again.
We are always on the lookout for that one killer dish which would make one want to return just to eat that. The unanimous feeling was that this was the steamed fish. This was pieces of a light white fish steamed and coated in a spicy lime sauce and topped with some fried morning glory. This combined with some rice would be a perfect dinner for me.
With any kind of foreign food I think there is a balance that has to be struck, between trying to preserve the flavours of the original dish with the tastes and preferences in the location of the restaurant. All this with ingredients that may not be used in the original. I think Ziu has managed to strike a great balance with their own creations not losing out on the Thai food heritage.
The very fact that since we ate there I have travelled and even as write this I am in Bangkok and still say we loved the food at Ziu, says a lot. Clearly, this is a great little Thai restaurant and we will certainly be back again pretty soon.
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