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River Tables
Roundup of the best restaurants on the riverside in Bangkok.
Having dinner at one of the restaurants on the banks of the Chao Phraya river is like being in a different city than central Bangkok. The noise and bustle is certainly a world away: the river in the evenings is the quietest place to be in Bangkok, especially since the best restaurants on the riverfront are situated at the old part of town, where the most prominent buildings are the temple complexes and the dramatic glistening stupas of the Grand Palace. High-rises are few and far between, and the fringes of old wooden houses built in the water on stilts offer a tranquil and romantic backdrop that elevates dinner into something more special.
There are few restaurants on the riverfront, and few lights – the houses skulk in semi-darkness and the black body of water silently slithering past is a mesmerizing sight. The quality of the restaurants is high, and the variety is also complete: the five restaurants reviewed below are the best ones on the river’s banks, and they represent all the range of dining experiences that can be had in Bangkok – whether that’s joining the boisterousness of an old-style dinner-and-karaoke joint or sipping wine at an upscale restaurant.
Supatra River House
266 Soi Wat Rakhang, Arunamarin Road (this is on the Western side of the river, and after 6pm there’s a shuttle boat from Maharaj Pier, near the Grand Palace). Tel: 02-4110305, 02-4110874. Open daily 11am–2.30pm & 5.30pm–11pm. Around 600 baht per person excluding drinks.
If you fancy an upscale yet affordable dinner, this is the one to pin down. The setting is plush and Thai, with beautiful patterned tiles and lots of handsome wood fixtures. The wine list is huge, service is excellent, presentation is artistic, and the sublime background music fittingly completes the romantic atmosphere.
But it’s the food that impresses most, and the large menu is mostly based on seafood, offering a mixture of classic and creative dishes. You can simply have grilled seafood served with chilli sauces – anything from snappers to lobster, all fresh and all tenderly grilled on charcoal. Or you can opt for something more creative such as seafood dumplings in green curry, or skewers of salmon served with curry peanut sauce, or deep-fried soft-shell crab served with a garlic and pepper sauce, or scallops in red curry and basil. All are perfectly cooked, and most dishes are only mildly spicy. If you’re drinking wine, you should consider ordering a Thai wine: the restaurant stocks wine by one of the best modern wineries in Thailand, Khao Yai wines. Like other Thai wines, Khao Yai wines are fruity, low in acids and tannins, and slightly sweet, making them ideal for spicy food (traditional imported wines tend to taste bitter with spicy-sweet Thai dishes).
Ta Ling Bar
Soi Wang Lang, Arun Road (on the Western side of the river – best way to get there is to take the boat across the river, from Tha Chang to Tha Phrannouk, which runs until 11pm). Tel: 02-4123993. Open: Tue–Sun 4pm–midnight. Around 150 baht per person excluding drinks.
This new restaurant set in a charming riverside house has already established itself on the circuit of young artistic Thais. It’s a small restaurant with a big personality: the simple and rustic décor has many artistic accessories (sculptures, paintings, and round fashionable lamps), and the music is a range of classic pop intermingled with more modern instrumental tunes. The concept is dinner-plus: a place to hang out and drink with friends.
First, dinner: among the choice of curries and soups on the menu, the best is a spicy tamarind-infused soup with chunks of salted, dried fish. There is also many Thai-style salads – if you can tolerate spicy food, try the raw shrimps covered in chopped chilli and garlic, and drizzled with fish sauce. Yet an even more creative concoction is the crispy catfish salad; the fish is minced and deep-fried, and served over a bed of spicy-sweet shredded papaya. And if you prefer fried rice instead of steamed rice, there’s much originality there too, including the fried rice with preserved egg (egg is sweet and salty), or the fried rice with crispy pork or chicken or shrimp in a chilli paste.
The portions are rather small, encouraging you to order an array of dishes to share. This is good, as it’s certainly a place to linger, and you can keep ordering more dishes to go with the drinking afterwards, such as cashew nuts with herbs and preserved shrimps. The fact that the river is so close by – the terrace is set out on the water, just a couple of feet above the water level – is another allure, making you feel so close to the river that you might imagine you’re floating, especially after a few drinks.
Khailom-Chom-Sa-Phun
11/3 Samsen Soi 3, Watsampraya, Phranakon. Tel: 02-6288382/3. Open: daily 11am–1am. About 400 baht per person excluding drinks.
A large cheery place that is always full for dinner, and for good reason: the menu is full of diverse dishes, mostly seafood, and there’s a live band in the evenings stomping out a mixture of Thai and Western classics. Among the traditional dishes, the soft-shelled crab in curry is excellent, and so is the snakehead fish cooked in tamarind and water mimosa and served in a hotpot. Mind you, you can also order seafood plainly grilled on charcoal, but best is to order a mixture of dishes. Any meal, for example, should include one of creative Thai-style salads – there are plenty of unusual salads such as salad with mushrooms or herbs or coconut palm tips. You can also have one of the flavorsome platters – crudités of vegetables and wedges of deep-fried mackerel served with a range of dips, including dips made from crab or shrimp. The lobster dishes are exquisite, served either with butter or black bean sauce, and ostrich is also on the menu – either stir-fried in black pepper or served in a sizzling hot plate.
Sala Rim Naam
Oriental Hotel, Oriental Avenue. Tel: 02-2360400. Open: daily noon–2.30pm & 4.30pm–10.45pm. About 800 baht per person excluding drinks.
The flagship restaurant of The Oriental Hotel is in a class of its own. There’s a terrace perched on the river (unlike the other restaurants mentioned here, this one is near the city centre and the skyline is a dramatic backdrop of high-rises), and a more swanky interior that recreates an all-out Thai setting for the foreigners who make up the bulk of the clientele; tables are low, sitting is on the ground with axe pillows for back support, and there are Thai traditional dancers in the evening. The service is professional, and the wine list includes two of the top brands of Thai wines – Chateau De Loei and Siam Winery.
The large menu includes many classical dishes such as coconut curries and Thai-style salads, as well as more creative dishes – among the latter there are things such as steamed Thai dumplings filled with herbed minced chicken and peanut, clear egg custard and vegetables soup with chicken threads and prawns, deep-fried fish with sweet and salty tamarind sauce, deep-fried chicken wing with minced chicken and prawn stuffing, and deep-fried herbed crab meat and minced chicken. There’s even a dish inspired from Lao cuisine: the steamed fish curry mousse that is infused with dill, and steamed in banana leaf.
The style of cooking is reminiscent of traditional royal cooking: lots of curry sauces low on spiciness, rather sweet, and full of flavours that linger on the palate. All the pre-prepared foodstuffs that go into the cooking – such as Thai curry pastes and chilli pastes – are made in-house to ensure distinctiveness and quality. And for the buffet lunch they also make some scrumptious dips served with vegetable crudités.
Ta Chang
Naphralan Road. Tel: 02-6235659. Open: daily 11am–10pm. Around 200 baht per person excluding drinks.
An old restaurant that is faithfully Thai-style, complete with a blaring karaoke, attracting boisterous groups of Thais who visit to eat, drink, and sing. The restaurant itself is well set out on the water as a standalone building, a covered concrete structure with open sides – although the low roof gives it a claustrophobic feel that is further emphasized by the clutter of dense tables. But never mind the decor: the food is good and relatively inexpensive.
As in other riverfront restaurants, seafood dominates the menu, and virtually all the dishes are traditional Thai dishes. There are lots of yam salads, and delicacies such as deep-fried shrimp patties, or shrimp steamed in lemon and chilli. Old-time favorite dishes include chicken with cashew nuts, oysters in a hot sizzling plate, whole sea bass encrusted with salt and chilli and grilled whole, as well as many variations of soups. Among the latter you’ll find the delicious baby crab in a hotpot of tamarind and water mimosa, the sea bass in a hotpot of lime and chilli, and the equally good tamarind soup with shrimps and coconut palm tips.
(C) Victor Paul Borg
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