Thai Flavours - Bella Vista

We recently found out that one of our high school friends owned a Thai restaurant in Bella Vista and have been wanting to pay it a visit for a while now. Apart from it being a bit out of the way from where we all currently lived, us and a few high school friends decided that it would be a good venue for a catch up. Thai Flavours was a restaurant tucked up within the businesses at Norwest - kind of close to the home-maker center down there, near all the gyms and the GP practices and the radiologists etc. For a Saturday night, the place attracted a decent enough crowd.

The place was modestly decorated, high ceilings - sending off that chillaxy vibe. We also took it for granted that our friend wasn't going to kick us out of his restaurant as we chilled and chatted until past their stated closing time. We ordered some chicken satay skewers, a couple of curries, a pork belly stir fried dish and a couple of noodles to share.

The chicken satay skewers (4 for $8.50) were actually quite appetising. The meat was tender and well seasoned and the peanutty satay sauce hit the spot with my satay craving. Not bad at all.

chicken satay skewers - $8.50 for 4

 I wanted a red curry and my friend wanted duck so we saw that the Thai duck curry ($16.90) as an obvious choice. The curry was tasty, mildly spicy as indicated, but not as "red" as others I've had in the past. The Choo-chee ($14.90), which we had with fish on recommendation from our restaurant owner friend, was really mild and smooth and creamy. I actually really liked the taste of it (maybe because I'm not into heavily spiced things) and would have been happy to gobble down the whole plate (if sharing wasn't the ettiquette :P).

thai duck curry - $16.80

Choo-Chee - $14.90

 One of the items on the restaurant's specialty list was the Pork Belly stir fried with greens. There was a good assortment of peas and broccoli with a decent a portion of pork belly (with crispy skin - kinda). It did look a little more watery than I had in mind but it was alrightly tasty in it's own rights.

Pork belly stir fry

The Pad Thai ($11.90) was good. But then again, I've very rarely labeled a pad thai as bad. It was the right sweetness, right texture and right amount of meat/vege/nuts ratio. However, I was slightly less impressed with the thai basil noodles. There was that hint of chili but not a lot of basil flavour. the noodles were also slightly sloppier.

Pad Thai - $11.90

Thai Basil Noodle - $11.90

Our restaurant owner friend recommended for us to try two desserts from his menu. One was a taro (meant to have sago) coconut milk dessert, and the other was sticky rice pudding. My friend loved the sticky rice pudding, especially this smooth pasty mousse that came with it. I was more a coconut tara fan...but it was a little odder than I expected. It was luke warm and slightly salty? I guess my personal preference for this dessert would be ice cold and sweet.

Taro coconut milk

sticky rice pudding

 All up, this was a relatively good dining experience. Sure it's not the most WOW thai food around - but it was decent food, good company in a good environment. Our owner friend seemed friendly with everyone and was pretty hands on - from taking orders to bringing food out to driving out the takeaway to taking the cash. Would probably come back for dinner if we just so happen to be in the area.

Ratings:
Food - 7.5/10
Service - 7/10
Ambiance - 7/10
Value for money - 7.5/10
Overall - 29/40

Thai Flavours
F116/ 24-32 Lexington Drive
Bella Vista NSW 2153
Tel: (02) 8824 4333