Singapore - Patara

Having recently been back from great eating experiences in Bangkok, it was dicey going Thai back in Singapore but being outvoted, the apprehension had to step aside.. The overall experience wasn't bad but of course, very ordinary compared to what I had savoured last week.

The fresh pomelo salad was very refreshing and combined with the piquant fish sauce, lime and dessicated coconut, made for a great appetiser. Contrast that with the soft shell crab served with green mango salad, the latter was disappointing, since the oil used to deep fry the crab was not as fresh as it should have been.

The soups were hearty but both were salty - the fish maw soup had a nice touch of being garnished with quail's eggs, which broke the monotony of it all. The tom yum with prawns was more fiery that we thought it would be and so we could not finish it all.

For 5 people, we had 3 mains which were each good sized portions.

The garouper fillet with 3 sauces was a nice fish and chips type fillet made from fresh garouper slices deep fried in beer batter. The 3 sauces were separately a fish sauce based sauce which was yummy, the other tamarind and sweet chili sauce were more ordinary but the 3 made for a nice merry-go-round of tastes form one single dish.

The green curry with chicken was competent and had juicy pieces of thigh meat, and so was juicy as compared with most which tend to serve the curry with breast meat.

The kailan with roast pork was tasty from the salted roast pork. The chef made a good effort to shave off the older parts of the kailan and so was more crunchy than this variety is usually, and made for easier chewing. May be a little salty overall for some but fine if eaten with rice, speaking of which the olive rice was a nice combination of fluffy rice with cashews, lime bits, fresh shallots, and the might chilli padis. Remember to remove the chilli padis if you are not used to having your tongue on fire.

Desserts were disappointing since the dessert buffet spread was quite blah and they did not have the unusual tamarind sorbet, nor egg yolk/pandan ice cream which I wanted to try. My friend who settled for the mango sticky rice was happy enough with her choice but would have been happier if the mango was sweeter.

If anyone is looking for Thai food in a central location in Singapore and in a comfortable environment with pleasant service (they did bring the ladies a chair each for our respective handbags) Patara is worth a visit.