Red Petite
194 Bank Street
South Melbourne, VIC
It has been quite a while since Miss P and myself had a good & interesting Thai food apart from home cook meal. We stumbled upon Red Petite after reading about it from ANTS magazine - August 2011 edition. The part that caught our interests was that they serve a particular type of food that Red Petite named them as Bangkok Tapas. Basically, these type of food can be classified as appetizers/ street food and they are the mixture of Thai and Chinese cuisines, we called it ข้าวต้มกุ้ย [pronounce: Khao Tom Gui]. We eat them with plain rice porridge or ข้าวต้ม [pronounce: Khao Tom]. I have yet come across any other Thai cafes/Restaurants in Melbourne that serve this kind of food except here. That nostalgic moment we got from thinking about the street food from home made us wanting to try them even more. So we made a trip to South Melbourne on a hunt for Thai street food/ Bangkok Tapas at Red Petite.
Red Petite is a small chic cafe by day and an interesting Thai cafe by night [Wednesday - Saturday], situated near the corner of Bank Street and Clarendon Street in South Melbourne. Just look for a small cafe with a bright red door, and you will find it.
The cafe is quite small and there aren't many tables inside, but one thing I like is its coziness and welcoming feeling that I got from the friendly staff. I left Miss P in charge of ordering the food, while I made the observation of the cafe and snapped few photos. The food that Miss P ordered was mainly from Bangkok Tapas menu, and to our surprise, the price of each dish was reasonable as well.
We started of with Deep fried skinny chicken wings marinated with herbs ($8) and the Deep fried prawns with tamarind sauce ($10) [five large prawns for $10....bring it on!], Both dishes were really tasty, the herbs lightly coated on the chicken wings gave out a nice aroma when I bit into it. Dipping it with the sauce also gave out a unique and interest taste to this dish. The prawns were thoroughly fried with the shell on, the prawn meat wasn't tough at all and eating it together with the crunchy shell coated with tamarind sauce was awesome. Just watch out for a fried dried chili and you will be safe!
Next few dishes came out to our table, there were Preserved cabbage spicy salad ($6), Salted duck eggs salad ($8) and Fried pork jerky salad ($8). We actually love them all as each of them gave savoury and unique taste. The pork jerky salad was a definite winner of the night. I have never seen this dish in any other restaurants apart from those back in Thailand. The pickles that came with the dish was fresh and crunchy and the tangy dressing went well with the sweet pork jerky.
Couple more dishes came out and gave us a jump with joy feeling from the aroma of them. The stir fried lightly coated fish fillet with young celery ($10) and stir fried pork with preserved cabbage ($10) were on the tasting panel. The stir fried fish fillet gave out a slight saltiness from the soy bean paste, eating with rice it was just right, but if eating it alone might be a bit salty. There was also a little kick from the pepper and ginger in the sauce. The stir fried pork with preserved cabbage gave out a nice charred aroma through out the whole dish. It was a nice combination of the tang from the cabbage and the charred stir fried pork. To my surprise, this pork dish did not give out that pork smell that I usually found in the pork in Australia. It must be a way that Red Petite cook it to get rid off the smell. Nice job on that I must say, 'cause I found the pork smell is such a turn off on a good dish.
The admirable things at Red Petite are the ceramic bowls and plates, they are very cute and gave out a feeling of being back in Thailand. I admire them for using these to capture the nostalgic feeling of the Thai diners and made us feel like home again.
+Disclaimer: The commentary contained in this blog is purely based on my own opinion and experience at the time of visit. Taste is a subjective and yours and mine can be differed.
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