Long Chim in Soho is a brand new restaurant by the chef David Thompson, the person who modified the face of Thai meals within the UK again within the early noughties. You’ll hear this repeated by cooks and meals writers at any time when Thompson’s identify is talked about, and his work genuinely warrants genuflection. Without him, it’s mentioned, there can be no Som Saa, no Kilnno Smoking Goat, no Speedboat Bar, nor lots of these different hip Thai consuming spots run by earnest boys referred to as Crispin who serve kipper curry to different earnest boys referred to as Crispin.
Thompson didn’t by any means invent the idea of Thai folks consuming – they’ve been managing completely effectively by themselves for the reason that nation was created within the thirteenth century – however he definitely dismantled the UK’s love of gelatinous but sating pad Thais and of boiled rooster items swimming in tinned coconut milk and masquerading as inexperienced curry. When he opened Nahm in 2001, Thompson laughed within the face of the predictable, cosy and secure Thai meals we’d been used to – comforting sweetness and nuttiness, with light, aromatic wafts of coriander and unthreatening warmth – and as a substitute favoured scallops, pigeon, Asian celery, white pepper and infrequently alarmingly daring ranges of each recent and dried chillies.
Twenty years on, in a somewhat chaotically styled venue within the coronary heart of London’s theatreland, there’s little proof that he’s mellowing a lot. Long Chim has taken over the bottom ground of Howarda restaurant I as soon as walked out of as a result of they wouldn’t let me have a walk-in desk except I gave them my identify, cellphone quantity and postcode, and which nonetheless operates from the primary ground. Anyway, the bottom degree area has been rejigged with garish decor and a clanking open kitchen, and appears to have been impressed by a design palette that screams: “This could be a Bangkok street food scene, right, guys?” full with daring neon indicators, animal murals and studiously staged piles of bottles. At occasions, the lighting is purple, at others blue, ought to you might have ever puzzled the way you’d look as a Smurf. Why do designers persist in attempting to recreate “the street” indoors? It at all times seems like a themed capturing vary at Chessington World of Adventures.
The menu, in the meantime, leans on the facet of crowdpleasers, with monkfish curry, crispy pork in 5 spices and “Long Chim rolls”, which transform lengthy, skinny, barely wonky, crisp spring rolls filled with a non-obtrusive mulch of mustard greens. Be warned, although, this menu is startlingly temporary, that includes a mere 4 starters – a few skewers, these spring rolls, rice muffins with crunchy pork – seven mains and the briefest of nods in direction of pudding; the rice choice is steamed jasmine or no rice in any respect.
“Long chim” interprets loosely as “come and try”, and also you actually might strive every little thing right here on a single go to. The menu feels as if it started life as one thing a bit extra formidable – the pre-opening hype promised wagyu beef salad and pink snapper fishcakes, as an example – and appears considerably meagre when put next with, as an example, these at close by Kiln and Speedboat. It’s punchily priced, too: a single skewer of admittedly scrumptious grilled beef with turmeric, galangal and coriander prices £8, whereas a suggestion of southern-style grilled squid with ginger is £6 a nibble. Two black tiger prawns with celery, spring onions and glass vermicelli (£19) all sang in the identical key: white pepper. The pomegranate salad was a thick, somewhat jammy bowl of wealthy pink fruit that acted as a welcome foil to the mellow monkfish curry with a cucumber relish.
My recommendation right here can be to order large, in case your pockets permits it, otherwise you may effectively go away nonetheless a bit hungry, by which vein we ordered each the desserts on provide. Grilled sticky rice with banana was precisely that: grilled lumps of rice with scorching banana. The different pudding, nevertheless, turned out to be the star of all the night. Tapioca with coconut and corn was a posh and fairly bowl of wobbly frogspawn with sunrise-yellow corn. And earlier than any of you begin, there’s no such factor as unhealthy tapioca: it’s the saviour of one million Seventies British schoolchildren’s teatimes, and it’s extensively liked throughout Thailand, too.
Long Chim is a spot for Thompson’s many followers to move to pay homage to a culinary legend. If they’re fortunate, they may even catch the person himself behind the stoves, so that they’ll have the ability to thank him in particular person for the influence he’s had on the UK’s strategy to Thai eating. Long Chim might not be fairly his greatest work, however the truth that he’ll at all times be remembered just isn’t up for debate.
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Long Chim 36-40 Rupert Street, London W1, 020-3319 7750. Open dinner solely Tues-Sat, 5-10.30pm. From about £35 a head, plus drinks and repair.
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The subsequent episode of Grace’s Comfort Eating podcast is out on Tuesday 24 December – hearken to it right here
