Review Of Seafood Market & Restaurant

[jfchandler]

Call me old-fashioned, but when I purchase something, I like to pay for it once, not twice. And I like to know the price for what I'm buying, and not have to guess about it. It was those issues that took a bit of the shine off of an otherwise pleasant seafood dinner at the Seafood Market and Restaurant, located on Sukhumvit Soi 24 near the President Park Hotel.

From the outside, this restaurant looks almost like a hotel, with a huge and elaborate front driveway and entrance off the street, which appears sized to handle what I presume are many tour vans and buses that visit there. Inside is a very large but pleasant dining room, nicely decorated and filled with cloth tablecloth covered tables. There is a separate area for smokers and what appeared to be a very large wine shop on-site, though we didn't check out their wine selection. On the Friday night we visited, most of the customers were farang, along with a few Thais. At 10 pm, the dining room was less than half full. The restaurant's posted operating hours are 11:30 am to 11:30 pm, though we were told we needed to order before 11 pm. Service throughout the evening was very good, with plenty of waiters and wait staff on hand to promptly bring requested items, refill drinks, clear emptied plates and the like.

Forget choosing from a menu for your dinner here. Instead, there is a 50-meter long, ice-filled counter where all manner of fish and other seafood are on display, followed by similar counters filled with vegetables and fruits to accompany your meal -- most of those items marked with purchase prices of XX baht per kilo. You tell the accompanying waitress what quantities you want of what items, they are then bagged and placed into a supermarket shopping cart. After weighing them and paying for them (the first of two checks you'll pay for the evening), the ingredients for your dinner are literally wheeled to your table, where you talk with your waiter about how you want the various items cooked and prepared.

At that point, you've paid for the raw ingredients by weight. But at the end of the evening, you'll get a second check covering the separate cooking charges for whatever you've ordered, along with charges for drinks and some sides such as steamed rice and even the obligatory cold towels. For a reasonable dinner for two, our bill came to about 1,700 baht: about 1,000 for the seafood and vegetables for our meal, about 350 baht in cooking charges and another 290 baht for two large Asahi beers.

I know the cooking charge scheme is one used at other similar seafood shops, but it's a practice that rubs me the wrong way. And even though the restaurant has a clearly marked cooking prices list on each tables (a list showing higher prices that what we were actually charged), we weren't sure exactly what our cooking charges would be until the final second bill arrived. For example, my GF ordered a plate of Japanese style spring rolls from a counter with sushi and similar Japanese style offerings. The spring rolls were not charged in our original food bill, but did appear on the second bill simply as a 260 baht food item (and no apparent charge for cooking it).

I ordered a 550 baht seafood combination plate, which seemed like a great way to sample some of their different offerings, since it included a fish fillet, squid, prawns, crab. I chose to have the fish stir fried with black pepper, the squid sliced and deep fried, the prawns served with red curry sauce, and the crab prepared with yellow curry sauce. You might think the one combination plate would come with one cooking charge. But when the second, final bill arrived, there were four separate cooking charges of 60 baht each for the four different items in the combination plate, making it a bit less of a bargain. That said, however, all of the seafood we ate was very tasty and well prepared.

Depending on what you order here, you can either come away with a bargain, or empty your wallet. For example, we ordered a pot full of mussels steamed in butter sauce. The mussels themselves (145 baht per kilo) priced at 78 baht, along with a 60 baht cooking charge. For that price, I could eat mussels there until I die. At the other end, crabs priced at 1,975 baht per kilo, and lobster of course even higher. Oysters, for some reason, were priced differently at 35 baht per oyster.

There were a few other oddities that deserve some mention here. Despite their vast selection of seafood available, I found absolutely no salmon steaks on hand. And the waitress confirmed they had none, other than some raw salmon cut in slices in the Japanese section. I also saw no live fish tanks here for customers to choose a whole fish. Instead, all the fish appeared to be available only as cut fillets on the counter.

Lastly, when we first started to order our seafood, my taste buds were thinking about accompanying the seafood with a nice fresh salad of iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, onions and such. But, of course, they have no menu and no salad to order. So when I asked the waitress, her response was to grab a head of iceberg lettuce (150 baht per kilo), a couple of tomatoes (85 baht per kilo) and an onion (85 baht per kilo) and offer that they could all be diced into a salad. That was not exactly the approach I had in mind, so we took a pass on the salad, and instead had a plate of stir-fried asparagus (80 baht per bundle plus a 40 baht cooking charge).

Were I to go back again, I'd be wary of the combination plate with its four separate cooking charges. The mussels were great, very tender and tasty. And the fish counter had good selections of reasonably priced halibut and red snapper fillets. And if someone else was paying the bill, I might even try their King crab legs and lobster offerings.

[TheWalkingMan]

Thanks for taking the time to post the review.

TheWalkingMan

[MidoriApple]

Don't tell me these food ordered, just for you and your GF only?

Too scary..!!

Well, thanks a lot for the reviewing, I have driven along this Suk 24 for more 3years, but never at a time visit this place. And as seen here, I guess I will forget this place, not my type...

[UncleFrank]

Isn't this the place the Tuk Tuk and Taxies take tourists to be fleeced?

[taxexile]

Isn't this the place the Tuk Tuk and Taxies take tourists to be fleeced?

this is the place where you go of your own free will to be fleeced.

i took some visitors to this restaurant a couple of years ago and found the whole experience a bit demoralising , the business of wheeling a supermarket trolley around choosing the food , the annoyance of lining up and paying for it , and then having to arrange for it to be cooked and then having to pay again , and pay we certainly did , every last item is charged for , even the cold towels.

reminded me of eating at one of the service areas on the M1 in england.

the food was good enough , but certainly no better or worse than could be obtained at any one of a hundred seafood places around town for a third of the price and three times the ambience.

the supermarket experience there is what i found so off putting , supermarket shopping is a horrible experience at the best of times , but to be given a trolley and pointed to a food counter when you walk into a restaurant and then be instructed into the procedures that operate there and at every point along the way be reminded or told of the cost just took all the pleasure out of the dining experience.

large falang presence there , with a helpful and professional staff helping to relieve us of our money. it was a bit like being in a production line cleverly designed to trick tourists and the unwary into thinking they have had a great meal and experience but in reality have been seamlessly relieved of a thick wad of cash by a bunch of very smooth operators.

this was 2 years ago , so i dont know if it has changed there , i certainly wouldnt rush back there to find out , unless someone else was footing the bill , but the whole experience was disappointing.

i couldnt recommend this place to anyone , but the bright lights and imposing facade of this place will attract enough customers without having to rely on repeat business.

[OriginalPoster]

Call me old-fashioned, but when I purchase something, I like to pay for it once, not twice. And I like to know the price for what I'm buying, and not have to guess about it. It was those issues that took a bit of the shine off of an otherwise pleasant seafood dinner at the Seafood Market and Restaurant, located on Sukhumvit Soi 24 near the President Park Hotel.

From the outside, this restaurant looks almost like a hotel, with a huge and elaborate front driveway and entrance off the street, which appears sized to handle what I presume are many tour vans and buses that visit there. Inside is a very large but pleasant dining room, nicely decorated and filled with cloth tablecloth covered tables. There is a separate area for smokers and what appeared to be a very large wine shop on-site, though we didn't check out their wine selection. On the Friday night we visited, most of the customers were farang, along with a few Thais. At 10 pm, the dining room was less than half full. The restaurant's posted operating hours are 11:30 am to 11:30 pm, though we were told we needed to order before 11 pm. Service throughout the evening was very good, with plenty of waiters and wait staff on hand to promptly bring requested items, refill drinks, clear emptied plates and the like.

Forget choosing from a menu for your dinner here. Instead, there is a 50-meter long, ice-filled counter where all manner of fish and other seafood are on display, followed by similar counters filled with vegetables and fruits to accompany your meal -- most of those items marked with purchase prices of XX baht per kilo. You tell the accompanying waitress what quantities you want of what items, they are then bagged and placed into a supermarket shopping cart. After weighing them and paying for them (the first of two checks you'll pay for the evening), the ingredients for your dinner are literally wheeled to your table, where you talk with your waiter about how you want the various items cooked and prepared.

At that point, you've paid for the raw ingredients by weight. But at the end of the evening, you'll get a second check covering the separate cooking charges for whatever you've ordered, along with charges for drinks and some sides such as steamed rice and even the obligatory cold towels. For a reasonable dinner for two, our bill came to about 1,700 baht: about 1,000 for the seafood and vegetables for our meal, about 350 baht in cooking charges and another 290 baht for two large Asahi beers.

I know the cooking charge scheme is one used at other similar seafood shops, but it's a practice that rubs me the wrong way. And even though the restaurant has a clearly marked cooking prices list on each tables (a list showing higher prices that what we were actually charged), we weren't sure exactly what our cooking charges would be until the final second bill arrived. For example, my GF ordered a plate of Japanese style spring rolls from a counter with sushi and similar Japanese style offerings. The spring rolls were not charged in our original food bill, but did appear on the second bill simply as a 260 baht food item (and no apparent charge for cooking it).

I ordered a 550 baht seafood combination plate, which seemed like a great way to sample some of their different offerings, since it included a fish fillet, squid, prawns, crab. I chose to have the fish stir fried with black pepper, the squid sliced and deep fried, the prawns served with red curry sauce, and the crab prepared with yellow curry sauce. You might think the one combination plate would come with one cooking charge. But when the second, final bill arrived, there were four separate cooking charges of 60 baht each for the four different items in the combination plate, making it a bit less of a bargain. That said, however, all of the seafood we ate was very tasty and well prepared.

Depending on what you order here, you can either come away with a bargain, or empty your wallet. For example, we ordered a pot full of mussels steamed in butter sauce. The mussels themselves (145 baht per kilo) priced at 78 baht, along with a 60 baht cooking charge. For that price, I could eat mussels there until I die. At the other end, crabs priced at 1,975 baht per kilo, and lobster of course even higher. Oysters, for some reason, were priced differently at 35 baht per oyster.

There were a few other oddities that deserve some mention here. Despite their vast selection of seafood available, I found absolutely no salmon steaks on hand. And the waitress confirmed they had none, other than some raw salmon cut in slices in the Japanese section. I also saw no live fish tanks here for customers to choose a whole fish. Instead, all the fish appeared to be available only as cut fillets on the counter.

Lastly, when we first started to order our seafood, my taste buds were thinking about accompanying the seafood with a nice fresh salad of iceberg lettuce, tomatoes, onions and such. But, of course, they have no menu and no salad to order. So when I asked the waitress, her response was to grab a head of iceberg lettuce (150 baht per kilo), a couple of tomatoes (85 baht per kilo) and an onion (85 baht per kilo) and offer that they could all be diced into a salad. That was not exactly the approach I had in mind, so we took a pass on the salad, and instead had a plate of stir-fried asparagus (80 baht per bundle plus a 40 baht cooking charge).

Were I to go back again, I'd be wary of the combination plate with its four separate cooking charges. The mussels were great, very tender and tasty. And the fish counter had good selections of reasonably priced halibut and red snapper fillets. And if someone else was paying the bill, I might even try their King crab legs and lobster offerings.

That's a restaurant that the company that I previously worked for frequently used to entertain overseas visitors. The drill was that they'd rent a private dining room and enlist about half a dozen of the companies Thai to come along, tell amusing anedecotes to the visitor, feast, and drink Singha. I always enjoyed the place, many of the meals were in fact spectacular, but it also struck me as a place that I wouldn't want to go to if I was paying for it myself. It wouldn't suprise me if the tabs we ran up their were a few thousand baht per head, but I never actually saw any of the bills. Aside from the cost, it seems like the type of place where it's important to be expert enough on the cusine to know exaclty what combination of dishes to order and to be able to tell them how you want it cooked.

Edited February 8, 2009 by OriginalPoster

[jfchandler]

I certainly don't disagree with the general flavor of the comments expressed above... And, the issues some of you raise are ones I also addressed in my review. So no argument coming from me on these things....

But...all of this begs the question. I too know a bunch of good seafood restaurants, generally located in the vicinity of the Chao Phraya River. But this was Friday night late, I live in Sukhumvit, and I had a VERY HUNGRY GF who just got off work and who really wanted to go for seafood without a long drive across town. So the question was: where is there a good Thai seafood restaurant in the Sukhumvit area...

Even closer to my home, there is the live seafood restaurant near the Asoke BTS station on Sukhumvit Road. But I've never gone there also, because it has an even worse reputation for overpricing and being oriented to fleecing tourists.... So I didn't even think of that place. But we wanted to try someplace new, not just the same places locally we'd been before...

So, if anyone has alternate suggestions for Thai seafood not too far from the general Asoke area, please do chime in....

I've been to another big place, more of a traditional restaurant, I think its name begins with N, over by RCA that is set around a lake and has, if I recall, a pretty good seafood selection along with a live singer and band. But I can never remember the name or exactly where it's located. If had I thought of that Friday night, instead of just now, we might have gone there instead...

[sabaijai]

Well known as a clip joint.

[sabaijai]

Sukhumvit Rd between Soi 1 and, roughly, Soi 49 is pretty much a wasteland as far as good Thai food goes. Most of the Thai places are orientated towards foreign residents and visitors. There are a few that aren't, but they're pretty much hole-in-the-walls with little to interest a serious Thai foodie.

Straight down Asoke past Rama IV, turn onto Th Narathiwat, and a few blocks down at the intersection of Narathiwat and Th Chan Kao is Khrua Je Ngor, excellent Thai and Chinese seafood. It may sound like it's far from Asoke but in normal traffic a taxi can travel from Suk to Narathiwat in 15 minutes or less. Khrua Je Ngor has a couple of other branches off Sathorn, I believe, but the Narathiwat one is the only branch I've tried.

On Soi Lang Suan, Home Kitchen (Khrua Nai Ban) (directly opp Soi 7) has very good fresh seafood. Not cheap but not a ripoff like Seafood Market. Further down the soi at the corner of Sarasin is the classic Nguan Lee, Thai and Chinese seafood at pretty reasonable prices, given the neighbourhood.

[Jingthing]

One of the oldest and most famous clip joints in the city.

Yes, all the taxi and tuk tuk drivers know it, and love it ...

[dotcom]

the food was good enough , but certainly no better or worse than could be obtained at any one of a hundred seafood places around town for a third of the price and three times the ambience.

Kindly nominate a few of your favorites.

High on my list is Thong Krueng - on Thonglor, forget which side soi - near J Avenue mall.

Thong Krueng Map

[rgs2001uk]

I certainly don't disagree with the general flavor of the comments expressed above... And, the issues some of you raise are ones I also addressed in my review. So no argument coming from me on these things....

But...all of this begs the question. I too know a bunch of good seafood restaurants, generally located in the vicinity of the Chao Phraya River. But this was Friday night late, I live in Sukhumvit, and I had a VERY HUNGRY GF who just got off work and who really wanted to go for seafood without a long drive across town. So the question was: where is there a good Thai seafood restaurant in the Sukhumvit area...

Even closer to my home, there is the live seafood restaurant near the Asoke BTS station on Sukhumvit Road. But I've never gone there also, because it has an even worse reputation for overpricing and being oriented to fleecing tourists.... So I didn't even think of that place. But we wanted to try someplace new, not just the same places locally we'd been before...

So, if anyone has alternate suggestions for Thai seafood not too far from the general Asoke area, please do chime in....

I've been to another big place, more of a traditional restaurant, I think its name begins with N, over by RCA that is set around a lake and has, if I recall, a pretty good seafood selection along with a live singer and band. But I can never remember the name or exactly where it's located. If had I thought of that Friday night, instead of just now, we might have gone there instead...

jfc

you have been here long enough now to know to avoid like the plague anything in this area, as others have pointed out nothing but overpriced clip jonts.

may i suggest you try the following, talay bangkok,

take a taxi down sukhumvit soi 21 going towards petchaburi road, go straight ahead at the junction of petchaburi road and head towards pra ram 9, when you reach pra ram 9 turn right onto pra ram 9 and keep in the right hand lane, turn right into soi 6 on pra ram 9, keep in the left hand lane and turn left at the first set of traffic lights, go about 50 yards and take the first turning on your left hand side, as you enter the soi the talay bangkok restaurant is on your left hand side, right beside the pra ram 9 hospital.

right across the soi is a thai night club called baroque, usually has live thai music, saw bodyslam in there a while ago.

exact address for restaurant is as follows,

577 thanon rim khlong sam san, kwaeng bangkapi, khet huay kwang, bangkok 10310,

phone number, 02 641 4818.

pleasant surroundings, good food, normal thai prices, live music, all in all a very laid back atmosphere making for a pleasnat evening far from the madding crowd. enjoy.

[taxexile]

Kindly nominate a few of your favorites.

well , there are none around the sukhumvit area , if we want to eat in sukhumvit we ususally go to small no name thai shops down the sois or into the emporium , for something more upmarket we go to the bigger hotels for the buffet lunches.

specifically for seafood , we go out on rama 2 just past bang kradi (about 15 minutes once you are over the river) , turn left out towards the coast where there are many large seafood places , most of them on stilts over lagoons , great food but very crowded at weekends.

[Nordlys]

Khrua Je Ngor has a couple of other branches off Sathorn, I believe, but the Narathiwat one is the only branch I've tried.

On 11th floor of Bangkok Insurance Building next to German embassy and Sukothai Hotel, on south Sathorn. I like this venue better than one at old Chan road.

Also Somboon on Bantadthong Road (and elsewehre) for probably the best fried curry crab (Puu Phad Pon Karii) in town.

http://www.somboonseafood.com/e-index.html

Edited February 8, 2009 by Nordlys

[DP25]

Those prices are very high compared to a Thai seafood place and the portions looked small, even the pot of mussels is overpriced. I normally pay about 80 baht for a HUGE pot of mussels, never even heard of a 'cooking fee' being charged on top of that. Any seafood restaurant where most of the customers are farang is best avoided, unless you just don't care about the price.

[jfchandler]

jfc

you have been here long enough now to know to avoid like the plague anything in this area, as others have pointed out nothing but overpriced clip jonts.

RGS... thanks very much for the suggestions/recommendations for Talay Bangkok and Baroque. Both are new names for me, so I'll certainly put them down on my list of places to try.

I'm always willing to try pretty much any place once...just to know personally and for the experience. But whether I'm willing to go back for a second time is the real test, and for value reasons, I'm not sure I'd be heading back to Seafood Market anytime soon.

That said, however, my GF very much enjoyed her dinner and the evening we had out. So that made it a good evening for us, notwithstanding the price. Not everything in this world comes down to money. Sometimes, a genuine smile makes everything worthwhile.

I'm not sure what you meant above by "avoid like the plague anything in this area." While Sukhumvit may not have the largest concentration of good Thai restaurants (although there certainly are at least a few very good ones around), it's certainly among the best for any variety of international restaurants and eateries. And many of them are perfectly reasonably priced and sometimes great values... not all overpriced clip joints.

So in my life here, what I often find myself doing is eating regular, simple Thai food every day from the street vendors and small shops around my home... usually in the 20-50 baht per entree range. But then when we go out to restaurants for eating, it tends to be non-Thai places, and most usually at very reasonable prices.

[jfchandler]

Also Somboon on Bantadthong Road (and elsewehre) for probably the best fried curry crab (Puu Phad Pon Karii) in town.

http://www.somboonseafood.com/e-index.html

Nordlys...thanks for the mention of Somboon Seafood... I haven't been there yet, but I know of the place and have heard and read many good things about it... I actually mentioned it to the GF as a suggestion the other night, but she was hungry, and didn't want to drive across from Sukhumvit to Silom late in the evening. For anyone who remembers Britain's "Rumpole of the Bailey" TV series, the phrase comes to mind... "she who must be obeyed..."

[onethailand]

the food was good enough , but certainly no better or worse than could be obtained at any one of a hundred seafood places around town for a third of the price and three times the ambience.

Kindly nominate a few of your favorites.

High on my list is Thong Krueng - on Thonglor, forget which side soi - near J Avenue mall.

Thong Krueng Map

Thonglor Soi 13.

Not exactly a seafood place though they obviously do serve some seafood dishes - and service is decidedly average - but the food is decent.

[Kharzi]

The sweeping statement that eateries between the lower Sukhhumvit Sois are comparable to a desert of opportunity is as unreliable as it is so obviously prejudiced.

Soi 33 tap nung next door to the Bull's Head gives the lie to such a specious contention and hosts a Thai alfresco restaurant that seldom disappoints as evidenced by the nightly congregation of Thai from most walks of life and a smattering of falang unhampered by the naive belief that most dishes piscatorial to be consumed in Bangkok are not farmed.

But I expect there are those that swear otherwise.......

[UncleFrank]

Samboon Seafood has a good reputation. Well known.

Unfortunatly, several fake Samboon Seafood places are paying Taxis to bring them to their place.

Blatant ripoff prices. Total scam on visitors.

[yamthaleh]

There's a small seafood restaurant on Sukhumvit soi 23 between Sukhumvit and soi Cowboy, on the Asoke side of the soi, with a small display of fresh fish/seafood on display out front. Although I've always been drinking, I've never thought the bill inordinate. I believe it has a western name, something so nondescript to be totally forgettable.

[taxexile]

Thong Krueng - on Thonglor

and service is decidedly average

service decidedly lazy there last time i went , about 2 months ago , sadly this is another place that is becoming too popular for its own good.

[jfchandler]

I should have mentioned before, but will now, there is a very economically priced seafood option in lower Sukhumvit that has been pretty good every time I've been there... It's just not exactly a traditional restaurant.

On Suk Soi 7, just across the street from the infamous Soi 7 Beer Garden, there is a large covered outdoor eating patio that is ringed by mostly seafood oriented food stalls. It may have an actual name like Seafood Something...but it escapes me now.

At any rate, have had many varieties of seafood there and not been disappointed any time -- all at pretty reasonable, Thai prices.

It's a great location for watching the ladies (and their dates) come and go from the Beer Garden in the late afternoon and evenings. And they often pop across the street to sit for a drink, fix makeup and chatter outside of the Beer Garden.

But, it's outdoors and thus no air con, the tables and chairs are the simplest metal, and the service is pretty much the order and run variety, because they're usually pretty busy and not so many staff. So for that reason, it wasn't the right place to take the GF the other night.

But for a bit of fun, or for some reasonably priced Thai seafood and a very large set of menu offerings, it's a good place to go in the area.

[Groongthep]

The sweeping statement that eateries between the lower Sukhhumvit Sois are comparable to a desert of opportunity is as unreliable as it is so obviously prejudiced.

Soi 33 tap nung next door to the Bull's Head gives the lie to such a specious contention and hosts a Thai alfresco restaurant that seldom disappoints as evidenced by the nightly congregation of Thai from most walks of life and a smattering of falang unhampered by the naive belief that most dishes piscatorial to be consumed in Bangkok are not farmed.

But I expect there are those that swear otherwise.......

I couldn't agree more. The name of this place is สวนอาหารป่ารสเลิด (no sign in English but pronounced Suan Aharn Bpa Rot Lert). It's probably one of the places that sabaijai would call a "hole-in-the-wall with little to interest a serious Thai foodie" but the myriad standard Thai dishes they do prepare there are always terrific as attested to by the high percentage of locals who eat there. One of my all time favorite Thai restaurants; simple as it may be.

Edited February 9, 2009 by Groongthep

[t.s]

in the sukhumvit area there is the large covered area by the beergarden on soi 7.

The first stall is called buakaew (not all stalls here are equal) and the food is excellent and inexpensive.

I have been eating there for years and never been let down

[jfchandler]

Uhh... I think I just said that... two posts above....

[sabaijai]

The sweeping statement that eateries between the lower Sukhhumvit Sois are comparable to a desert of opportunity is as unreliable as it is so obviously prejudiced.

Soi 33 tap nung next door to the Bull's Head gives the lie to such a specious contention and hosts a Thai alfresco restaurant that seldom disappoints as evidenced by the nightly congregation of Thai from most walks of life and a smattering of falang unhampered by the naive belief that most dishes piscatorial to be consumed in Bangkok are not farmed.

But I expect there are those that swear otherwise.......

Do you know the name of the place? As I said there are a very few exceptions. Soi 49 has a a few excellent Thai venues, likewise on and off 55. Just remembered there's the night market along soi 39 as well. Still, pickings are slim overall, for Sukhumvit.

As jfchandler pointed out, Sukhumvit is great for international restaurants, hotel restaurants, etc. Ask Bangkok natives about good Thai seafood places to eat in the Sukhumvit area and they'll generally roll their eyes. Even my Thai friends who live in that area generally choose not to eat Thai there, but rather Indian, Lebanese, Italian, etc. YMMV.

Neighbourhoods with a higher standard and selection of Thai eateries than lower Sukhumvit include Sathon (the district, not the road itself), around Vic Monument (esp Th Rong Muang, which isn't all Isan food as it once was), Yannawa, Dusit, Banglamphu and Thewet. Along Sukhumvit there are some good place along or just off sois 49 and 55.

I agree with whoever mentioned the Chao Phraya venues, lots of choice there.

Dined at Khrua Jeh Ngor last night, still excellent for seafood and the Narathiwat branch isn't very far from Asoke.

[jfchandler]

I agree that really good Thai restaurants are more the exception, than the rule, in lower Sukhumvit -- exactly the opposite of the International dining options.

One exception for Thai dining, however, is the very pleasant Rosabieng restaurant in Suk Soi 11, opposite the Ambassador Hotel... Great outdoor patio dining, as well as air con indoor restaurant. A vast, albeit somewhat poorly organized menu. Trying to find what you want, or the kind of food you want, can be a real chore given the size of the menu and how it's organized. Very good Thai food, including many seafood choices. Very reasonable, though not cheap, prices. A lot of dishes you just won't find at the typical Thai restaurants around town. Live music outdoors many evenings. Good service and staff. Never had a bad meal there. And they even have an outdoor covered gazebo table that sits beside a small pond they have, which makes for a very romantic setting for a meal, provided you can keep the mosquitoes at bay...

One past review posted on the web is here...

[Groongthep]

The sweeping statement that eateries between the lower Sukhhumvit Sois are comparable to a desert of opportunity is as unreliable as it is so obviously prejudiced.

Soi 33 tap nung next door to the Bull's Head gives the lie to such a specious contention and hosts a Thai alfresco restaurant that seldom disappoints as evidenced by the nightly congregation of Thai from most walks of life and a smattering of falang unhampered by the naive belief that most dishes piscatorial to be consumed in Bangkok are not farmed.

But I expect there are those that swear otherwise.......

Do you know the name of the place?

See post #24. This is a great little hole-in-the-wall place and although they do have seafood on the menu it is not a seafood restaurant.