Aroon (Rai) Restaurant Restaurants in Chiang Mai - Lonely Planet Travel Information

Address
45 Th Kotchasan, E of Pratu Tha Phae
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Phone
276 947

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Lonely Planet review

Look for Chiang Mai specialities such as kaeng hang-leh, kaeng awm and kaeng khae . The latter two dishes are more like stews than curries, and rely on local roots and herbs for their distinctive, bitter-hot flavours. The spacious open-air dining area upstairs is favoured by night-time clientele, and in hot weather it's cooler than downstairs.

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Checked this place out in November 2008 looking for the Chiang Mai speciality curries mentioned by the LP. They certainty weren't leaping out from the menu. In fact, we could only see the standard tourist Thai dishes you see everywhere. Being a determined Thai food fanatic I wasn't to be put off and spent some time deciphering the separate section of the menu written in Thai script. All sorts of lovely dishes there so we decided to order. That's when the real fun began. When I tried to order a red curry I was told I couldn't have it. I thought maybe they'd sold out but after a few broken Thai/English exchanges it turned out we couldn't have it because it was spicy! Even after explaining that we wanted a spicy dish they refused saying it was too hot for us. Next I tried to order a jungle curry - more out of sport then real desire - but was refused. We did finally manage to get one curry dish off the Thai menu and a few dishes off the standard tourist menu. The curry was a little spicy but nothing unusual. It was surprisingly runny though which makes me suspect they watered it down with stock. In any case it wasn't remarkable. The chicken with chilli and basil from the tourist menu should really have been called chicken with basil as there was no discernable chilli. Our final dish of stir fried morning glory was as you'd expect. Overall the experience was very disappointing. I understand places must get tired of naive tourists sending back or complaining about spicy dishes but I object to the tasty stuff being hidden away in Thai script. Some people want to try authentic food and want something more than the bland stir fries you can get anywhere. And if someone can read Thai script, order in the dish in Thai and tell you they love spicy food it's unacceptable to refuse to serve them.