Chili Coco - Greenslopes, Brisbane. For my mum's birthday, she felt like Thai as it is one of her favourite foods. After some searching around the surrounds, a few were shortlisted and this winner in Stone's Corner was chosen. Therefore, ringing up the restaurant to make a reservation, it was me, my parents and my dining buddy going out to dinner here. Of the course of the past couple of years, there have been two previous restaurants in this exact location and now it is time to see how well the next one does.
Walking into Chili Coco, there are two definite aspects that it has going for it: there is, of course, the expected wonderful service that comes naturally from Thai restaurants, and secondly is a characteristic interior decor. Most of the time, Thai restaurants will have fairly lavish decorations (sometimes extending to the cutlery) including plenty of paintings, statues of Buddha and even water fountains on the odd occasion. While that is often lovely it is always good to see a place buck the trend.
The interior at this restaurant is like walking into someone's den. It is calm in tone, cool in temperature, has a mood lighting plus right near the back of there is a couple of couches and some books to read. Plenty of eclectic items can also be spotted; the one I kept on noting was a picture of a Superman comic. To top this all off, a suggestion to be had when taking a kid here is to play "find the Smurfs". Lastly before getting onto the food, at the time there was a method to get 15% off the bill just by mentioning that they were seen on Must Do Brisbane. Must do puts it right for this place.
The menu is a deviation from the usual Thai fare of selecting your meat then the sauce. It is not modified for Western palates, and it can get quite spicy if you ask for it hot enough. Starting off though, somewhat weirdly, is their breakfast menu during the morning which is more or less several basic, wholesome options. During lunch, it is more or less like that with the stir fries and curries available, during dinner it gets much better. The selection is just the right size, with a good amount of entrees at the start, plus a couple of soups then the usual expected selection of stir fries and curries. Following up is a mixed selection - the expected basics and some more inventive dishes - of noodle and rice-based dishes before it gets to the chef's specials page.
Without a doubt, the chef's specials page has the best selection. Unlike the antecedent menus, there was a different focus here with plenty of duck, pork and seafood options. The majority of them are without descriptions of what they are, with a few exceptions near the end. Finishing off the menu is a really small list of sides, essentially being for rice and bread (plus a fried egg finish for some meals). This unusual menu was one of the reasons that it was unanimously selected.
Since, as it was aforementioned, that they have breakfast items here it should come to no surprise that they sell all the expected kinds of coffee here. My dining buddy went for one of these, opting for a cappuccino. Taking a sip of it, it is not too bad itself. Nothing to warrant coming in specifically for it, but as a side to a meal it works well. As well as coffee, they also have a small list of drinks which include the usual suspects and a range of speciality Thai drinks. Upon usual compulsion, I went for the most unusual I could see. This was called "Nom Yen" which was literally described as being iced pink milk. The best way to describe it is that it tastes a lot like a strawberry milkshake. Knowing south-east Asian cuisine, drinks often have condensed milk in them. Those with a sweet tooth will lap it up.
So then, it is starting off with the entrees. After having thoughts of what to order for mains - which will be gotten to later - the prospects of entrees were brought up. A couple of them were selected: vegetarian curry puffs and fish cakes. Presentation has always been something apparent in Thai cooking, and the each entree were served on a platter with a halved slice of orange (having a habit of nicking the garnishes from entree plates, I certainly got a bit of the orange), a garnish of lettuce and a small tub of sweet chili sauce. These were obviously freshly done, as the curry puffs were at a hand-burning level of hot. As usual, the Thai fish cakes were Thai fish cakes. The curry puffs were way better, with a hot potato filling.
As for the mains, they were a diverse selection of dishes in both terms of meat and type of dish. Once again, that was achieved while getting a good idea of what the menu selection wholly had to offer. Some were better than others, but that speaks more about the better ones than the otherwise selections; all of these were great choices, and had their own different characteristics.
Starting out with one of the lesser ones, my dining buddy went for the Jungle Curry with chicken. Unlike the other basic curries form the menu, this curry's base is more watery. It has a distinct flavour combination of kaffir lime, lemongrass, green pepper corn, garlic and chili. This was good, but nothing that would do this place any justice. It felt a bit more natural in tone and texture and it did have a good aesthetic with plenty of peppercorns laced on top of it. For something different, it definitely does the job.
In order to get a noodle dish, there was also a selection from it. To make the best diversity possible, the meat was calamari and the drunken noodles were the least familiar so that was chosen. This is a spicy dish, using flat rice noodles with choice of meat, egg, basil and fresh chili with special sauce. With all the complexity of the previous dishes noted, this dish was surprisingly effective and had some of the more distinct flavours of the night. One thing that could have contributed to this, though, could have been being less familiar with it.
Ask my mum, and she will tell you that there is no way that one can visit a Thai restaurant and not order the massamum curry. It is only available in beef, which really pleased her (she is a purist when it comes to that). Suffice to say, this was one of the best versions of the classic dish that I can remember having. The chef did not skimp in any way on the beef in this curry; there was proportionately way more of it than there was potato. The beef was very tender, and the sauce of the curry was also really thick with the right finish off of roasted peanuts throughout the dish. Massamum is always a case for trying a classic wherever you go.
Before even leaving the house, I knew what my first order was going to be. Going for the eponymous menu item again, it was the Chilicoco tofu special. This was a dish of lightly battered tofu topped with minced pork. It was well worth it. There is more tofu than pork, and the dish was a simple one with not a whole lot of complexity to it. This was a contrast to the drunken noodles and the jungle curry. It is worth trying.
Last but not least was the tamarind fish. This was a gorgeous dish of fish fillets, battered and served with an infused tamarind sauce, plus Tamarind Fish: fried fish fillets covered with a tamarind sauce. Again, a simple concept that works really well in execution. The fish was perfectly cooked, with the batter just right and not distracting from the fish (who hasn't had something battered that was proportionately towards the batter side?) and the tamarind sauce really helped create the essence of it. Even so, there were several fillets on there being a generous portion.
Topping off the order, some Jasmine rice was requested. Getting back to the pointers for service, when the rice was ordered each person got their own small bowl of freshly steamed rice. The quantity of rice definitely sufficed a single person. Also, there was an order for some roti. All of this was all just too much, even with four stomachs. Luckily this restaurant does do doggie bags.
Chilicoco is absolutely worth checking out, even if suburbia is peppered with plenty of Thai takeaways. This one feels real and is not attempting to appeal to anything but the palate and having a memorable experience. Such wonderful service, in one of Brisbane's most atmospheric eating places sure made for a brilliant meal and I see this becoming one for the ages.
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