Meeting of minds and flavours

WHEN TWO of the stars of Thai television’s “Iron Chef” programme come together, the result is inevitably going to be a fusion of two very different specialists. 

Boontham Parkpho, a specialist in Japanese cuisine, and Chumpol Jangprai, who is known for his Thai delicacies, launched Vivarium last year on Rama IV Road and have been delighting diners ever since with Asian fusion dishes that merge the very best of Japanese produce with Thai classics.

Now Vivarium recently launched a second branch at upmarket mall Siam Paragon. The dining area is much more compact than its older sibling and that’s probably fortunate given that Boontham is on his own.

“Chumpol has a very busy schedule so I have to run the second branch alone,” he explains. “The menu is identical to the first branch but I’ve added more seasonal seafood ingredients both imported from Japan and sourced locally.”

While the first outlet is big enough to seat 100 diners, the second caters to roughly half that number. Designed in duplex-style, the interior boasts reused steel pipes, tree roots, discarded metal and glass hanging from the walls and ceiling, and displayed on scaffolding that doubles as shelves. 

“I used to work on a construction site and that inspired the interior designers to use found objects from sites and turn them into decorative elements,” Boontham says with a smile. 

We start with Thai Rice Cracker Topped with Uni (Bt350) that comes with a creamy and rich dip made from red curry, minced shrimp, coriander root, roasted peanut, pepper and uni (sea urchin roe). It’s also topped with cooked uni that adds a crunch and contrasts well with the creamy taste.

Popular Thai food goong chae nam pla (raw shrimp marinated in spicy dressing of lime juice, fish sauce, chilli and raw garlic) gets an elegant makeover thanks to the Japanese botan shrimp, which has a sweet and firm flesh. The shrimp meat is flash-seared to retain its delicate texture and slightly glazed with fish sauce, while the head is deep-fried for a brittle finish. Served with two choices of dressings: Thai-style spicy seafood, and Thai-style seafood mixed with wasabi, it’s priced at Bt1,200 with the botan shrimps but there’s also a wallet-friendly version with Japanese Ama shrimp for Bt780.

For a main course, a good choice is Japanese snow grilled and served with Thai-style tamarind sauce (Bt540). Equally delicious is the Southern-style yellow curry made with taraba crab that isn’t too spicy and comes with rice vermicelli (Bt1,900).

Although Boontham says this outlet targets tourists who may not be familiar with spicy Thai cuisine, several of the East-meets-West dishes are pretty fiery even for the Thai palate. Among them are the hotate, Japanese scallop that is grilled and dressed with spicy, sweet and sour Thai herb dressing (Bt650), and grilled kobe beef served with jaew dipping sauce, the super-spicy Isaan-style dressing. 

Vivarium also offers fusion pizza with five different toppings. I sampled the snow fish and ebi (salmon roe) pizza with gaeng som (yellow curry) spice (Bt560) but was not impressed by the match. Other options include kurobuta pork with chilli and sweet basil sauce and fried egg, kobe beef with spicy holy basil sauce, hotate with green curry, and snow fish with tom yum sauce.

There are authentic Thai dishes too if fusion is not your thing. Worth trying are Pad Thai with tiger prawns (Bt240), and the Crabmeat Fried Rice (Bt260), which has an abundance of crabmeat.

Don’t leave without trying one of the tempting Thai sweets like Bua Loy (Bt120) – five-coloured, sweetened coconut milk pudding with young coconut meat and palm fruit, and Lod Chong (Bt90) – pandan flavoured rice flour droplets in palm sugar syrup and coconut cream. 

Wash the meal down with pure sugarcane juice (Bt80).

  

FANCY FUSION

Vivarium’s new branch is on ground floor of Siam Paragon.

It’s open daily from 11am to 10pm. Call (02) 610 9551.