Benjarong - the name for some reason rings a "gong". But figured it actually means "five colours" in Thai, and the more common usage is for referring to painted porcelain. There may not be many Thai restaurants in Chennai, and when one talks about it, the only name that crops, not surprisingly, is that of Benjarong. The restaurant is located near The Sheraton Towers on TTK Road, Alwarpet.
I reached the destination for once, without losing my sense of purpose and direction :-). The restaurant logo - A traditional Thai dancer with hands outstretched sideways - adorned the front porch type entrance. My two friends lived up the virtues of punctuality, which meant I was the last one to take my seat at the table. This particular drive from Tambaram to Alwarpet on my bike was one of the most painful ones, thanks to billowing smoke from all kinds of vehicles and the mad-rush on a Saturday afternoon. The guys had already started on a rather exotic looking tender coconut water and what I believe, was Jasmine Tea. I was hungry beyond reasonable limits, but decided to expunge the grime and soot on my hands prior to digging in. What followed was comedy of epic proportions!! Preeth made the first move to the wash room, and I opted to wait outside for my turn. While I waited for my turn, I even had time to make two calls and still there was no sign of Preeth. The third call I got on was with Preeth and apparently he couldn’t figure out a way to unlock himself. Like any good samaritan, I volunteered to unlock him from his misery, only to find that I was unable to unlock him and worse, I locked myself too in the wash basin area. Nihal had to be our saviour, so I buzzed him and he responded, tongue-in-cheek, that he didn’t want to lock himself too with us. After some embarrassing moments and good laughs, Nihal turned to be our saviour but he safely chose to outsource the job to one of the restaurant staff. Not to be done with the fiasco, I used the wash room and once again I locked myself in. After the final rescue act, we were re-assured that we were not the only smart-alecs to go through this experience. But am sure we were unique in doing a double-act in this one.
To liberate our senses, we ordered the Thai staple Chicken Pad Thai, a custom ordered Chicken Red Curry and the special Chicken Jungle fried rice. The food portions were quite acceptable, and seemed reasonably priced given the ambience, taste and location of the restaurant. However, the items that are laced with Prawn cost a premium - somewhere around Rs.545. The Pad Thai was little too sweet, but complemented the other two spicy offerings. While the overall restaurant setting was really good, one should not expect waiters adorned in traditional Thai attire, as was the case when the restaurant started off. I am assuming the place would probably look more beautiful during the evenings, when the Thai handicrafts and paintings would come to life in the dim lights. That remains to be tried out though. Of the items that we ordered, I would surely recommend the "Jungle fried rice" which had generous doses of fine fried onions, but the Red Curry was nothing extraordinary. Preeth really liked his coconut water, which apparently had a zing to it :-). I enquired if they had the sticky rice for dessert and unfortunately they didn’t. Preeth recommended that we could head to French Loaf for trying out some pastries and cakes. The overall meal for the three of us at Benjarong cost around Rs.1400, which was expected, given the pricing standards set by most of the restaurants from Oriental Cuisines stable. So with a heavy heart, a relatively lighter purse, and a satiated feeling, we hit French Loaf and tried out the Mango pastry, a Carrot-Walnut Cake and a Blueberry Pastry. All yummy and delicious!! While Preeth and Nihal headed for the Chennai Open, I laboured back home.
Benjarong@Chennai
