Mengrai Thai must be one of the most (if not THE most) famous Thai restaurant in Toronto. I use the word 'famous' because they are heavily embellished with awards even from the Thai Royal government and had serviced big screen celebrities like Jackie Chan, Jessica Alba and the list goes on. Head chef Sasi was an iron chef winner and is celebrity status herself.
With such an adorned list of accomplishments, we arrived ready to culinarily enlighten. Once you walk up the stairs into the restaurant, the place has an old antique feeling to it like a mashup of a Thai temple and a traditional diner. A little worn but lots of traditional flair.
Their menu had a lot going on as it was so wordy that it was a little hard to navigate through. We decided to place our full trust in our servers recommendations and ordered the most popular items:
- Tom yum soup: this was the most sour Tom yum I have ever had. The sourness was so overpowering that it was hard for me to enjoy any other flavour that accompanied it.
- Divine crispy morning glory: battered thai spinach, it was fried similar to tempura style with a nice sweet and sour glaze. I thoroughly enjoyed this and would recommend.
- Sasi's red curry chicken with lychee: served in a pineapple and had lychee in the curry, interesting concept but can't say I was a fan. The taste was a little bland and it didn't have a strong flavour profile. The chicken meat was also slightly overcooked.
- Sasi's pad Thai: the noodles were nice and chewy and it was a solid pad thai but again there wasn't a distinctiveness that would make me want to get it again.
Overall, it was still a satisfying meal and I wouldn't go as far to say this is a tourist trap because I'm sure Sasi is a super talented and great chef. However, our actual experience with the food here dulled in comparison to the glowing expectations of celebrity chef resto.