Indian Hut Serves High-End Indian Cuisine -- Bangkok, Thailand

With such a large and vibrant Indian community in Bangkok you would expect to find good Indian food here and you can. There are any number of places that serve high-end Indian cuisine and it’s usually of the northern Indian variety. That means tandoor cooking and the highly refined dishes that were created by the Mughlai chefs stretching back hundreds of years.

Southern Indian is more problematic, although with a little searching you can find some places and even ones that specialize in vegetarian food. There are a number of small open-air places on the little back sois around Silom Road that are very inexpensive – and very basic – that serve very good food at really low prices.

However, if you want an elegant setting in which to dine on top-quality Indian food, one place in the Silom area is Indian Hut which is on lower Surawong Road very close to the second stage expressway and across the street from the Manohra Hotel. This small, cozy place has been open for about 12 years and it’s been consistently good since then. I even tried it with an Indian friend right after it first opened and he was quite impressed.

As with all really good restaurants everything starts with good management. I have not been familiar with all of the managers there over the years but the current manager, Bobby, is a veteran of the Bangkok restaurant scene, having managed Maharajah’s on Sukhumvit Soi 8 for a number of years and I got to know him there. One of his hallmarks is good service and the service at Indian Hut is very good, matching the food in that regard.

The décor here is an immaculate white on white with plenty of mirrors creating the illusion of more space in this compact dining room. There is, in fact, an upstairs room that can also be used and is good for groups and parties. The main dining room is comfortable, classy and conducive to fine dining. What was once a strictly Indian cuisine menu has had an addition recently which I have not yet had a chance to try and that is the inclusion of some Indian-Chinese fusion food. Years ago I had some dishes that were described this way at another Indian restaurant and the dishes were interesting as they incorporated Chinese ingredients in some of the more popular Indian cooking styles.

An update of this article soon will contain some information on this new part of the menu. For now, though, I’ll concentrate just on the Indian dishes I know there starting with some of my favorites (although, admittedly most things here could be called favorites), the butter chicken, tandoori prawns, the mutton seek kebab and some of the different biryanis. There’s also the selection of vindaloos, including chicken, when I’m in the mood for something spicy and just about anything else out of the tandoor oven including chicken and lamb.

They also have dishes here from the Nawabi area of India which are specific only to this area as well as Rajasthani cuisine from Jaipur. As you can see, there are a lot of different dishes and styles to choose from here and they do all of them well. It’s well worth a visit since you can try things you’ve probably never had before or stick to your old favorites. Either way, it’s high-end dining in an authentic Indian place.

See http://bangkokdining.ning.com/profiles/blog/list for info on Bangkok restaurants.