Fine dining Thai at Patara Hampstead

My husband and I love Thai food. In fact, I could eat it pretty much every day – I just love the sweet, salty and sour flavours and the way their food is always so beautifully presented. I was invited to the launch of Patara in Hampstead last month but unfortunately couldn’t make it as I was attending an awards ceremony so I decided we’d go for dinner instead.

We’ve been going to their Maddox Street branch for years but I was really excited to hear that Patara had opened in Hampstead as it’s much closer to where we live. It’s in the same place where Chinese restauramt Goldfish used to be years ago and it follows a similar layout although the decor is definitely more luxurious. It’s quite dark with low lighting, which makes for a rather romantic dining experience. (By the way, the restaurant was really busy. These photos were taken when we left and we were the last table…).

We ordered our usual bottle of Prosecco and were immediately brought prawn crackers – which we love. Also it gives us something to munch on whilst we look at the menu!

For starters we opted for the Patara platter, which consists of a selection of their starters – chicken satay, dumplings with chicken, sweet turnip and peanuts, red curry fishcakes, duck spring rolls and spicy king prawns served on a lettuce leaf. I love ordering starter platters as you get to try a little bit of everything.

We also ordered the beef fillet and rucula salad, which had a real chilli kick! It was far too hot for my husband but I loved it.

Unfortunately our favourite dish wasn’t available, which was the Massaman curry. They used to do it with osso bucco, which was absolutely mouth-wateringly delicious but they’ve now changed it to lamb shank. For mains we opted for the Chicken Kieaw Wan, which is Thai Green Curry to you and me, with steamed jasmine rice. We also had the Chicken Phad Thai, which came with the chilli, sugar and crushed peanuts on the side so that you could choose how you like it.

We were quite full and normally we don’t order desserts but we did last night. My husband ordered the sticky rice with mango and I opted for the sago pudding in coconut milk. I loved mine! My husband declared the mango as ‘a bit too sweet’.

We thoroughly enjoyed our meal – great food and warm, friendly and excellent service from our lovely waitress. We will definitely be back!