Kao Soi Thai Bistro

Review

Crash test chicken

What is it about street food that fascinates people so much? You don't sit comfortably, nor are the finest ingredients cooked. What you get in street and cookshops in Asia and Latin America is usually over-seasoned and you shouldn't worry about hygiene. Nevertheless, there is hardly anything better than deep-fried codfish balls from a stall in the Caribbean, freshly sliced tripe from Orazio at Mercato Nuovo in Florence or fried rice with prawns in Bangkok's Yaowarat. It is probably the immediacy that makes people so happy. Cooked in front of your own eyes, served directly, eaten without cutlery. A very original form of gastronomy that we have somewhat lost sight of over the centuries in the course of adopting courtly table manners. The people from All Reis are quite good at trading in street food happiness. Six years ago, they turned the makeshift space in the back room of their fantastic store Thalad Thai on Schweglerstraße into a small, pretty restaurant on the other side of the street, which has been going like gangbusters ever since. During the lockdown, a branch opened in Ballgasse, then a kind of Thai café called Oliang, and now the street food specialists have opened a street food restaurant: Kao Soi is tiny and cramped, has just seven stools and you take your own Thai beers and soft drinks. And if you didn't know what kao soi is by then - a curry dish from northern Thailand with braised chicken and crispy fried noodles - you'll know what it's all about when you see the order counter: the display case is full of gorgeous chicken torsos and piles of boiled and fried chicken breasts - all made of plastic, by the way, in keeping with both a wonderfully bizarre Asian tradition and Austrian hygiene regulations.
I didn't go for the khao soi chicken, although that looked very good both in plastic and in real life, but the khao man kai mix, a combination of boiled and deep-fried chicken breast. Boiled chicken breast, is there anything more bland? Well, it's cooked here with garlic and ginger, which results in a clear chicken soup that you can't really get enough of; plus you dip the tender meat in this incredible soy-tamarind-chili-coriander sauce, yes you're done. The strips of crispy deep-fried chicken with sweet and spicy chilli sauce can hardly compete with that, although they are also very good (€ 16.90). 15 minutes later, you're done, full and happy. Little space, a small selection and then boiled chicken breast - the people at Kao Soi know how to make happiness out of it.

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