Nakhon thai restaurant Singapore review: Thai classics served whilst being screamed at.

Anybody that has been to Thailand, or loves the cuisine, knows the food they serve is often some of the most interesting in the world, with its expert balance of sweet, salty, spicy, sour and bitter the key to a good dish. When I was in Thailand I did a cooking class in Chiang Mai that opened my eyes to the depth of flavour you can create with their ingredients and the David Thompson of Nahm green curry I made was fantastic even without some of the more local ingredients.

My green Thai curry

We have a particular favourite in Singapore on Orchard Road (which we will review later) but on this occasion, with one of our friends leaving the country, she wanted us to try Nakhon, about 5 minutes walk away from Kovan MRT.


Expectations where definitely built as we waited in the queue for 30 minutes (a favourite hobby of Singaporean foodies) however with better table management this could have been cut in half. This is due to the fact the open front restaurant may be small but the four seater tables where mostly filled with two people only. Being a more casual restaurant it makes no sense that when the majority of your customers are two why not seat them together, rather than make them wait so long.

In the queue you will be handed a menu (just one no matter how many you are) and given time to make your selections.

Finally seated, our iced Thai tea ($3) already beat us to the table. Nice and extremely sweet.

For three people we went with three appetisers, two mains and rice each.

Our first appetiser was pandan chicken ($6) which was fragrant from the cooking process but a little dry without the sweet chili sauce which itself was a little lacking in flavour.

Second appetiser was the papaya salad ($5), crunchy julienne of papaya, carrot and green beans were coated in a spicy dressing sauce. Unfortunately this was fiercely hot (perhaps too much?) and Louise refrained from anymore however I enjoyed it.

The papaya salad

The final appetiser of spring rolls ($4) were a little sad, small and also pretty bland.

The two mains consisted of fried chicken mince with hot basil leaves and a oily spicy sauce ($6) and a beef green curry ($8) along with a portion of rice each ($1).

Green curry

Stir fried chicken with hot basil

Our selection

The green curry was fragrant and creamy with an acceptable portion of beef and aubergines but again was lacking the oomph to make it amazing. The stir fried chicken was better though and definitely something we would have again if we return as the meat was still juicy and  it had just the right amount of spice, though negatively we could not taste much basil flavour.

Overall we did enjoy Nakhon but everything was just lacking a little bit in each department to make it very good. The queue too is a problem but it turned out to be worthwhile.

One thing we must note was the screaming heavy metal rock music blaring out of the speakers that almost ruined the meal. It seems the wrong staff member was given free reign over the playlist that night and I am sure we were not the only ones irritated by this.

Rating: 7/10
Expect to pay: ~$15-20 per person when you share dishes
Would we go back: Yes, the restaurant is close but we would not travel far for it and also on the condition they remove the terrible music.
Any Freebies: No

212 Hougang Street 21 #01-341
Singapore 530212
Tel: +65 6286 8785

Five minutes walk from Kovan MRT.