Rosa's Thai Café Birmingham
ONCE UPON A TIME…
So Rosa’s Thai Café—the latest of London’s fast expanding restaurant chains—makes its way to Birmingham, retracing its footsteps from Liverpool, Manchester and Leeds.
Reading ‘Rosa’s story’ on their website it’s a tale of their founder, Saiphin Moore’s journey from mountain farm in northern Thailand to London, starting with a market stall in Brick Lane, before opening up her first UK restaurant in 2008 at the site of Rosa’s Café—an old greasy spoon, without the money or the means to change the name on the sign.
Fast-forward 13 years and opening in Paradise Birmingham, with Dishoom as your neighbour, confirms Rosa’s now a big player. But, whereas over the road you could almost feel you’ve stepped out of a time machine into bustling Bombay in the 1930s, Rosa’s is a far more understated affair; not least as it’s much smaller at 80 covers (compared to Dishoom's mammoth 330). And it feels as much café as restaurant without a hint of the usual stereotypical paraphernalia associated with Thai restaurants—bamboo, running water or traditional costumes etc. And there’s nothing wrong with that.
Rosa’s Thai Cafe Birmingham - Interior
We’re here for the soft launch and given it’s 50% off the food we decide to go in large and without any particular lunch hour time pressures, we opt for a sharing plates approach and it’s brought out all in one go.
Sweetcorn patties
Unfortunately, it’s a stodgy start… sweetcorn patties “corn fried in a light batter flavoured with kaffir lime leaves & red curry paste until crisp and golden, served with Rosa’s sweet chilli sauce” are too heavily battered and manage to taste almost of nothing.
Tom yum chicken soup
The tom yum chicken soup has a decent balance of sweet and sour but barely registers any heat despite it’s 2 out of 3 chilli rating which allows saltiness to dominate the palate and the chicken is too dry too.
Papaya salad
The papaya salad does exactly what it should … it’s sweet, sour, salty, spicy and actually delivers perfectly on its 2 out of 3 chilli rating.
Rosa’s ‘homemade’ spring rolls, steamed brown rice with fried garlic, egg fried rice & Rosa’s green curry with chicken
Rosa’s homemade spring rolls are crispy as they should be—out of a hot fryer—but otherwise unremarkable and I admonish myself for falling for the ‘homemade’ tag being an indicator of something better than the ordinary.
Beef panang curry
I’d read somewhere Saiphin (‘Rosa’) recommends their beef panang curry, so it’s a done deal for me but only confirms their chilli scoville scale requires a recalibration, and leaves far too much work for the beef strips to do in what’s just a lightly fragrant and coconutty soup.
Rosa’s green curry with chicken
Rosa’s green curry (with more dry chicken) dangling the carrot of three out of three on the chilli scale merely confirms it’s not so much a recalibration of the scoville scale in the kitchen that’s required, but a reprint of the menus.
Rosa’s Thai-Pa Pale Ale
The star of the show for me is actually Rosa’s Thai-Pa (a pale ale blended with lemongrass and lime)… so much so I had two, just to confirm the second was as enjoyable as the first. It was.
As well as the distinct lack of heat, the main feeling that springs to mind is the food is too safe, but with a bill of £46 including two lots of rice and the tip I shouldn’t really quibble. But on the question of would I go back? The answer is probably not, although it’d be fair to cut them some slack given it’s a soft launch and a slightly reduced menu for kitchen safety reasons.
Rosa’s is a story created by brand consultants… a tale of the mountain farm girl done good, with her unusual ingredients and dishes and spun around English café traditions. I suspect it’s aimed very much for the ‘corporate marketplace’ and you don’t get more corporate than the Paradise Development. Even the restaurant’s style has more than a whiff of corporate canteen to it. Just like the food—it’s well presented and functional—but otherwise mostly unremarkable.
As for those unusual ingredients and dishes, we’re not talking anything more unusual than lemongrass, tamarind, Thai basil, kaffir lime leaves, galangal, coconut milk... all available in most supermarkets. As for the dishes it’s Thai menu bingo… breadcrumbed prawns and sweet chilli sauce; chicken satay and peanut dipping sauce; tom yum soup; spring rolls; papaya salad; red, green, Massaman and panang curries; stir fries; pad thai, zzzzzzzzzzz
Surely, we’re 25 years too late for a menu like this to impress?
Upon leaving I’m prompted to go online to give them a 5 star review. Sure, I’ll just hop into the time machine and head back to 1996, find myself an internet café, fire up Internet Explorer and get that review on Yahoo.
WORTH A TRY
Unit 2B, Chamberlain Square, Birmingham B3 3AX
