Thai on Wye

13 Aug

Yam Nua. Beef salad.

The Gannets have frequently visited the lovely town of Hereford and environs over the last few years, but this plucky city has been eclipsed by its neighbours where food is concerned–at least if the chaotic consensus of internet fora can be believed. Poor Hereford, so close to Ludlow and Abergavenny and so far away from fine dining! It is within this context that we were very pleasantly surprised by Thai on Wye on West Street, right in the centre of town. We had just finished a hard day at work and were looking forward to a good meal. In the spirit of keeping our options open, we decided to give all the restaurants on our short list a once-over, but we were especially intrigued by the reviews the two Thai restaurants in the town centre had received on the various review sites. It was still a coin toss from the look of the menus, but we opted for Thai on Wye after I noticed there were actual Thai people eating there who did not appear to be staff or the staff’s family members.

As we were sitting down, we received a warm welcome by the only server in the restaurant that evening. She proved to be very much “on the ball” and made sure we had everything we needed the whole evening. Her friendliness and attentiveness, along with the top quality of the food at Thai on Wye were the main reasons we returned there for another meal two nights later and why we can recommend them without reservation. This is simply the best Thai food we have had in the UK. Yay Hereford!

Ped Makham. Crispy duck with tamarind sauce and cashews.

There are many choices on the menu, which could use a bit of re-organisation, perhaps by grouping the dishes together according to course and style rather than by main ingredient (usually meat). In fact, the menu started off with the best method, but got a little lost. We feel most people order according to style, and it has the knock-on benefit of keeping vegetarians out of the “veg ghetto” located at the end of the menu. Nonetheless, we spotted a few favourites and proceeded to order far too much–we are Gannets, after all.

The tom yum goong sour and spicy prawn soup was excellent–this deceptively simple dish is usually our litmus test for Thai restaurants. The yam nua beef salad was slightly less piquant and just as delicious. The see krong moo op, or spare ribs in sauce were succulent, with the meat so tender it nearly fell off the bone.

Pla Manow. Filet of seabass with lemon juice and chiles.

Our server asked us how spicy we would like each dish; spicy was spicy.

Our mains were a comforting yellow curry with chicken, ped makham crispy duck (which the menu recommends), and beef mussaman (mad sa man), which was wonderful and would have been just as good with some local lamb. All of the flavours were distinct and the freshness of the ingredients really came through.

The star of the show turned out to be the crispy duck. It had a lovely tamarind sauce, with the right balance of sweetness to off-set the sourness of the tamarind. It was so good, we ordered it the second night as well, along with a dish our server recommended–pla manow sea bass in a sweet sauce made with lemon juice and chiles.

The Gannets will be in Monmouth soon, which isn’t far away from Hereford at all. Thai on Wye should be expecting us for a third round, this time with reinforcements!

Thai on Wye
15 West Street
Hereford HR4 0BX
namkiing@hotmail.co.uk
Telephone +44 1432 376769