My first brush with the durian was at a night market a couple of days into my first visit to Bangkok, when a faintly nauseating whiff of discordant smells – vanilla, garlic, a touch of perspiration – invaded my nostrils. Once over this olfactory hurdle, though, I learned to love this prized Southeast Asian fruit, with its custardy flavor (and hints of bitter caramel). Think melon crossed with an onion, an acquired taste not beloved by everyone.
Closer to home, the polarizing durian gives its name to a well-established Thai restaurant in Larchmont, as well as a new outlet, recently opened a few miles down the road in New Rochelle.
Photographs by Jeremy Wayne.
On my first visit, crispy rice cakes were “on the house,” as announced by a young female server as she unceremoniously plonked a bowl of said cakes on the table. They resembled Rice Krispies, clumped together with a vaguely shrimp-y, sweet tang, a not entirely edifying snack. I was more taken by the little paper rosette – or was it a miniature chef’s hat? – that decorated the top of the straw stuck into my elegantly fluted glass of Diet Coke. Classy.
The look of the new Durian is, how shall we say? – eclectic. Workaday, square wooden tables sit on scrubbed wooden floors and the overhead lighting, while interrogation-level bright, is yet somehow cheerful. Besides those key elements, it’s back to the kindergarten with stackable outdoor metal chairs in the gaudiest shades of green, yellow and red – sturdy and unbreakable, child-resistant if you will. A line of potted yellow plastic tulips sitting on a low wall separating the bar from the restaurant introduces an element of kitsch.
That bar by the way, where you can perch on any one of four pert stools – those vibrant yellows and greens again – is stocked with Hendrix, Tanqueray 10, some proprietary whiskeys and a bottle of Ketel One, plus some interesting liqueurs and mixers. They’re all you need to make a lychee mojito or mango colada. Me, I stuck with Diet Coke and cold Singha Thai beer.
The menu is comprehensively Thai, with an especially appealing “Thai Specialties and Home Cooking Section.”
Starting with a classic, though, I enjoyed tom yum goong, a rich amber broth with white mushroom, onion, lemongrass and cilantro, packed to the gills with fat, wonderfully tender shrimp. Duck salad, a veritable kitchen garden of green chard and red kale leaves camouflaging generous amounts of duck in a tangy Thai vinaigrette, smacked of piquancy and plenitude.
One of the “home cooking” specialties, called hang le, a Burmese-style braised lamb shank in ginger curry sauce and apparently a northern Thailand favorite, was new to me. I loved this unctuous, slow-cooked lamb in its rich, ginger-spiked gravy.
More familiar green or red curries come with your choice of beef, chicken, pork or shrimp. I had my green curry with beef but found the eggplant a little sludgy and the sweet, coconut cream sauce a touch cloying. For a green curry, traditionally hotter than red, I also found it “under-chilied” – not that I’m a chili-masochist. Indeed, I fared better on a second visit, with a red curry (this time with chicken) appropriately spiced, string beans replacing the eggplant and the flavors altogether truer. On that second visit, dishes I and a friend enjoyed included chicken larb (spiced minced chicken with rice powder, mint and red chili;) short-ribs with sticky rice and a celebratory tamarind duck. This was a terrific half-duck, prepared with palm sugar, tamarind and ginger and served with steamed vegetables.
We enjoyed several rice and noodle dishes, too, many of them gluten-free.
The eponymous durian made its one and only appearance in the kao neow thurian desert – a kind of rice pudding with warm, sticky rice and coconut cream. If you’re not quite ready for your durian-itiation, roti – a Thai-style Indian paratha (wheat flatbread), with sweetened condensed milk, which the menu blurb describes as a late-night delight on the streets of Bangkok – or the purple rice pudding (“a favorite offering at Thai temples”) might float your Thai long-tail boat instead.
The verdict? Delicious Thai food in a jolly, café-like atmosphere with cordial if not effusive service. A neon sign (vivid red and green, naturally, the colors of passion, as Vincent van Gogh called them), framed in a sort of living wall at the far end of the restaurant, proudly, announces “Thai Food Every Day.” When the Thai food is this good, and offered at these relatively friendly prices, I’d have to say, “Why not?”
For more, visit duriannewrochelle.com.
