Karachi has too many restaurants — there, I said it. Every other week there’s some hot new place popping up that serves mediocre food and is hyped to death by influencers and other Karachiites starved for activities other than eating. But every once in a while, the city produces a gem.
I’d heard about Sukhumvit a while ago — back when it was a supper club operating out of the owner’s apartment — and always wanted to try it out. When I learned that it was now a restaurant, I knew I had to visit.
I went with the intention of trying everything — or almost everything — on their limited menu. I don’t know when this facet of my personality developed, but I no longer want a lot of choices at a restaurant. I want to go somewhere and for them to do a few dishes, and do them well, not offer me everything under the moon and serve something mediocre.
That wasn’t a problem at Sukhumvit. Their menu features two soups, one salad, one starter and then powers into the mains — one stir fry, krapao, two curries, one noodle and two seafood options.
The food comes in variations — single serving or servings for two — but if you’re in the mood to try stuff out, I’d recommend getting single servings and ordering more things.
After a failed first attempt because we found out the food ran out by the time we arrived for our 10pm reservation, we tried again a few days later and arrived to a thankfully empty restaurant.
Warm woods, warm lighting, and colourful lanterns decorate the small restaurant in Phase-VIII. It doesn’t try to be pretentious and stuff — instead, with its dark green walls and warm wood interiors, it’s created a warm, cozy space.
The seating is primarily two-person tables scattered around the restaurant that can be pushed together for larger parties, and one much larger table that’s apparently from the restaurant’s supper club days.
Sukhumvit operates on a reservation-only time-slot basis — 7pm to 8:30pm, 8:30pm to 10pm and 10pm to 11:30pm — from Wednesday to Sunday. While I understand why there are time slots, I don’t much care for them. You’re given a one-and-a-half-hour slot, which I don’t think is enough time, especially given that Pakistanis linger over their meals. We went over our time slot but to the restaurant’s credit, they said absolutely nothing to us. However, knowing there was a group waiting had us scarfing down our dessert in a bid to vacate the table. Perhaps that’s on us, but I feel like two-hour slots might work better.
We started off with soup, despite it not being soup season, but I was so glad we did. We ordered the Tom Yum Goong, described as a hot and sour prawn soup with lemongrass, galangal, kaffir lime leaves, Thai red chilli, mushrooms and lime, and were served a complimentary Tom Kha Gai soup — described as a creamy coconut chicken soup infused with galangal, lemongrass, Thai red chilli, mushrooms and lime. Each soup was for Rs1,200 and was easily enough for two people.
The Tom Yum Goong was packed with flavour, which is right up my alley. I’m not usually one for more subtle flavours — I love a dish that packs a punch, and that’s what this soup was. It was spicy, rich and lemony, and I loved it even though I don’t even like seafood.
The second soup, the Tom Kha Gai was lighter and smoother, thanks in large part to the coconut milk. It was slightly sweeter and less intense than the Tom Yum Goong, but still flavourful. My friends enjoyed this one more.
Next was the Papaya Salad or Som Tum — a shredded green papaya tossed with lime, chilli, tomato, long beans and peanuts. I liked this, and it was a good papaya salad, but it wasn’t a star like the soup was for me. For Rs900, I think it was pretty decent.
Our mains came all together, and we were at once spoiled for choice. I’ll start off with my favourite, the Chicken Krapao or Pak Krapao Gai. Minced chicken, stir fried with garlic, chilli and Thai basil, and topped with a delightfully crispy fried egg — what’s not to love? According to my friends, this was one of the most authentic versions of Krapao they’d had outside of Thailand.
A single serving of the Krapao was for Rs1,800.
A close second was the Stir Fried Beef or Neua Pad Nam Man Hoi — beef stir-fried in oyster sauce with carrots, beans and onions. This was my friends’ favourite. It had a heavier, richer taste compared to the Krapao’s more herby flavours, but was as delicious. I especially enjoyed how tender the beef was because there’s nothing worse than chewy meat.
The dish was packed with garlic, yet it wasn’t overpowering. A single serving of Stir Fried Beef was for Rs2,000.
When choosing between the curries, my thought process was simple — a curry is a curry is a curry. My friends waxed rhapsodic about Sukhumvit’s Green Curry. To hear them describe it, it was unlike the thick curries you usually get in Karachi, and was very flavourful. Again, they used their favourite word — authentic ™.
We decided to go with the Red Curry or Gaeng Daeng Gai so they could judge whether it was as authentic™ as its green counterpart. Their conclusion was that the green curry was in fact better.
With my first bite of the curry the words “a curry is a curry” resounded in my head and I moved on to more interesting fare. But soon I was back, spooning more of the curry onto my plate. It was light, flavourful and a little nostalgic. When most of us think of Thai food, a red or green curry comes to mind, and I was actually quite glad we ordered it. Apologies red curry, I didn’t realise your game.
Both curries at Sukhumvit cost Rs1,800.
Next was the Pad Thai, which I thought was just okay. On the drier side, the noodles were topped with shrimp, very well-seasoned tofu, bean sprouts and peanuts. This isn’t me saying it was a bad dish — it just wasn’t my favourite.
In general, I preferred the dishes at Sukhumvit that aren’t on everyone else’s menus. A single serving of the Pad Thai was for Rs1,800.
Last came the Tamarind Fish or Pla Ma Kham, which was fish in a spicy, tangy, sweet tamarind sauce. Once again, I am not a seafood person, but I did try some to give it a shot. Don’t ask me what fish it was because I can’t tell the difference.
The consensus at the table was that the tamarind sauce was nice, and gave the dish a bit of a kick, but had it come with a less generous helping of sauce, you would have been able to taste the flavour of the fish better. The fish cost Rs2,000 for a single serving of three pieces.
To cap off our incredibly over-the-top meal, we ordered Mango Sticky Rice, which was perfect. Creamy and topped with what I believe were toasted seeds, and mint leaves, this was exactly what we needed after all that food. The Mango Sticky Rice isn’t on the printed menu at the restaurant but is on their online menu and costs Rs1,300.
In terms of value for money, I think Sukhumvit does a great job balancing prices with high quality ingredients. It’s not the cheapest place out there, but nor is it the most overpriced.
We over-ordered in our quest to try everything and so our bill was a little over Rs5,000 per head for three people. All the prices I’ve mentioned are exclusive of tax. Most people aren’t going to go order the entire menu, so safe to say, their bill will not be as high as ours.
Do I think Sukhumvit is perfect? No, no restaurant is and certainly not in its first couple of months. Do I think it has great potential? Yes, absolutely.
In my opinion, what works best at Sukhumvit are the dishes no one else is doing well. Great soups, great meat-based mains and a lovely dessert at the end.
