Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Review: Siam Cuisine

Type: Thai
Location: 4950 York Rd., Buckingham, PA
Phone: 215-794-7209
Fax: 215-796-7216

According to its website, there are several locations of this restaurant. We went to the one in Buckingham. In theory, the Doylestown location might have been closer to home, but parking in downtown can be a real PITA, and the one in Buckingham is in a cute little strip mall with upscale stores that's right near my cats' veterinarian. There are no parking issues in that mall, especially on a Monday night.

We each ordered soup to start, and split a mixed seafood dish. My other half ordered the hot & sour soup for $4; I went with the tom yum gai. The hot & sour soup was allegedly delicious. My soup, on the other hand was not so stupendous. The broth was great -- nice and lemongrassy-spicy the way it's supposed to be -- but the sliced chicken thrown into it was worthy of a rubber chicken circuit hotel lunch. It's as if the chef tossed the chicken into the boiling broth, forgot about it for 10 minutes, and said "eh, serve it anyway."

Granted, it was a Monday night, and we were the only two people in the restaurant for the duration of our meal, so maybe the chef wasn't on his game when we visited. Still, overcooked chicken slices do not belong in a soup, if they are the featured ingredient. Overcooked chicken can be used in a soup, but chop it up into small chunks, and make it into something like a semi-thin pot pie filling, with carrots, peas, and diced potato.

Our mixed seafood dish was also partially overcooked. We ordered "seafood ginger" for $20. The angel hair pasta on which it was served was great. The shrimp were only slightly overcooked, but the scallops were overcooked big time. I don't really like scallops to begin with, but I will eat them them if they are prepared correctly. Little white hockey pucks don't do it for me.

On the upside, the squid and salmon components of the dish were perfectly cooked.

Honestly, I don't know whether to give this place a thumbs up or down.

Maybe I should not order chicken or any form of seafood. What they toss into the sauce is overcooked, but the sauce itself is wonderful.
215-794-7209
215-796-7216 fax

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