Thai House (Burnaby)

This is actually my third time to Thai House, once in Richmond and twice in Burnaby. There are multiple branches: Richmond, Burnaby, North Vancouver , Downtown and Kitsilano. It is owned by a chain of restaurants including Samba Steakhouse, Chilli House and Urban Thai Bistro.

I enjoy coming here with 3 or more friends as most of the dishes really has to be shared to enjoyed. Thai House has a warm ambiance and many Thai decorations inside the restaurant. The place is usually pretty busy with a diverse group of customers.

As it was a very hot day (record breaking heatwave in Vancouver!), we immediately ordered some drinks; The Royal Thai and Pina Colada for myself, both virgin. The Royal Thai drink was made of blended lychee and coconut milk juice which yields a very unique (and good) taste I thought, very refreshing on a hot day.

In terms of ordering, the majority of the food on the menu are spicy but you can request mild even if shows "3 chilli's". As both of us cannot really stand too much spice, we ordered the Chicken lettuce wrap without any spice as appetizer and we thought it was great!

Presentation overall for all of our dishes were decent but nothing spectacular. We had the Thai peanut sauce on chicken breast strips (forgot the Thai name), with spinach undedeath. Above is the fried salmon with creamy garlic sauce. I thought this was a very interesting dish. The sauce is like a creamy tomato garlic sauce. It tastes a little like a western dish and it could use a tiny bit more thai spice/herbs flavouring to make it taste more Thai'ish.

None of the dishes came with rice, so you have to order rice seperately. We ordered two bowls of coconut rice which came in one big bowl (above). I guess they steam the rice using coconut milk and call it that way, which makes the rice smell nice.

I noticed some people around our table ordered the "Thai Ice Tea" and it looked very interestingly "red" so I just had to try it! It came and I noticed it smelled similar to an HK cafe ice milk tea but stronger in terms of the tea smell. It tastes like nothing I've drank before and the best I can describe it is it LIKE a HK ice milk tea except it is much stronger in terms of the tea and is abit minty. Definatley an acquired taste. Does anyone know how they make this?

Our bill came to $60.59 for two of us and I thought it was a little pricy. I noticed that alot of the food in Thai restaurants overlaps with Malaysian restaurants such as Tropika so I sometimes wonder whether a dish is originally Thai or Malay. I guess those two places ARE close together.