I've been getting into Thai food recently and we have often pondered visiting some of Leeds Thai restaurants but never actually been to them. I mentioned this on Twitter and
@Artemisfoul1812 suggested a little place on Briggate called Saengarun with a very reasonable lunch menu, 2 courses for £9.
The decor is very basic and minimal with a few oriental images around the room, it's pretty much the opposite of the highly decorated rooms of some oriental and Asian restaurants.
We were given the menus to look through and I'm usually not one to stick to a set lunch menu when given the option of the full menu.
I opted for the Poh Teak to start, a Fisherman's soup with squid, mussels and king prawns.
The colour of the broth didn't look very appealing but what it lacked in appeal it more than made up in flavour. It started off with the most intense fish soup flavour combined with all the flavour of the lemongrass, coriander and lime followed by wave after wave of chilli heat. It was superb. The large pieces of seafood were also well cooked. Be warned this may be a touch hot for some as I thought my face was melting at one point, especially as you work down the bowl.
For my main I went for Gaeng Ped Yang, boneless duck in a coconut milk based red curry with pineapple and Thai basil.
After the starter I was not looking forward to this, faced with more heat after the inferno of the first dish, I was about ready to crawl under the table and wave the white flag. Fortunately this wasn't a hot curry, It was however, excellent, a beautiful vivid red curry with huge pieces of soft duck and a sauce with a great depth of flavour.
We didn't get any desserts because we were too stuffed.
Service was good, quick and efficient and we didn't have to wait long for our food. The final total came to £34 for a set lunch menu, 2 courses off the full menu, 2 beers and a coke. Excellent value
I would quite happily put this place as one of my top places to eat in Leeds simply because the food is epically good.
