With Little Soi, Kochi gets another Pan Asian street-food option. The new restaurant near Kadvanthra offers street food from Singapore, Malyasia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Burma and Thailand. Run by Chennai-based Pricol Gourmet Pvt. Ltd, Little Soi is a smaller version of Chennai’s Soy Soi.
The interiors are in shades of black and red and the glass doors ensure that it is naturally well lit. Diners get a partial look into the open kitchen and one wall is dominated by a large painting of a chopstick-wielding Tamil woman.
Brand Chef Peter Tseng tells the story of how the team researched the street-food menu for Soy Soi by travelling to these countries over 21 days. “It was all about eating, eating and some more eating. We ate so much that sometimes we’d eat more than one breakfast, in fact many of every meal.”
Peter says he has recreated the dishes, while staying true to the authentic. “This is not fusion, rather street food presented in a modern way.” Little Soi has a curated menu, picked from Soy Soi’s more expansive one. Since our palate tend to gravitate towards the familiar satays and the like, Peter helps with choosing. So we have tom yum soup, chicken and celery dumplings, Balinese prawn satay, Little Soi lotus root, Burmese chilli lamb and khow suey.
Kochi/ Kerala, 24/06/19:" Chicken and celery dumpling" Little Soi Restaurant. Photo:H.Vibhu/The Hindu.
We begin with the Thai tom yum, a light soup flavoured with lemon grass, Thai chilli paste and coriander and shrimps that go well the soup. Chicken and celery dimsums are followed by crisp-fried lotus stem. The menu includes dimsum varieties such as shumai, har gau, gyoza and wontons besides bao, spring rolls and others. The sushi fan is spoilt for choice.
The starters arrive —Balinese prawn satay, Little Soi lotus root and Burmese chilli lamb. The crisp fried lotus stem is a crunchy treat, flavoured with finger root ginger and basil.
Kochi/ Kerala, 24/06/19:" Burmese knalik swe" Little Soi Restaurant. Photo:H.Vibhu/The Hindu.
The main course menu has rice (fried rice, nasi goreng, coconut rice); noodles (pho, khow suey, laksa, char kuay teow). But the star of the meal, for us, is without doubt khow suey (khao soi), a Burmese one-dish soup meal, as much for its flavours as for the drama of assembling it.
The eggs noodles arrive, with two halves of a boiled egg, accompanied by a large platter at the centre of which sits a bowl of flavoured and spiced coconut milk. This is surrounded by the condiments: tofu, chilli flakes, crushed peanuts, fired shallots, crushed and fried garlic, and zucchini.
Pour the coconut milk on the noodles, sprinkle the condiments and it is ready.Every spoon is a mix of varying textures and flavours. Then there is Burmese chilli lamb, which looks ‘Chinese’ but the hint of cumin proves otherwise.
There are a few dessert options such as pisang goreng, coconut pannacotta, jellied water chestnut, and fudge brownie. Dessert, for us, is Little Soi Sphere and lemon grass and coconut panacotta. The panacotta, with a hint of lemongrass, is a good way to wrap up a meal.
(A meal for two costs ₹1500)
