YOU should get in the queue early at the newly opened Khao Man Gai, a Thai restaurant in Ara Damansara, Petaling Jaya.

Our two friends did just that for us, ordering the dishes at the counter and paying for them first, like in a cafe.

It’s a restaurant with no fancy décor. The food came fast: lava rice with basil chicken, lava rice with seafood, Thai chicken feet salad, steamed chicken rice, fried chicken rice, Thai mango sticky rice and the drinks.

We asked for plates to share the food, and five tiny metal plates landed. I haven’t had a Thai chicken feet salad in ages, and here it was a generous portion of chicken feet skin buried under lots of Chinese celery, onions, chilli, serai, all tossed in a sour, sweet, spicy dressing.

I was surprised as it was not as chilli hot as I had expected. The down side of this was the chicken feet skin always came attached to a bone. Still, it was a good, perky Thai salad.

In the lava egg rice with basil chicken, the white rice was drowned in an eggy sauce, with the addition of a runny fried egg, then completely covered with fried minced chicken with Thai basil and some long beans.  It was hearty comfort food, with lots of flavour.

I preferred this to the lava egg rice with seafood. This too had the rice generously covered with an egg sauce cooked with squid and prawns. I thought it had less flavour than the basil chicken one.

I had the best Thai chicken rice here. I loved the rice, so fragrant and cooked perfectly, each long grain separated from the other.

The rice was flavoured so well that you could even eat it on its own without the chicken. The chicken was done well too, the upper thigh part I had was smooth and juicy.

The fried chicken rice was delicious too: the chicken had a crispy, crumbly skin and the meat tasted good, even the breast part.

I wished we had a bigger portion of mango sticky rice. I couldn’t believe it came in a box with a tiny portion of sticky rice, cubes of mango and a tub of santan.

The sticky rice was fabulous: transparent grains (I love my rice, sticky or not). But I wished they had used a different kind of mango. We thought it was a little unripe though it was sweet.

All in all, we paid just RM109.30 for lunch for the five of us. The chicken rice is RM10.90 for both steamed chicken and fried, lava egg rice is RN11.90 for basil chicken and 17.90 for seafood, mango sticky rice is RM9.90, Thai milk tea and coffee is RM7.90 each and RM4.50 for the pandan and lemongrass drinks.

The restaurant is pork-free.

Khao Man Gai is at 23, Jalan PJU 1a/3j, Ara Damansara, Petaling Jaya. It opens from 11am to 3.30pm. It’s closed on Sunday. – April 13, 2024.

* Eu Hooi-Khaw has been writing about food for the longest time, covering all aspects, from restaurant reviews to cooking and recipes, as well as the healthy side of it. She has written for major newspapers and magazines, published the cookbook Fresh Ingredients, and also writes for her website hooikhawandsu.com.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.