Thomas's Monday Morning Poetry

A while ago I penned a scathing critique of a newly opened restaurant in Port Elizabeth with a fishy theme combined with distinctly fishy service, style and taste (it was definitely not Ocean Basket, in case anyone was wondering).

So, I take great pleasure in describing the restaurant that a few friends and I frequented on Saturday night!

We booked a table at Natty’s Thai Kitchen for 8 0 clock on Saturday night. From what I had heard from others, I was ready to experience something akin to a culinary orgasm.

In case you missed the little hint in the title of the restaurant, Natty’s specializes in Thai cuisine. It is situated next to Decadence, just off Park Lane, Port Elizabeth.

Natty’s is not a fancy restaurant: you do not find white table cloths on the tables, or menus bound in leather. You get plain pine tables (I think it was pine- maybe the red wine was getting to me) and a menu written in chalk, on a blackboard, on the wall. There is a picture on the wall of a guy surfing. If you smoke, you smoke outside. The restaurant is ideal for a good chat with your friends: seriously relaxed atmosphere. Did I mention that they don’t serve alcohol? You bring your own. So, if you take a bottle of red wine and you are having so much fun with your friends that you run out before the main course has arrived, you’re in trouble.

And now for the fun part: the food! Everyone’s idea of Thai food is the Thai Green Curry Idea. With so many dishes that I had never heard of on the board, I asked Mark, the main dude, for some advice. He suggested a variety of starters for the whole group. Good idea. Tasty, very tasty. I can’t begin to describe every exquisite taste, suffice to say that we were well prepped for the main course.

I asked Mark whether we could sample the Red Curry. I had heard that it was seriously hot. He gladly agreed. Crisis. Your initial impression is that it’s not that hot. From then on it steadily gets hotter. You think the fire in your mouth will die but it intensifies. One friend called for ice to rub onto his inferno-like lips.

So, how was the main course?

I ordered the beef, stir fried with vegetables, flavoured with ginger and served with noodles. I can’t remember what everyone else ate. I was mesmerized by my meal. I have eaten in many restaurants in many parts of the world and I have never experienced such an exquisitely delicate taste.

Mark, the host, is one relaxed guy. Very chilled. I did not have the pleasure of meeting his lady. I shall be back though, and I shall thank her for her exquisite fare ( I’ve used the word exquisite a lot).

Last but not least: this is not one of those promotional scripts that go ‘and the fillet mignon taste fantastic with the Nederburg Lyric’ with a cheesy photograph of the scribe clutching a glass of the offending liquid, a hot waitress and whatever was being eaten, neatly manicured and gathered with gorgonzola grins and empty eyes.

And now for a little bit of Chinese philosophy, curtesy of the Tao Te Ching:

The Way is like an empty vessel
That yet may be drawn from
Without ever needing to be filled.
It is bottomless; the very progenitor of all things in
The world.
In it all sharpness is blunted,
All tangles untied,
All glare tempered,
All dust smoothed.
It is like a deep pool that never dries.
Was it too the child of something else?
We cannot tell.
But as substanceless image it existed be before the
Ancestor.

Way heavy man.

Tootle pip.
Thomas


I've got to say I totally agree with Thomas on Natty's in Port Elizabeth. My 'adopted' parents (Rob&Sheila) took me there, the first time i met them. It was still in the road parallel to Parliament Street then. I have taken people there a few times since and perhaps TAO is the best way of describing it. Simple and incredibly soulful not to mention the 'exquisite' food. Good job Tom!
Love from The Wandering One x