Catriona C.
Yelp
Hmm, I'm lost to understand the high praise for Dusit, as it left me feeling very much wanting, and I was so disappointed in that. For what was delivered, it was overpriced and varying in quality. The place was absolutely heaving (Friday night and we hadn't booked anywhere), but we were kindly shown to a table so long as we vacated by 9pm. No problem, and we were happy that we were accommodated.
The restaurant, hot damn, I have never been in a place so noisy that I can't hear myself talk. It was full to the brim and just seemed that the acoustics were nicely setup to cause a constant sound of bedlam. I literally couldn't hear half of what the SR was saying, and we lapsed into silence for most of the meal. It felt rushed, with someone coming past our table every few minutes, asking us for an order, or delivering up food. For drinks, I had a very average Merlot (only two reds for sale by the glass, so options limited), and the boy knocked back a couple of lemonades.
The boy and I shared fish cakes and popia. The popia were nicely stuffed, more filling than batter, and the fish cakes were pleasant. We followed this up with duck with choo chi and pad prig ti dumm (monkfish, king prawns and scallops). I had thrown caution to the wind and gone for one of the pricier options on the menu, but the lightly spiced monkfish sounded too delicious.
And this was where the problem was, it wasn't delicious. It was nice. It wasn't spicy - flavoursome and nicely cooked (scallops were pretty close to tender), yes, but not spicy and the flavours, well, they just weren't very elegant or interesting. The SR seemed to enjoy his duck, but in the same, deflated, 'oh, is that it?' kind of way. My dish also had some random squid that I didn't really want in there as well. We had ordered some pad mee on the side - which had the consistency of super noodles - and some roti. The more I ate, the more I realised I didn't want to. When the waiter came round to start emptying our table i.e. push all the remaining noodles onto our plates - I said no. I also don't like having someone else serving food onto my plate. So instead, all the food was heaped onto the SR's plate. It didn't exactly give me the option to return for more noodles later.
Overall, it felt rushed and we didn't really enjoy our meals. To be honest, it overall came out as feeling all very average. Average food, average wine. Service - too hassled and rushed - by the time the main course arrived my stomach was in knots and I was feeling pretty anxious - not relaxed at all. Surroundings are way way way too noisy - need to seriously dampen acoustics in there - and price was seriously excessive of quality. In all honesty, I think this is the first Thai restaurant I've visited where I've been disappointed, and that's a shame - I can't think of a point where Dusit really scored well, bar some well cooked scallops and that really isn't enough to inspire me to return.