Zaap by Chang Thai Lao Restaurant — Restaurant in Sydney

Zaap by Chang wasn’t my first foray into Lao or Isan cuisine, so I knew to order Lao sausage ($15) and to avoid asking for extra heat. Dishes from Laos and Thailand’s northeastern corner tend toward being both fiery and sour. The Lao sausage proved a good exemplar with thick slices of fatty pork sausage seasoned with minced markut, lemongrass, garlic, galangal, chillies and shallots padded out with sticky rice and fish sauce. My other Laotian go-to is a crispy rice salad called nam khao ($20). I found the version here a little flat and one-note, lacking the textural interest you usually get from clumps of deep-fried seasoned rice and the sourness from fermented som moo sausage. We ate ours over slices of Lao sausage in lettuce wraps with bottles of Beer Lao ($9), the country’s best-selling beer brand.

Green papaya salad is common to both Lao and Isan cuisines but originated in Laos. The Laotian version is called tham mak hoong but is listed on the menu here as som tum Luang Prabang ($15). Thai som tum tends toward being sweet, sour, spicy and salty from the use of fish sauce. Lao tam mak hoong is spicy and salty with more intense funkiness from fermented fish sauce (padaek) and pickled crab; it’s also much wetter. Both dishes usually contain green papaya, green beans, and cherry tomatoes. The Lao version is more of an acquired taste, and here it also lacked visual appeal. One byte prawn Zaap ($9/2) were better presented but lacked the palate burst you’d expect from prawns dressed in herbs, chilli and lime wrapped in betel leaves. The heavily designed menu and on-table marketing collateral all look like they have been set up for franchising, so perhaps the differences are deliberate: dumbing down normally zingy dishes for wide scale appeal. It didn’t seem to impact the restaurant’s popularity with groups of young people. The open plan, nicely decorated second floor space was rammed with big groups though perhaps they were attracted by the very...

We had lunch at this recently opened Thai Lao restaurant in Cabramatta shopping center. We ordered pad ko rat (cousin to famous pad thai) stir fry noodle, esan set (grilled chicken kai yang and sticky rice), Thai salad with grilled pork jowl (yum moo yang) and Thai fried fish cakes (tod man pla). We like all dishes, but especially love the stir fry noodles and fried fish cakes dishes. The pad ko rat is similar to pad thai but with additional fermented bean sauce adding its complex taste. The fish cakes are great with the special pickles sauce. However, we were a bit disappointed with the Thai salad and noodles dishes because we expected them to have spicier punch from Thai chilly, especially after we asked the waiter for spiciest version shown on the menu (three chillies picture).

On our second lunch visit, we ordered stir-fried crispy pork with holy basil + rice (pad ka pao moo grob with extra kai dow), rice with five spices pork knuckle (pad khao kha moo) and prawn tom yam goong soup. For dessert, we tried their special bua loy sweet dish. We love all dishes especially the tom yam soup and the sweet and fragrant bua loy. All are authentic Thai dishes and you can ask what level of spiciness you like. We ordered most on very spicy level and we got almost all of our orders in the right spiciness level.

The place ambience is good and bright. The place is also quite spacious so it won't feel too crowded / noisy which is a good thing in Cabramatta. Customer services from floor staff are reasonable for a new restaurant in suburb like Cabramatta. Prices on the menu are competitive and they're offering 10% discount for soft opening period up to mid June 2022. However, please note that they only accept cash payment right now and I'm unsure whether they will provide other payment options...

Tried out Zaap Thai after word of mouth, lunch special does not include the most popular dishes however for only $2 more you can order this so wasn't a big deal. Place was spaces and clean, the guy waiter attended to us as soon as he seen us all sat down however didn't know too much on what was on the menu for lunch specials, took our order after confirming a few things! Place wasn't that busy as it was after 230pm however our order took almost 20mins which was not satisfactory as the lunch time rush was well and truly over, I guess the reason it took so long after looking at the kitchen we saw one of the cooks chatting away with the female waitress laughing and carrying on, not a good look when your kitchen is clearly visible to customers! Food finally arrived however didn't come all at once, the female waitress after talking with the young cook finally got around to bringing us one dish not sure why she didn't bring 2 at once when it was ready to be served guess she cannot carry more than 1 thing at a time which is bizarre as she is a waitress and this is their forte, luckier for us an older male I assume was the manager/owner decided to bring it to us YAY! Food was nice however a little sweet and definitely not the best in the area and not the worst either but a solid 3.5 out of 5. Apart from the slow cooking time and slow waitress food was ok. Should try out for yourselves, here's hoping the waitress and the young cook realize they're not alone and are in fact there to work so you do not get the slow meal served...