AT KHUA LEK Cafe & Restaurant — Restaurant in Chiang Mai Province

The food at Culek is mediocre, but it’s lovely to sit on the patio next to the river and so I often eat there. I had an unpleasant experience today, which is probably not unique to this restaurant, because similar things have happened at other Thai restaurants in Chiang Mai.

I ordered from the menu based on a photograph of the grilled salmon salad, which showed a bed of greens with 3 half fillets of salmon coupled with about a half a dozen pieces of egg omelette. The price was 229 baht.

When I placed my order, the waitress advised me that the egg component was not available, it would just be the salmon. I asked if there would be a reduction in the price as a result. The waitress told me the price would be the same but the salmon component would be larger, which was fine with me.

However, when my salad came, they were only 2 half fillets of salmon on the bed of greens, and of course none of the eggs. Yet the price was exactly the same on my bill.

In other words, the salad depicted on the menu came without the eggs and without 33% of the salmon, yet I was charged 100% of the price. It’s not fair to blame the waitress for what I got, but she should not have advised me that the missing eggs would’ve been made up for with extra salmon. That simply was not the case. But shame on Kualek for adopting this practice that unfairly increased its profits at the expense of...

We are on a 5 week food safari of Chiangmai and Surat Thani, seeking out authentic local food that we can't get at home in Australia.

Khualek is a pretty restaurant with glorious sunset views of the city. It was full when we arrived, so it is popular with tourists. There were no locals there. The staff are attentive and helpful. The menu is extensive.

Unfortunately you can only buy whiskey, limited brands of beer, vodka buckets or fruit juice. The place would make a killing on cocktails. Perfect spot for a sunset mai tai.

During our first visit here last week had a few issues, but we decided to give them a second chance.

We started with the crab head fat with sticky rice, and that has very interesting flavour and texture.

The gaeng hung le moo was delicious. The sauce was very rich and flavoursome, with ginger and pepper coming through without overpowering the dish. We needed more sticky rice!

We also had the deep fried tilapia with crispy lemongrass ginger and basil leaves. It was easily 10/10. They should never change anything with this recipe - it was spot on, and the hero of the whole menu in our view.

Khualek is not crazy expensive, If we hadn't had the issues last week, it would have scored 5/5. We are glad we went back.

We'll be back again...

The ambience at Khua Lek restaurant is definitely 5 star, 🏆 it’s a lovely location on the Ping river east bank. Dining here during sunset is very romantic 👌🏻

They play low chilled piano jazz music which is perfect. They have live music as well in the evening.🎹

I read in one of the reviews that it was expensive which is absurd it’s VERY cheap dining here: seafood with rice is only 4 USD it’s not the biggest portions but at that price anyone can afford Appetizer and desert or even 2 portions.

I also had a portion of spaghetti with chicken bolognaise- which was a bit disappointing (2 or max 3) But the seafood n rice was good a 4. I guess they better stick with Thai food.

It was mostly a local guest that were dining here and a few tourists.

I’ll be back for more sunset...