Among the theatre crowds and packed dining rooms of Covent Garden, Plaza Khao Gaeng offers something far more transportive than the average pre-show dinner spot. Part of the Chaiyo restaurant group founded by chef and restaurateur Luke Farrell, the restaurant is rooted in nearly two decades of Farrell’s life in Thailand, recreating the flavours, atmosphere and regional cooking he fell in love with while living there.
Following the success of Plaza Khao Gaeng’s original Tottenham Court Road site and sister restaurant Speedboat Bar, the Covent Garden outpost continues the group’s uncompromising approach to Thai cuisine. Many of the herbs, chillies and specialist ingredients used across the menu are even grown by Farrell himself at Ryewater Nursery in Dorset, where he has created a jungle-like microclimate to cultivate everything from Thai limes to green papaya. It’s the sort of detail that explains why the food tastes so distinctively alive with heat, citrus and aromatics.
The menu focuses heavily on southern Thai cooking, with dishes designed for sharing across the table. Snacks include fried chicken with crispy shallots and sweet chilli sauce, skewers glazed in southern red curry and turmeric, and jungle herb fritters served with peanut dressing. Salads move well beyond the usual papaya offering too, featuring combinations such as fried sea bream with fermented budu fish sauce and shaved lemongrass, or prawn and pork mince with fern shoots and coconut.
Curries are a particular highlight. The beef massaman arrives rich with slow-cooked beef shoulder, potatoes and shallots, while the green curry with chicken, palm heart and pea aubergine delivers layers of sweetness and spice. Elsewhere, there are stir-fried dishes such as dry wok-fried pork with wild galangal and long pepper, plus vermicelli noodles with prawns, coconut and chives.
And, especially for groups, the Plaza Talung sharing menu, which is available only at the Covent Garden site, also offers a deeper dive into the cooking of Thailand’s southern borderlands which sounds really exciting.