When it comes to Thai cuisine in a fine-dining setting, not many come close to Benjarong at the Dusit Thani Makati. It has been a favorite of my sons for decades now, and it’s reincarnation on the Dusit’s ground floor has not diminished the high quality of the food, and the impeccable service that Benjarong has always represented. 

The very latest of Benjarong’s special food offerings is called the Benjarong Experience: A Curated Tasting Menu Vol. II, and it’s done in partnership with Moët & Chandon. What Chef Cha Yongbanthom has come up with is an eight-course tasting menu that’s high on culture, authenticity, and creativity. And there are options to do either champagne pairing or wine pairing with your delectable eight-course feast for the senses.
Pre-pandemic, Issa and I would frequent Bangkok, and a perennial element of our itinerary would be dining at Thai restaurants such as Paste and Issaya Siamese Club. This tasting menu of Chef Cha, a winner of Iron Chef Thailand in 2014, is undoubtedly the closest one can get to experiencing Bangkok gastronomy here in Manila. It is not to be missed if you love food and Thai cuisine.

The first course is a pha pla, tuna salad with ginger, lime and herbs, encased in a cone, and served with edible flowers and set in a coconut tuile, flavored with tumeric. The tuile is excellent, adding a bevy of textures and surprising flavors to the dish. A truly great way to start off this culinary adventure.

Sai oua is northern Thai sausage, served with crispy pork skin, sticky rice infused with coconut milk and fried to resemble "tutong," and accompanied by a green finger chili sauce. Again, the play of textures is enthralling.
The larb ped is a duo of spicy duck salad that’s complemented by a watermelon sherbet and topped with dried fish flakes. Reminiscent of the bonito flakes we get in Japanese dishes, you’ll love the sublime interplay of hot and cold as this combination assaults your senses of touch, sight, and smell in a good way. This was one of my absolute favorites, and I would head back just to have this again.

A tom yum pu ma prao on is the soup course that has crab and shrimp and a plethora of herbs that turn this into one of the healthiest of broths you could concoct. This one has the proverbial "guhit" as you sip the soup, leaving a lasting impression. A tom yum that’s been elevated.

The panaeng see krong kee is a lamb cutlet with splattered red curry sauce lying on a bed of rice noodles. This one is imaginative beyond compare, as the rice noodles takes the place of the rice one would normally expect. The red curry sauce is stupendous and I agreed with Issa who commented that she would come back and make this her main course, as the one chop, just wasn’t enough. 

The khao phad tom yum came as the main course of the dinner. It’s a prawn with chili paste, accompanied by tom yum-infused fried rice. Believe me, the fried rice alone was worth the price of admission. The chili paste is underneath the prawn, so be sure not to miss on it, as it added so much taste to the prawn, and took away any possible comment about dryness.

Two desserts complete the meal. First, there’s a coconut dumpling, the ka nom iom, and if there’s one dish here that tasted almost Filipino, it would be this ‘sweet ending’. But wait, as there’s also an I-tim ma muang, Chef Cha’s ultimate dessert. It’s specially made Mango ice cream encased in a chocolate shell that’s colored to resemble a mango fruit. Coconut nitrogen, edible flowers, coconut shavings and a rice cracker surround the ‘mango’, so that once again, a subtle play of textures is created!
Issa was enjoying the champagne pairings, which unfortunately, I abstained from. For me, the subtlety and delicacy of the tastes, flavors, and textures were already enough to categorize this as one of the more exciting and impressive dining I’ve experienced this year. Chef Cha and Benjarong have hit the culinary jackpot with this tasting menu.

For reservations at Benjarong, Dusit Manila, call 7238-8888. Trust me, this is a Thai gastronomic dream come true.