The Nava Thai restaurant is somewhere I've been dining at regularly for over 15 years now, and I can honesty say I've never had a bad meal there. If you're a fan of Thai cuisine, you've come to the right place, as they really do serve a rather splendid lunch or dinner.
The set up is a ... Read review
Advantages: Delicious Thai cuisine and traditional village pub all rolled into one Disadvantages: Portions rather on the small side. Quite expensive.
The Nava Thai restaurant is somewhere I've been dining at regularly for over 15 years now, and I can honesty say I've never had a bad meal there. If you're a fan of Thai cuisine, you've come to the right place, as they really do serve a rather splendid lunch or dinner.
The set up is a little odd, as the Nava Thai restaurant is actually situated within the public house of a very small village called Stedham, about two miles out of ... ...
==THE NAVA THAI RESTAURANT==
The Nava Thai serves a superb menu of more than 80 authentic Thai dishes - all served by Thai waiting staff dressed in traditional Thai costumes. The menu consists of a goodly range of soups, curries, salads, meat, seafood and vegetarian dishes (also available to takeaway should you so wish).
The emphasis is on traditional Thai food at the Nava Thai. The owner, Mudita Karnasuta wants ... more
The Nava Thai restaurant is somewhere I've been dining at regularly for over 15 years now, and I can honesty say I've never had a bad meal there. If you're a fan of Thai cuisine, you've come to the right place, as they really do serve a rather splendid lunch or dinner.
The set up is a little odd, as the Nava Thai restaurant is actually situated within the public house of a very small village called Stedham, about two miles out of Midhurst in West Sussex. The pub, called The Hamilton Arms, is tucked away from the main roads, down a quiet country lane, and it's certainly not somewhere you'd come across by chance - you really need to have heard about it, and make a special trip there. Word of mouth has certainly done its work, as despite being so tucked away, it's a very popular pub, and the restaurant within it does a roaring trade all year round.
THE HAMILTON ARMS
From the outside, The Hamilton Arms looks like your typical English pub. It's got white walls and a lovely terraced area festooned with brollies and hanging baskets. However, inside the pub tells a very different story. The place is full of intricate wooden carvings and panels, elephants and other exotic creatures. There are lots of Thai handicrafts and a stall selling Thai delicacies (so you can stock up on special ingredients and cook your own Thai food at home). I suspect the locals were more than a little alarmed when the proprietor, Mudita Karnasuta, took over the pub, fearing it would change beyond all recognition. They need not have worried as they still serve the usual range of pub beverages, including a good selection of real ales, and you can also buy Thai beer as well. It's the same story with the food, there's the usual range of traditional bar snacks, but there are plenty of Thai dishes to choose from as well. The knit between traditional English pub and oriental influenced cuisine works surprisingly well, and a taste of the exotic in the sleepy village of Stedham seems to have gone down a treat.
THE NAVA THAI RESTAURANT
The Nava Thai serves a superb menu of more than 80 authentic Thai dishes - all served by Thai waiting staff dressed in traditional Thai costumes. The menu consists of a goodly range of soups, curries, salads, meat, seafood and vegetarian dishes (also available to takeaway should you so wish).
The emphasis is on traditional Thai food at the Nava Thai. The owner, Mudita Karnasuta wants to ensure that all dishes served in her restaurant are as authentic as possible, so many traditional Thai ingredients and recipes are used. Evidently some British served Thai food leans towards dishes from China or South-east Asian, and cannot really be described as genuine Thai. Mudita is a founder member of the Thai Restaurant Association, which promotes authentic Thai food in Britain. She also teaches Thai cooking and has even produced a video called Simply Thai.
As a side note, the pub is also the base for a charitable trust called The Mudita Trust, which helps prevent child prostitution and abuse in Thailand. Ten percent of all the pub profits are sent back to Thailand, so eating there is also doing your bit for charity too.
THAI FOOD
Thai food has become increasingly popular in the West in recent years. For those of you unfamiliar with Thai cookery, let me briefly explain what you can expect on a typical Thai menu cuisine. Although Thai cookery is renowned for being spicy, it is balanced by five pillars of flavour - hot (spicy), sweet, sour, salty and bitter. All Thai dishes have two or more of these "pillars" as this is seen as the key to a good balanced meal. Thai food is also renowned for its enthusiastic use of fresh herbs and spices, as well as fish sauce - Nam Pla, which smells truly disgusting, but it really does add flavour to almost any dish. Thai food is often served with a variety of condiments to liven up their dishes, such as rice vinegar, sweet chili sauce, soy sauce or dried chili pieces. One of the most popular ingredients is Nam Prik (no sniggering at the back please...), a spicy chili based paste or sauce.
Thai cuisine is also affected by regional influences with southern dishes leaning towards the use of coconut milk and northern dishes using a lot of lime juice. And of course, Thai cuisine has been hugely influenced by its surrounding neighbours, especially India and China. In fact, I'd describe Thai cuisine has having the subtly of spiciness that some Indian dishes lack, but avoiding the super sweetness that some Chinese dishes lean towards. In other words, Thai food is spicy, but not in the mind blowing way you experience from your Indian vindaloos or madras dishes. Similarly, Thai dishes avoid the wincingly sweet, glutinous, day-glow coloured sauces you get in anglicized Chinese dishes, such as sweet and sour pork et al. Thai cuisine is subtle but never boring - the chilis and fresh herbs they scatter copiously all over their dishes see to that!
THE MENU
The full menu at the Nava Thai Restaurant consists of around 80 dishes. There are your instantly recognizable Thai classics such as satay/sateh, dim sum, curries, stir fries and noodles, with lots of unusual surprises dotted about. For example, you have Khai Luk Kuey (roughly translated as "son-in-law" eggs" deep-fried eggs and topped with gravy and crispy shallots) or Ped Yang (roast duck with a special sauce, pickle, ginger and cucumber) or Gam Pu Tod (fried crab claws in batter served with sweet chili sauce). My favourite part of the menu is the starters. I can never make my mind up quickly here, and if there is a mixed plate of several dishes on offer, I always plump for that. There is a choice of ten starters ranging from fishcakes, spare ribs, satay, dim sum, stuffed chicken wings, crispy wontons, spring rolls or squid rings. I've tried most of them at some stage or another, and they are all simply delicious. They usually come garnished with intricately cut salad garnishes (a hand carved carrot in the shape of a flower), and with tiny delicate saucers of dips such as sweet chili sauce or vinegared cucumber.
If you prefer a soup for your starter, you won't go far wrong with a Poh-taek or a Tom Yum Goong. Poh-taek is a seafarer's soup served in a fired pot to keep it piping hot. Consisting of a creamy coloured liquid brimming with prawns, fish, squid and crab claws, it's simply delicious. It's also extremely spicy (and always make my eyes run a little bit), but the subtle flavours of seafood, coriander and mushrooms aren't overwhelmed by the spiciness. Tom Yum Goong is a clear hot and sour flavoured soup, fragranced with lemon grass, galangal, kraffir lime leaves and shallots. The flavour is intensified by fresh lime juice, Thai fish sauce and crushed chillis. Another variety of Tom Yum Goong is Tom Yum Goong Nam Khon when coconut milk is added to the soup.
Moving onto the main courses, you'll be simply spoiled for choice. The menu is divided into Thai curries, chicken, pork, beef, duck and seafood dishes. There are also a selection of egg dishes, and salads as well as noodle and rice dishes. If you're new to Thai cuisine, I recommend you start off with a coconut based Thai curry served with rice or noodles. Gaeng Ped Gai is chicken cooked with red chili paste, bamboo shoot and coconut milk, and it's described as medium hot. If you feel more adventurous, you can choose the Gaeng Kaew Wan Gai, which is basically the same dish but served with young green chili paste (instead of red chili paste), and is slightly hotter. I'm a bit of a wuss when it comes to overly spicy food, so I tend to stick to coconut milk based dishes, so some of the fire is doused out of them.
Rice is a staple of Thai cuisine, as with most Asian countries. Here you get to choose from sweet-smelling jasmine or coconut rice, or simpler, plain steamed rice or noodles (ideal for more highly aromatic dishes). Or you can have sticky rice (Khao Neow), a unique variety of rice that contains an unusual balance of the starches present in all rice, which causes it to cook into a sticky texture.
I'm not going to run through the entire menu here, as the full menu is available on their website if you'd like to take a more thorough look. It is worth noting that vegetarians are well catered for at the Nava Thai with a separate menu consisting of 20 or so dishes.
SERVICE and AMBIANCE
The service is always very good in both the pub and the restaurant. The staff in the restaurant dress in authentic Thai costumes which really adds to the ambiance of the place. The service is friendly, yet unobtrusive and the staff glide quietly about the place, so you hardly know they're there. The décor is very much in keeping with the oriental theme with lots of delicate wood carvings and statues dotted about the room.
WHAT'S NOT SO GOOD?
The main drawback to the Nava Thai is the prices. It is quite expensive to dine there. Starters cost around £5.00 each, and the soups are no cheaper. Main courses are priced from £6.00 to £9.00 per dish. Added to which, the portions at the Nava Thai are always on the delicate side. You won't get a huge plateful of meat or fish here. The emphasis is on appreciating the subtle flavours and nuances of the dish rather than on having a huge blow out. My partner has often left the Nava Thai feeling a tad peckish. That's not to say he hasn't enjoyed his meal, because he has. It's just that the portions are always rather on the small side, beautifully presented, but small. If you're looking for mountainous portions, you're in the wrong place!
CONCLUSION
I've dined at the Nava Thai more times than I can remember, and I keep going back for more. We've celebrated birthdays, anniversaries and just plain wanting-to-eat-out-evenings there many a time. We've never yet had a bad meal, and always have an enjoyable experience. The food is always authentic, unusual and delicious. The service always friendly subtle and unobtrusive. If they loose a star from me, it's because of their small portions and high prices. It's not cheap to dine there, and the portions are sometimes a little on the inadequate side. However, if you're after trying authentic Thai cuisine in pleasant surroundings, you're certainly in the right place.
Recommended.
OPENING HOURS AND FURTHER DETAILS
Lunch - 12.00pm to 2.30pm (last orders) Evenings (except Sundays) - 6.00pm to 10.30pm (last orders) Sunday Evenings - 7.00pm to 9.30pm (last orders)This pub is popular and it is advisable to book if you wish to dine in the Nava Thai. Parking is plentiful and easy to find. There is a good sized garden to the rear with a children's play area. There is also a paved terrace to the front of the pub with plenty of tables under umbrellas. Dogs are welcomed in the pub (but not in the restaurant). In case you are worried about not liking any of the food and drink - they serve a full range of traditional pub grub, as well as all the spicy stuff. Drinkswise, it's just like a normal pub, with a full range of spirits on optics and beers and lagers on pumps. If you're a Real Ale enthusiast, they serve London Pride, King & Barnes, Ballard's Best, Fuller's, Everards Tiger Best, Fuller's HSB, and Wadworth 6X all of which mean nothing to me, but might to you if you're that way inclined..... Oh and they accept all the major credit cards too when you come to pay for your meal.
CONTACT DETAILS
Hamilton Arms / Nava Thai Restaurant School Lane Stedham Midhurst West Sussex GU29 0NZ
If you like the sound of the Nava Thai Restaurant and want to give them a try, not only can you print off a 10% discount voucher from their website (http://www.thehamiltonarms.co.uk), they often take part in The Times "Dine with Wine" or "Eat out for a Tenner" promotions. Keep an eye out.
Advantages: Interesting architecture and buildings. Fascinating history. Pleasant surrounding countryside. Disadvantages: Heavy traffic through the town in summer months. Can be hard to park.
, is also worth a mention (and a separate review at http://travel.ciao.co.uk/NavaThaiRestaurantStedhamWestSussexReview5819819). This is a rather superb Thairestaurant in a lovely country setting, and well worth a visit.
NEARBY
The closest place of interest to Midhurst is the small town of Petworth, home of Petworth House and Park (a delightful place to visit - the grounds are simply superb with many free-roaming deer and a stunning lake). Petworth is also a haven for antique shops, and it?s a great place to spend a few hours. You could easily spend an afternoon in Petworth if you?ve been in Midhurst all morning.
If horse or motor racing is more your thing, then you?ll find Glorious Goodwood about 8 miles away. Goodwood is home to a world famous racecourse (set high on the South Downs) as well as ...
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