Banana Tree

I tend to have lunch each week with a friend. It breaks up the working day and I have a theory it makes you much more efficient. So a friend had suggested Banana Tree on Wardour St. I don't think this branch opened up that long ago and you could tell.
It purports to be a restaurant offering 'an authentic selection of dishes and specialities from the Indochina region'. The menu is enticing with a variety of interesting and alluring options including noodle soups, curries, grilled meats and special regional delights. With the curries there is the choice of upgrading it to have a supplement of a sesame glass noodle salad, sweetcorn fritters, prawn crackers and rice.


The first time I went we tried the spring rolls and a sauteed lamb with cashews upgraded with all the extras and a chicken in a lemongrass and coriander sauce. The spring rolls were okay - nothing to rave about nor complain about either. The chicken and lamb were both quite nice and tasty but the things in the 'supplement special' weren't that impressive - the sweetcorn cakes were a little too greasy, whilst the glass noodle salad had no noodles in it whatsoever. We were assured that it was simply in the name and just made with vegetables, but the next time it definitely did have noodles! It hate it when I'm lied to and somewhere can't just say sorry that they'd made a mistake!

Then the second time I went back, I got a pork belly plus all the indochina trimmings, and my friend a spicy tamarind aubergine dish, being one of the few vegetarian options without tofu or something fake. Neither of us were convinced about the mock duck as an option! The pork belly smelt wonderful but the fat on top wasn't at all crispy, perhaps my mistake, but that's what you'd expect - who wants to eat a great big lump of fat? The sauce was rich and packed full of flavour, but the meat itself could have been more tender, having been cooked for 4 hours it seemed a tad too chewy for my liking.



The other strange things about the place, were that staff kept on trying to clear away dishes whilst I was still in the middle of eating and only give you a fork and spoon to eat every dish with. Fine if you're having soup but not so great for pork belly...

I wouldn't go back in a hurry but I would visit again out of convenience. Just don't have high expectations. There are branches across town including Battersea, Clapham, Angel, Bayswater, West Hampstead & Soho.

http://bananatree.co.uk/

www.trisori.com