Restaurant review: Green Mango

Category: Classic Contemporary
We always seem to come here during a downpour. Plus the open kitchen allows you get to see him and his team showing off their skills.

It’s a menu that marries sushi with Thai, and it works well. The sushi selection is extensive. There’s sashimi and nigiri that includes sea eel, salmon roe and octopus along with the more conventional tuna and salmon.

 

There’s maki, temaki and the proverbial California rolls, but some chef’s specials do add interest. Salmon sushi sandwiches were flying out of the kitchen, while salmon roses and even a Thai-style sushi are worth trying. There are a variety of platters that take in all options, depending on appetite and budget.

With Durban’s heavy rain and unseasonal chill, we leaned heavily towards the Thai menu. To me, sushi is for lunch-time or after-work drinks.

It’s a simple menu, livened up with regular specials which included honeyroasted duck and a whole deep-fried snapper. I’d had the duck previously and enjoyed it. The snapper sounded just right, but as it weighed in at 450g, it needed to be shared around the table. Unfortunately my fellow diners were wimps who couldn’t deal with fish eyes… Next time I’ll pick more adventurous companions.

The clear chicken and vegetable soup starter was good, if a shade bland for me, but the Bird Lady loved it. She wanted the recipe. McDonald’s spicy beef soup had oodles of flavour. I opted for a starter platter. The satay was succulent, with a good spicy peanut sauce, the Thai spring rolls and chicken wontons crisp, and the only real complaint of the night, was that the Thai sweet and sour chilli calamari had a slight taste of the fridge about it.

The curries come in a choice of mild, medium or hot: and you can have them green or red. The green chicken curry, for many the benchmark of a good Thai restaurant, gets the thumbs up, as did my red prawn curry. Rich, with all the right spicy notes, the prawns were plump and juicy and generous. And because it was medium, the chilli was well and truly present, but didn’t blow your head off. To complete the picture is a choice of stir-fries from the wok, or fried rice or noodles.

There is something about Thai establishments and dessert that doesn’t marry. And this was no exception. The only dessert that’s original, in the sense that it’s made in the kitchen, was a deep-fried banana spring roll. And my choice of mango sorbet was not available. Otherwise it was ice-cream and chocolate sauce, Italian kisses (why I ask, when even the Italians find them passé), or deep-fried ice-cream. This is rolled in coconut and dipped in batter before hitting the fryer. It makes for a rich dessert, but the fast melting ice-cream makes the batter soggy pretty quickly.

The winelist is fairly simple, but at least the mark ups are reasonable. There’s little that’s flash here with eight whites and six reds taking in the likes of the Two Oceans and Durbanville Hills ranges. Rhinofields Merlot tops the tables at R170. While the dry whites may work well with the sushi selection, a larger range of Chenin and Riesling may complement the spicier Thai menu.

Average price of a three-course meal, without wine: sushi R50 to R160, Thai R110.

By Frank Chemaly
Address: Avonmore Centre, 9th Avenue, Morningside, Durban
Tel: 031 312-7054