Chao Lay

I remember I couldn't get in "Chao Lay" seafood restaurant during my last trip to Huahin with my sister, it was jammed at 7pm and my sister and I went back the next day to secure a seat at 5:30pm, it was jammed pack on a friday night.

This time I took Victor to "Chao Lay", a night before we eat there, I had him go look at the menu and walk around the restaurant just to make sure he is comfortable with it, then we'll go together sometime. My golf booking agent from Denmark told us the princess of Thailand dine at "Chao Lay" at least once a month. Well I turned my head to Vic and say to him: "If the food is good enough for the princess of Thailand, it should be good enough for you!"

It's an open air restaurant on the pier facing the gulf of thailand, the kitchen and operation are mainly downstairs, also the fresh seafood department with tanks filled with lobster / grouper / all sorts of sea-creatures is located downstairs. You can order standard food on the menu and it's a 4 color photo with english description menu, good for any tourists to order. Or be a little more creative, pick your own fish / tiger king pawn (no kidding, it's really king size, the pawn is bigger than my hand) / lobster / scallops / crabs ....etc. They weight it by the kg and charge a small fee to cook to order.

For example I ordered a steamed grouper, they weight it and tell me how much it cost per kg and how heavy my fish is, I told them I want it steam with ginger, scallion, garlic and soy sauce with shitake mushroom. It came up a total price of 350 thai baht = US$ 12

We had scallop, fish, shrimp, vegetable, rice and dessert mango plus 2 glasses of wine for 1300B = US$ 40

Hey it's good enough for the princess, it's good enough for me!