Finding good pasta priced in the low B300 range in Phrom Phong these days is becoming a rarity, which makes Lobster Main Kitchen’s reasonably priced menu all the more enticing. 

 

Found hidden away in the back room of Aroon Cafe just a few minutes away from BTS Phrom Phong, the venue is the brainchild of Pariyapat “Kook” Liangsrisuk, who used to work at Angelini and L'Atelier de Joël Robuchon, and Karn Liangsrisuk, a bartender from Dag. It’s a tiny space lined with bare concrete walls, rough surfaces, and colorful art pieces. Although the room nails the intimate vibe (better than many Bangkok restaurants), its tiny size means you can write off any hopes of a private conversation. 

 

Lobster Main Kitchen promises good, hearty comfort food at reasonable prices. While many of the dishes tick those comfort boxes, our most recent visit highlighted how easily simple food can cross the line into mediocrity. Don’t expect to be blown away here, and some of the dishes can be downright disappointing.  

 

Take the four cheese pizza (B340) for example, which came out on a pathetically dry and chewy dough that felt more like eating a pie than a pizza, while the cheese (which should be deliciously gooey and stringy) just crumbled off each bite like it had been sitting out in the open air for ages. Give the pizza here a wide berth. 

 

While the pastas certainly fare better in the sense that they are edible, we found ourselves indifferent to the flavor profiles and preparations. The carbonara (B320), a staple of any good pasta restaurant, was forgettable and bland, while the tagliatelle aglio olio peperoncino with house-smoked beef (B550) tasted more like a pad kheemao than a proper AOP. It’s so spicy you’ll need a glug of expensive San Pellegrino and Acqua Panna water, which is all that’s available, to soothe your tongue after each bite. 

 

Redemption was found in the beef tongue salad (B400), which was very well cooked and matched perfectly with the bed of rocket, tomatoes and balsamic glaze. The beef tongue was so good we assumed the beef tongue saffron risotto (B690) would be a sure hit, but that too was a disappointment when the risotto arrived at the table looking wetter than the streets of Bangkok in September. Even the delicious beef tongue, which was once again cooked to perfection, couldn’t uplift what felt like sloppy risotto soup.

 

The desserts were a bit of a bright spot: comforting, sweet and simple. While the panna cotta (B180) won’t win any cooking competitions, we gladly gobbled it up. Same goes for the tiramisu (B200) with its inviting coffee aroma and subtle rum flavors—but we would have preferred the ladyfingers to be softer and mushier instead of crispy. 

 

Although we like what Lobster Main Kitchen is going for, the preparation of the food, lack of inventiveness, and mediocre flavors firmly put this one in the “stuck in the neighborhood” category.