AsiaLIFE

Darren Gall throws of his wine-tasting bib and takes on the food of three “continents” only to discover a souvenir shop and cheese and ham toasties.

I, (an expatriate Australian) recently had lunch with my Khmer partner and an Irish photographer at a quaint little café-cum-restaurant named Trios Continents. The place purported to combine the cuisines of Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam, all somehow pulled together and managed by the charming Nagayoshi Maki.

Roughly the size of two Chinese shop-houses, the high ceiling provides an airy ambience to the room with pale colours and simple furniture adding to the breezy, uncluttered feel of the space. However, I was taken a little aback when I discovered that the restaurant was actually a souvenir shop that had recently transformed a corner and now served a limited, café style menu.

At this point you might be thinking that I should have done both the venue and myself a favour, spun 180 degrees and fled the scene – lest staying meant entreating the reader to a scathing, titillating account of the disaster that was bound to follow.

I could raze the building with sparks flying from the rapier like strokes of my caustic quill. Why not? Restaurant reviewers the world over have built their reputations on disembowelling the best efforts of those who are driven to try their hand at culinary creativity.

The menu consisted of four kinds of apparently vegetarian soup, a couple of flavoured ice and ice cream concoctions for dessert, one (apparently vegetable) curry and a selection of three different types of toasted sandwiches. If the order of food selection appears a little non-traditional it is because that is the order in which they were listed.

Things got off to a shaky start – with me furtively scrawling notes and our cameraman unholstering a camera the size of an anti-tank missile – the manager quickly worked out what was going on and began falling all over herself and our table proffering apologies for matters we were yet to grasp.

As the restaurant claimed to represent Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam this was possibly the reason the listed Japanese miso soup was not available.

The only main on the menu being the curry, I ventured to point toward its picture, the waitress’ puppy dog eyes following my motion, grew more forlorn with the arc of my index finger, there was no curry. The caption under the carrot soup read ‘The B-Carotene what contained carrot, help you exhausted with stress. The orange colour makes us cheerful’. How could I resist?

Carrot soup and toasted ham and cheese sandwiches it was then, with the vegetable soup ‘set’ and salad for my guests.

Food ordered, our delightful manager now recovered herself from the virtually prostrate position next to our table and went into full crisis mode. All of the available soups were quickly prepared and assembled before us with sides of brown rice and small bowls of organic salad greens complimented by a few quarters of cherry tomato and an ‘original’ salad dressing. T

his quickly revealed our next surprise – the two hearty joints of pork floating in the ‘vegetable’ soup and the ample chunks of chicken lurking beneath the surface of the ‘tomato’ soup! To this carnivore all of the soups tasted fresh and flavoursome however, they might want to have the defibrillator handy for apoplectic vegans.

Then came the highlight, toasted ham and cheese sangers with chunky bread, melting cheese and fresh ham. I ordered a second – they were salvation for both me and the unflappable, honest efforts of our delightful host. If Faulty Towers ever decided to recast the character of waiter Manuel with a Japanese female, Ms Maki would surely have to get the part.

The beverages ordered were non-alcoholic, simple and as they should be, lotus tea (fragrant, healthy), iced coffee with sweet milk (a sort of perverse pleasure). The crushed ice and green tea ice cream thingy with red beans was refreshing, the soy ice cream was not to my taste, but neither is soy milk.

The company that owns this boutique and café extravaganza is based in Siem Reap and specialises in producing, wholesaling and retailing a selection of cookies and peppered, banana chips (interesting) that can also be sampled.

If all this seems rather harsh – I assure you that whilst it is perhaps a brutally honest account of our meal – the overall experience was amusing to the point of being delightful and all done with great charm and sincerity.

Would I return? Probably not, but that won’t faze Ms Maki and nor should it, because this café / restaurant was not created for the likes of me. Trios Continents is a souvenir and craft shop that also serves as an outlet for the parent company’s cookie and banana chip empire, it caters to the tourist market.

I have visions of busloads of Japanese tourists being deposited at regular intervals outside the store as I am sure, does Ms Maki. Offering a simple, inexpensive selection of fresh, healthy Asian dishes and a few toasted sandwiches along with tea and coffee is undoubtedly appreciated by the new arrivals and potential shoppers and Ms Maki and her establishment deserve every success with their target audience.

Trios Continents, 182 Street 63, Tel: 017 787 648.