The Brisbane restaurant with dual personalities

By day its a bakery and cafe, but this inner west eatery transforms into an altogether different pop-up at night to deliver a unique experience for diners.

IT’S a two-for-the-price-of-one deal at Paddington Social.

By day, the inner-west cafe not far from Suncorp Stadium is serving Campos coffee, pastries, breakfast and brunch, while by night it morphs into Lek’s Thai Pop-Up Kitchen.

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Locals could breakfast on mango and coconut hotcakes, come back for a cornflake crumbed chicken burger at midday and finish off with a massaman curry for dinner in this enterprise run by three friends, Gibb Mookachonpan (baking), Tyler Sargent (cafe) and Lek Senee (Thai).

The one-time corner shop, which had most recently housed Pizzeria Violetta and Sichuan Bang Bang, last year morphed into its new dual personality with a low key, airy, all-purpose fitout. Bare wooden tables, including
a communal version inside in the air-con and picnic tables on a section of gravel outside, provide plenty of seating options. On a mid-week night it’s reasonably busy with chirpy staff buzzing by to deliver bottles of cold water, pre-poured wines by the glass and well-timed dishes, with bills paid at the counter.

Lek's Thai Pop-Up Kitchen is in the Paddington Social cafe building. Picture: Mark Cranitch

Senee’s menu is extensive – salads, curries, soups, wok-fries, noodle and rice dishes – but stays largely in standard suburban territory, although there’s a strong selection of vegan options and an array of well-priced ($15-$17) “one plate wonders” such as wok-fried crispy pork belly with Chinese kale and rice.

We begin with steamed prawn wonton dumplings ($9 for four) and sample several of the starters courtesy of a shared mixed entree ($11) comprising a roll-call of the usual suspects, satay chicken skewers, fish cakes, vegetable spring rolls and pleasingly, something different in the massaman-flavoured pulled pork curry puffs, which stand out from the decent but unremarkable line up.

The Phad phed fish dish at Lek’s. Picture: Mark Cranitch

The clipped wine list runs to 14 choices, all available by the glass or bottle, from $35 for a bottle of T’Gallant Cape Schanck pinot noir up to Yarra Ridge chardonnay at $65. Singha, Stone and Wood Pacific Ale and James Boag’s Premium Light are on tap, with Balter and Great Northern Super Crisp among the packaged options.

Crispy barramundi fillets bathed in a sauce of attractively spicy red curry paste teased out with coconut milk and enhanced by wild ginger ($24, pictured) with vegies thrown in for good measure, is generous enough to be a meal for two, while the green curry of beef with bamboo shoots, eggplant, vegetables, kaffir lime and Thai basil ($17) is hearty rather than memorable.

The fit-out at Lek’s. Picture: Mark Cranitch

Four desserts are on offer, including sago and black bean cooked in coconut milk or steamed glutinous rice stuffed with banana, wrapped in banana leaf, but we opt to share the “old school Thai sundae” with a couple of scoops of coconut ice cream, jackfruit, lychees and
a sprinkling of peanuts ($8),
to cool us down on a steamy Brisbane night. Like the rest of the menu, it’s not aiming to reinvent the wheel, but it’s unfussy, generous in proportion and well-priced.

LEK’S THAI POP-UP KITCHEN

Address 167 Given Tce, Paddington

Phone [phone]

Web paddingtonsocial.com.au

Open Sun-Thur 5-9pm, Fri-Sat 5pm-9.30pm