The Spirit House has become a busy tourist destination but the fare’s still fair
The Spirit House Thai restaurant at Yandina has become a busy tourist attraction but the food is still a pleasant diversion.
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It was our first trip back to the Spirit House after several years, and much had changed.
The jungle garden – or the “oasis” as it is described in the brochures – seemed to have moved a bit closer. The bamboo was taller and thicker and created a green tunnel for us to make our entry. I wondered whether in a few years hence we might need a machete to hack our way to our table.
The cooking school in a separate building away from the restaurant looked exactly as it did when we were students a decade ago, although the lesson plans had changed considerably.
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Now there are modules in gluten-free Thai feasts, one-bowl wonders from Singapore and Korea, curries from Indonesia and India, and street food from Hanoi. I made a mental note to book a class in wok meals for busy people and wondered whether I would ever find the time.
Busy, busy, busy. That’s the new order and it seems to have caught up with the Spirit House, which is no longer the sleepy, rambling Sunshine Coast hinterland hideaway I remembered.
It is now a big production number, with the school, gift vouchers and tourist excursions, and even Spirit House holidays abroad to Asian cities whose cuisine inspires the menu.
We arrived without a booking and were told the joint was full – but wait! A smug duty manager found a spot where a table could be erected for our group. I got the impression he thought he was doing us a great favour.
First we would have to wait in the Hong Sa Bar, a comfortable Balinese shack that wasn’t there on our last visit. There I sat down to be engulfed by smoke drifting from an incense pot. It was as though my maiden aunt’s potpourri had spontaneously combusted. I sneezed.
Mercifully we didn’t have to wait long before we were ushered to a pleasant isthmus away from the mainstream with a view across the lake (pond?) to the main house.
A lizard climbed a tree and sat there watching us the entire meal.
Our waitress (she told us she came from Singapore) was pleasant and ruthlessly efficient, quickly rattling off the menu highlights and showing a deep understanding of Asian produce when quizzed about the ingredients.
As diners poured in, it suddenly dawned on me that the restaurant had morphed into a tourist attraction.
Spirit House is essentially a Thai restaurant with recipes drifting into Indonesian, Indian and Korean territory.
We all began with a tasty, but fleeting, Moreton Bay bug entree ($17) with a tiny morsel of bug meat, peanuts and ginger served on a betel leaf with a squirt of nam jim that verged on the sweet and sour. It was hardly the most generous starter.
Next came a smoked salmon-flavoured coconut soup ($18) with Thai spice and chilli oil. It was served from a teapot into little ceramic shot glasses containing the fish and was blindingly good, perhaps the meal’s highlight.
Ridiculously, there was no Queensland wine on a rather thin wine list so I drank tap water.
I had mixed feelings about my duck braised in a master stock ($47) with a red curry sauce, charred baby corn, lychee and ginger.
The stock seemed to me to be flabby and sweet with a mouth feel of oddly flavoured porridge. However, the blonde and the brunette would not hear a word against it.
We did agree the jungle curry with ocean trout ($48) was deeply satisfying, as was a sticky rice panna cotta ($18) with lovely bursts of tropical fruit, a mango sorbet and a coconut crunch.
SPIRIT HOUSE
20 Ninderry Rd, Yandina
BOOK: Ph (07) 5446 8994
spirithouse.com.au
OPEN: Lunch from noon seven days; dinner Wed-Sat from 6pm
MUST TRY Coconut soup with Thai spice and chilli oil
VERDICT
Food 7
Ambience 7
Service 7
Value 6
OVERALL: 6.5/10
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