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Porkfat

Fresh and fiery family meal.

Baked tiger prawns with vermicelli.
1 / 6Baked tiger prawns with vermicelli.Jennifer Soo
Grilled pork jowl with smoked chilli nam jim.
2 / 6Grilled pork jowl with smoked chilli nam jim.Jennifer Soo
Homemade coconut ice cream with candied pumpkin.
3 / 6Homemade coconut ice cream with candied pumpkin.Jennifer Soo
Steamed coral trout with pickled plums.
4 / 6Steamed coral trout with pickled plums.Jennifer Soo
There is dining across two levels.
5 / 6There is dining across two levels. Supplied
The downstairs dining room.
6 / 6The downstairs dining room. Jennifer Soo.

Good Food hat15/20

Thai$$

Talk about doing what it says on the box. At this warm, family-run diner on the border of Chinatown, owner-chef Narin “Jack” Kulasai uses pork fat where other kitchens use standard cooking oil, and the flavours are more complex, rounded and rave-worthy as a result.

Baked prawns are a must, the meaty electric-orange tigers roasted with vermicelli and oyster sauce, and sporting little jewels of crisp-fried fat.

Bring your own pinot for grilled pork jowl powered by smoked chilli nam jim, and bring a group to load the table with a heaving puff-ball omelette tingling with white pepper, plus a few tamarind and soy-sticky beef skewers, and at least one of the monthly, limited specials (whole deep-fried barramundi, say, lavished in a purple-red three-flavour sauce pulsing with garlic and chilli).

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There are Thai restaurants with longer menus and pricier fit-outs, absolutely, but few nail the salty-sweet-sour trinity like this one.

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Original URL: https://www.smh.com.au/goodfood/nsw-good-food-guide/porkfat-20231226-p5etpx.html