This morning was hard to get out of such a comfy bed. Like we mentioned in our last post, we’ve been staying at pretty nice hotels for the past month all throughout Southeast Asia, but this hotel is exceptional, even to Western standards. We found a cute little breakfast place down the road called Crepe and Co and it was phenomenal! It was a bit pricy compared to other places (still less than U.S. prices), especially since most of our breakfasts are included with our room rate, but it’s Joey’s birthday, so we decided to splurge a bit (yes, a $15 USD check is splurging here in Thailand). Joey ordered banana & chocolate pancakes and I got the hash brown skillet breakfast that was out of this world.
After breakfast we caught a taxi to make a quick pit stop to get Joey’s dad a gift before continuing the birthday festivities. We took another taxi and started at 3 Bears Craft Brewery, which is one of the only true craft breweries in Bangkok. They had four delicious beers and we decided to split one of each. The first two were Goldilocks Blonde (a play on the brewery’s name) and Jackal Pale Ale. The second two were Hunters IPA and the incredible Gorilla Stout. All four were very tasty, but we both agreed that the stout was one of the best we’ve had. While enjoying our beers, we split an order of house beer battered onion rings that were just as tasty, and paired perfectly with the beers.
Before finishing at the brewery, our server gave Joey a little birthday gift…a really cool silicone coaster with the brewery’s logo that will fit perfectly in our apartment back home. After we finished at the brewery, we caught a cab right outside and came back to the hotel for a quick dip in the pool. After some more quality R&R by our hotel’s amazing infinity pool, we went up to our room to get ready to wander around Lumphini Park and have an amazing dinner. We took the BTS above group train to Siam and transferred to a different line to Sala Daeng. We wandered around Lumphini Park, which is very comparable to New York City’s Central Park in terms of a dedicated green space within a bustling metropolis, so we really appreciated the space and the time spent there. We took some pictures of the King Rama VI Monument, who dedicated this green space in the early 20th century. We even saw some live music and walked around the Young Farmers Market and tried the famous giant Thai pomelo!
After spending some time in and around the park, it was time for our much-awaited reservation at La Table de Tee. This was probably one of the most unique and exciting food experience either of us had ever experienced. The restaurant has a set 5-course menu that changes weekly. Within this 5-course menu, the last three courses have two options to choose from. I won’t talk too much about our menu specifically because I’ll post a picture of it (along with each item) below, but Joey and I decided to choose different items for each of the final three courses, so we could experience the entire menu (yes, even the durian dessert)! The best part of the meal came out with the dessert, as I contacted the restaurant in advance to inform them of Joey’s birthday, and they went above and beyond with his surprise. He was in total shock! See for yourselves below!
We were so stuffed by the end of the meal (they even added a sixth course in between the last entrée and dessert, which was a yummy gelatin with a peanut macaroon) that we almost needed to be rolled out of the restaurant. Luckily, we were able to hail a cab just down the street and came back to hotel and headed up to our hotel’s amazing rooftop bar, called the Octave Rooftop Bar
We came back to our room to find yet another thoughtful birthday surprise…a beautiful (and huge) slice of chocolate mousse birthday cake for Joey, with candles and all!
After a long day of celebrating, we were so stuffed we could barely even try the cake, but I managed to set it up for him to make one last birthday wish before we went to bed. Tomorrow, we’re sadly checking out of this amazing hotel and heading to our last accommodation of the trip for our final three days here in Bangkok, with a full day of exploring temples, Chinatown, and riding the Chao Phraya River, so stay posted!