Food

Exploring Thai Food in Australia: Top 10 Must-Try Restaurants

Archie Connelly

April 7, 2025

Exploring Thai Food in Australia: Top 10 Must-Try Restaurants

Thai food has become rather well-known all around Australia and a preferred dining choice for many of the residents. Thai food presents a cool substitute for classic Western cuisine with its well-balanced mix of sweet, sour, salty, and fiery tastes. The cuisine's fresh and healthy ingredients, cultural interaction via travel, and growing availability of real Thai restaurants all around the nation help explain its general appeal. Featuring Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, and Brisbane venues that have made major contributions to Australia's active Thai food scene, this paper investigates the top 10 must-try Thai restaurants around the nation.

Sydney's Thai Culinary Treasures: A Closer Look

Sydney, Long Chim

Long Chim Sydney, which sits at Pitt Street and Angel Place, has become well-known as a hip restaurant presenting Thai cuisine in an industrial setting. With a respectable 4.1-star rating based on more than 2,000 reviews, the restaurant specialises in traditional Thai foods, including curries, stir-fries, and meat dishes. Long Chim Sydney has great value with its varied menu choices even though it falls into the higher price range. With halal food, vegan options, vegetarian selections, and organic cuisine, the restaurant meets a range of dietary tastes. Beyond its cuisine, Long Chim Sydney is fit for many dining events, from family trips to business meetings, because of its friendly environment with a bar, gender-neutral toilets, and Wi-Fi.

Thai Home

One of Sydney's best Thai dining venues, Home Thai, has developed a reputation. Home Thai provides an authentic experience with great dishes, including grilled Isaan-style sausages and comforting hot-and-sour prawn soup, according to Asian Inspirations' list of top Thai restaurants in Australia. Locals and guests looking for real Thai tastes especially like the restaurant because of its dedication to authenticity. Every meal is meticulously made to reflect the spirit of traditional Thai cuisine, guaranteeing a dining experience that will enthral guests and inspire return business.

Bangkok Becky

Bangkok Betty is quite reasonably priced without sacrificing authenticity or quality. For casual dining, the restaurant is renowned for its affordability and generous portions.

Highlights of their menu are:

  • Sizzling stir-fries
  • Real massaman beef curry
  • BBQ chicken
  • Prawns—things you really should try.

Bangkok Betty offers consistent quality and real tastes that have earned it a spot among Sydney's best Thai restaurants, whether for your Friday night dinner or Saturday lunch.

The Thai Food Scene in Melbourne

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DoDee Swanston paid for

Nestled at 245 Swanston Street, DoDee Paidang Swanston is a small kitchen focused on Thai street food. With a wonderful 4.6-star rating from over 2,700 reviews, this little restaurant with a modern vibe has delighted patrons. DoDee Paidang provides excellent value while preserving authenticity with prices ranging from A$20 to 40. Featuring a varied menu including alcohol choices like beer, cocktails, and wine alongside happy hour specials, the restaurant is well-liked for lunch, dinner, and solo dining. Families, groups, and visitors alike would find the laid-back, friendly, and trendy environment fit.

Thai Waves

Thai Tide presents a fresh viewpoint on Thai cuisine and claims to be the best Thai restaurant in Melbourne's central business district. Thai Tide distinguishes itself with its emphasis on regional Thai cuisine created with first-rate locally grown ingredients.

From Southern Thailand's Patthalung Fried Chicken to Central Thailand's Braised Beef Shin Massamun Curry, the restaurant features cuisine from many Thai culinary traditions, including Ballina Pippies with Nam Prik Pao Chilli Jam. A well-chosen assortment of Australian and international wines as well as classic Thai-inspired cocktails balances these presents.

Currently running a unique event called "R Rising Tides" on April 16, 2025, with a guest chef presenting Southern Thai cuisine is Thai Tide. To further value customers, the restaurant also runs daily happy hour specials from 5 to 6:30pm.

China Chin

With its emphasis on Thai and Asian cuisine, Chin Chin has significantly changed the scene of Thai food in Melbourne. The restaurant's braised pork and gapi fried rice with caramelised chicken are particularly well-known for their exceptional quality. The popularity of the restaurant in Melbourne has resulted in expansion; another site in Sydney lets more Australians enjoy their distinctive take on Thai cuisine. Chin Chin's popularity reflects its constant quality and creative approach to classic Thai tastes.

Thai Dining Outplaces in Perth

Saotalee's Location

Saowanee's Place, which is in North Perth, offers a calm and soothing environment together with fresh and fiery real Thai cuisine. The restaurant is well-known for faithfully presenting Thai cooking methods and tastes.

Signature dishes call for:

  • Pad prik
  • Panang chicken curry
  • Chilli and basil beef stir fry
  • Deep-fried fish in tamarind sauce
  • Paw paw salad

Every dish shows the restaurant's dedication to real Thai food, which honours its origins and fits Australian tastes.

Long CH Perth

A modern rendition of beloved Thai street food classics is provided by Chef David Thompson's Long Chim Perth, housed in the State Buildings. The restaurant designs a modern, interesting space for savouring Thai cuisine with a creative twist.

For group dining, Long Chim Perth is perfect since friends may split meals including:

  • Chicken larb
  • Cured pork sausage
  • Roast duck
  • Massaman beef curry

The restaurant is also well-known for its amazing array of desserts, which inspire customers to save space for sweet delicacies to finish their dinner.

Thai Cuisine Highlights Brisbane's

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Thai Kitchen Platform

Thai Pan Kitchen offers real Thai food to Brisbane using well-made dishes influenced by Chiang Rai customs. Recently adding more dining space, the restaurant provides dine-in, takeaway, and delivery choices to nearby areas. Customer testimonials show the great quality of Thai Pan Kitchen's products; one customer said their pad Thai and papaya salad was "the best I have ever had" and praised the generous amounts. Another patron stressed the restaurant "deserves 6 stars" and praised the food's authenticity. Using fresh food and traditional recipes, the restaurant highlights its link to Chiang Rai culinary customs, giving Brisbane residents a real taste of northern Thailand.

Thai Cuisine, Smiling

Based in West Melbourne, Smile Thai Cuisine lives up to its name by providing delicious food at affordable prices that truly satisfy customers. The restaurant has a large menu to meet a range of tastes.

Highly advised and regarded as classic dishes to try are their:

  • Green curry chicken
  • Pad Thai with prawns

In Melbourne's competitive Thai food scene, Smile Thai Cuisine is now a unique choice thanks to its combination of quality ingredients, real preparation, and fair price range.

Thai Cuisine's Growing Appeal in Australia

There are multiple reasons Thai food is becoming more and more popular in Australia. Appealing to Australian palates looking for novel gastronomic experiences, the cuisine's distinctive mix of sweet, sour, salty, and spicy tastes offers a welcome substitute for classic Western cuisine. Fresh herbs, vegetables, lean proteins, and light cooking techniques abound in Thai cuisine, which naturally fits Australia's growing emphasis on healthy eating. Though they have potential health advantages, ingredients like lemongrass, ginger, and coconut milk provide unique flavours. Among Australians, Pad Thai, Green Curry, and Tom Yum Goong are the most often requested Thai foods. Combining stir-fried rice noodles with tamarind sauce, peanuts, protein, and lime, Pad Thai is both familiar and exotic enough to stand out. While Tom Yum Goong provides an ideal harmony of hot and sour tastes, green curry balances spiciness with creamy coconut milk.

Eventually

From traditional street food restaurants to upmarket venues presenting modern interpretations of classic dishes, Australia's Thai restaurant scene provides varied dining experiences. The ten restaurants highlighted in this paper offer the best Thai cuisine in Warrawong, Sydney, Melbourne, Perth, and Brisbane. Whether it's Long Chim's industrial chic ambience in both Sydney and Perth, DoDee Paidang's intimate street food experience, Thai Tide's regional specialities, or Thai Pan Kitchen's Chiang Rai-inspired cuisine, every venue offers something different. Their shared values are: real flavours, quality ingredients, and designing unforgettable dining experiences. For foodies wishing to discover Thai cuisine, these eateries offer first-rate starting points around Australia's main cities. These restaurants are evidence of the cuisine's ongoing appeal and the effective cultural exchange between Thailand and Australia via the universal language of food, as Thai cuisine keeps becoming more and more popular all around Australia.


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About Archie Connelly

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