You wouldn’t guess that a fine-dining restaurant lies behind a white door of a structure that seamlessly blends in with the rest of the houses on the small alley of Trok Saphan Yaun. Hybe Songwat serves dishes inspired by the owners’ travels, and in prices that won’t break the bank. Every dish also cleverly manifests Vietnamese influences, mainly for the fact that the historic area was once occupied by the Vietnamese, “I want people to know the story of the neighborhood,” Piyapa “Meow” Vichiansan, one of the co-owners, explains.
She is quick to point out, however that they are not a Vietnamese restaurant. “We serve food based on our trips to different countries. After we get back from a trip, we talk to the chef about how we can interpret our experience into the food. Like when we visited Korea, we came up with Korean food—but with Vietnamese tweaks.”
The food is not the only thing that takes you on a journey. Each sense is heightened through the ambient music, the heady smell of incense, and video recordings of the owners’ travels playing on vintage TVs.
During our visit, the menu (B1,590) revolved around the theme Fraichement (“fresh” in English), and walked us through seven Vietnamese-inflected courses within three chapters: Street, River and Home. Each dish is named after a certain part of a journey. Along the River reveals baked razor clams topped with garlic crumbs and edible flowers, and comes with kumquat mayonnaise. It is followed by Go With the Flow, a bisque with butter-poached river prawns, and Vietnamese-style ravioli made with cassava flour and topped with lemongrass foam.
The main dish, Homemade, is inspired by home-cooked fare in the Vietnamese city of Can Tho. Patrons can choose between beef or chicken. We had the latter, and it was delicious—crispy on the outside and tender on the inside, glazed with Vietnamese fish sauce, and served with broken rice, barley turmeric risotto and mango salsa. Hybe also offers a wine pairing option for each chapter with an additional charge of B790.