Restaurant Review: Lai Rai

Vietnamese Street Food Goes Upmarket In Peckham

I like to think I'm pretty good at taking pictures of my food. The only problem I usually have is sitting opposite my painfully publicity-shy partner who wants me to do it as quickly as possible. So I don't know what happened to my pictures that I took at Lai Rai recently. Apologies if they hurt your eyes and offend your aesthetic sensibilities. But maybe they reflect the red-sky-at-night outside on Rye Lane at 9pm in June and maybe they also reflect the red and yellow colour scheme of Lai Rai inside. Kind of like a Pee Wee Herman day dream combined with a David Lynch nightmare.

Lai Rai is the latest addition to a constantly evolving Peckham foodie scene. It only opened a couple of weeks ago and the Standard has already praised it (critic David Ellis's choice of film reference was Wes Anderson). Having now tried it myself their review was pretty accurate, except for his line about the "delapidation of Peckham". Sure there are grungy bits, but walking from the station we passed Forza Wine reviewed here, Cornerhouse and John The Unicorn. Janda Diner, recently reviewed here, is only a few doors along. Nothing delapidated there.

And nothing delapidated about the food in Lai Rai, which is a Vietnamese cafe during the day that morphs into a restaurant serving high class innovative Vietnamese street food in the evening. It's an intimate, bustling restaurant with long tables upstairs, a couple of tables downstairs and stools at the window if you want to keep an eye on the delapidation outside.

For starters we went for a couple of small plates. i expected the prawn lollies – chao com – to be humble prawn satay. What I got was something far more psychedelic. The prawn was mashed into a puffed-rice covered ball which you dipped into a small pool of sauce. Each bit seemed to offer new flavours and when we finished that wasn't all. We were advised to suck on the sugar cane stick, which is not something I tend to do in public.

We also had five spice beef shin croquettes in a kumquat sauce. This also teased and taunted the tastebuds. A hint of soy here, an echo of vinegar there, with a touch of Viet aranci ball about it. This really is quality street food.

There were only four choices of mains. I had to skip the crispy chicken leg and seafood option on doctor's orders, although it took every ounce of will power to resist the fresh mussels in coconut brother with lemongrass.

The betel leaf beef with smokey Viet coffee barbecue sauce was exactly as the menu described it. Patties that were dense and filling. I think cloves might have been involved. There was something about them that reminded me of going to the dentist. At first I thought maybe something had been overcooked but this was the barbecue and coffee flavour working its way through.

The grilled seasonal vegetables were superb and not the sort of vegetables we expected. Yes, there were peppers – orangey red to match the decor – and onions, but also plump succulent okra, covered in a white tofu whip. I've got a funny story about okra, also known as ladies fingers. I'll tell you it one day.

Some pickled greens came in a small bowl. They are good for the digestion I'm told whenever I order them. Here they were light and tasty too and sometimes that's what matters the most.

The only disappointment was that they had run out of sticky rice. Now admittedly we were the last customers of the night but surely a Vietnamese restaurant ought to be well stocked with rice. It hardly needs to be freshly bought and they couldn’t have used it all up on those pran lollies. Instead we had a side of charred baguette with golden syrup which, if I'm honest, a) didn’t have enough golden syrup on it and b) didn't really go with the other dishes in the way rice naturally complements a meat dish

But overall we both really loved Lai Rai. The bill, with a couple of glasses of white wine (and a free taste of a different white wine) came to just over £80. It's a stylish, modest affair and if I was pushed I'd probably have to say that I preferred the Malaysian food in Janda Diner a few doors down, but that really is merely a matter of personal preference. Lai Rai might just be doing street food, but it's done with love, care, attention and skill. Compared to other similar places I've tried it is streets ahead. Which is more than you can say for my photography.

Lai Rai, 181 Rye Lane, London SE15 4TP