D’Elephant Thai, Shop F018, Chadstone shopping centre, 1341 Dandenong Road, Chadstone. Phone: 9568 6600
Consider The Sauce has never before set foot in Chadstone shopping centre.
I’ve often been told that it is a bit more upmarket and swish.
This – an invitation to a blogger/media/industry tasting at D’Elephant Thai restaurant – is my chance to see if that’s the case, and to make very interested observations about the food on offer.
Especially in comparison with our very own reference point, Highpoint.
I’m aware that Chadstone is huge and that I see only a very small part of it.
Nevertheless, turning up typically early, I take in warmly regarded Malaysian and Chinese eateries, several classy-looking cafe-style outlets and a really fine grocer/greengrocer/deli – all within a few hundred metres of my destination.
D’Elephant Thai is a relatively new establishment, the management of which is keen to gauge the reactions of a mixed bag of invitees to their food (see menu below).
The place is nicely done out in cheerful style.
The event is very well run and the staff are wonderful.
I admire the joint’s aim of providing good Thai food at affordable prices in a shopping centre context.
As my handbag for the night, Nat Stockley, points out, some of the very best and most personality-laden Thai food in Melbourne is also some of the cheapest.
But for Bennie and I, in the west, Thai food is invariably a notch or two more expensive than the other readily available multicultural choices.
I enjoy the D’Elephant food.
A couple of dishes – a soup, a curry – are way to sweet for me.
On the other hand, several dishes have a good, feisty chilli whack going on – not something you’d normally expect in a shopping centre and something to be wildly applauded.
A centrepiece of the proceedings is a som tum station at which the papaya salad is being prepared from scratch for the assembled.
They should definitely think about making this a permanent fixture.
(The salad was good.)
Would we eat at D’Elephant Thai if it was at Highpoint?
For sure.
(Consider The Sauce was a guest of D’Elephant Thai management and we were served food from a pre-set event menu. Editorial input into this post was neither sought nor granted.)
consider the sauce 
Would you believe it’s almost impossible to find a decent Thai place in Japan?! Sad but true.
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Interesting … I’ve always been under the impression Japan does gave great Chinese and Italian places. What else are you missing out on?
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I don’t know about Chinese because I hate Chinese food but you are surely right in that there are so many there’s gotta be a lot of what would be considered good ones. Italian, that depends. In Tokyo for example, there is not a single pizzeria that deserves the ‘truly great’ tag although we found 1 in Osaka that we go back to whenever we go there. My husband is a huge pizza lover so trust me, we’ve tried our way through many Tokyo establishments! There are lots of good high end fine dining Italian places but really good medium price segment places are not so abundant I find. Maybe I’m a bit too harsh because places that only offer spaghetti in lots of different variations automatically forfeit their potential ‘really good’ status by my books, as pasta isn’t just spaghetti.
Well, we live in Nagoya these days which is very conservative. We miss good Turkish, Greek, diner/burger, French bistro, European style sundae, North African, Mexican, South American, Spanish, …… &, maybe less categorizable but at least as important to us, nice cafés. You know, that sort of thing that you seem to have in abundance in Oz. There are lots of cafés here but the quality is abysmal.
You can get some of those fixes in Tokyo but not all. It’s no mistake I’ve taken to living on sweets because you can find good French style cake easily enough here.
The only good Thai place I’ve been to in Japan was in Kobe where I lived for a short period. As it was 1 of the first Japanese cities to open trade relations with other countries after the seclusion it has a very international flair, by Japanese standards. It’s much smaller than Tokyo, Osaka or even Nagoya but the food diversity is much higher.
We are lucky in that there is a good Italian with several restaurants in Nagoya though, their pizza is better than anything we encountered in Tokyo [although not as good as that Osaka place by a long shot].
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Wow, thanks for the great and long comment! Yes, now I know why your blog is so dessert-centric!
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Well as it always is there were several things coming together. I’ve always had a massive sweet tooth & been eating cakes, desserts etc. for meals for a long time, but not exclusively. The absence of good reasonably priced savory food here & the availability of good French style cakes just precipitated my becoming an exclusive dessert eater I guess.
I do still eat savory food occasionally, like when my husband & I go out for dinner, usually about 1/week or when we travel, for example to the Bay area last summer where there is awesome savory food EVERYwhere but I’m not putting that up on wattwurmnashi. wattwurmnashi will always be & stay a sweet blog. I’ve been considering to set up a 2nd reviewing blog for savory but so far I couldn’t be bothered because pastry is my true passion & thus far more important to me but even so I probably won’t ever catch up with my 1000s of desserts etc. eaten at 100s of establishments so far & growing almost daily…
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