Here’s a first for the Pattaya Mail Dining Out Team! A review of a room. Yes, this is the Antechamber of Yupins Restaurant in the Jomtien Complex, a restaurant we have visited many times to review the food. But this time it is the antechamber, the room you have to go through to get into the restaurant that is being reviewed.
The review is not for Architect’s Weekly either, but there has been so much happening in the antechamber recently that the International Builders Guild has shown interest in a center spread for their monthly glossy.
Replacing the previously open connecting area between the outside and the dining room is this newly refurbished antechamber. It may have had a roof, so one did not get wet, but you were still left to the vagaries of weather. Climate change at Yupins was not universally enjoyed, as well as the annoying vocal calls from the multitudinous greeters as you walked down through the complex.
Finding elephants in rooms seems to be an international preoccupation these days, and while there is enough room in the new antechamber to swing several cats (no cats were injured in the course of this review), swinging an elephant is just a little too optimistic, though I am assured that a stationary pachyderm can be accommodated.
Another advantage of the enclosed area is you are no longer at the whim of the rain god who seems to have a down on us every afternoon at present.
Along with the décor there is a wonderful Heath Robinson “automatic” door closer with strings and plumb bobs, counterweights and floral arrangements. It is worthwhile stopping in the antechamber just to take it all in. (For those non-UK readers, “Heath Robinson contraption” is perhaps more often used in relation to temporary fixes using ingenuity and whatever is to hand, often string and tape, or unlikely cannibalizations. The antechamber features all of those.)
The end result of this architectural tour de force has been a doubling of the restaurant’s air conditioned capacity, and increases the chance of being able to walk in and find a seat. However, I do recommend that you ring and make a booking first. This is a very popular restaurant, for all the right elephantine reasons.
Oh yes, the food! On our last official review I wrote “Despite the small size of the restaurant, Yupins gives a very large choice of excellent food and wine at moderate prices. Yupin can hold her head up high.” The only change I have to report now is that while it may still be a single shop-house, but with the refurbished antechamber it is no longer “small sized.”
After an unsuccessful elephant swinging exercise, we settled in and tried my old favorite, the sizzling garlic prawns, then washed down with the suggested New Zealand Villa Maria Sauvignon Blanc 2016.
We moved from there to a wonderful Australian grain fed Rib of Beef (large enough to be classified as half a cow), carved at the table plus vegetables, chips and more Sauvignon Blanc (B. 1495). This was shared easily between three people, making it a very inexpensive main course per head. Well done Ms. Yupin.
I have to say we have never been disappointed at Yupins, covering the food, portion size and service. Well done again Ms. Yupin.
So, for all the right reasons, Yupins is firmly embedded on our list of very highly recommended restaurants. Do try, and say nice things about the antechamber and watch the Maître d’ get misty eyed. Egypt may have its pyramids and India its Taj Mahal, but we have got the Yupins Antechamber!
Yupins, 413/42 Jomtien Complex, Thappraya Road. Parking inside the complex, or plenty street-side. For those who travel with GPS, the coordinates are 12.901719, 100.869066 (not that you really need them to find Thappraya Road). Open six days 6 p.m. until 10 p.m. closed Wednesday. www.yupins.com, telephone 038 250 394 as bookings will be coming thick and fast for the antechamber experience.
(Photos by Marisa Corness)
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