Makan Halal
Marina Kitchen Phuket
Casual Dining · Phuket, Thailand
Cuisines: Thai
Marina Kitchen operates out of a modest building in Koh Kaew, on the outskirts of Phuket Town, where the family that runs it also lives in the rooms behind the dining room. The restaurant's own decor hasn't chased any particular trend, an air conditioned section and a handful of tables set with the kind of practical, unfussy furniture that suggests the kitchen matters more than the room around it.
The menu runs through a wide stretch of Thai home cooking rather than settling on a single regional style. Keng som, a sour and spicy fish soup built on tamarind and turmeric, sits alongside a mango salad tossed with crispy fried fish, kangkong stir-fried with belacan, and Chinese kale finished in oyster sauce. Seafood shows up throughout the menu: a seafood tom yum thick with prawns and squid, battered squid served as a starter, and a whole deep fried seabass that arrives crisp skinned with a chili and lime dressing on the side. Chicken with cashew nuts and a black pepper chicken cover the more familiar end of the menu, and a Thai style omelette, thick and lightly caramelised at the edges, is a common side order alongside a plate of stir-fried mixed vegetables.
The restaurant sits a short drive from Royal Phuket Marina, in a part of the island better known for boat charters and waterside dining than for neighbourhood Thai kitchens, which makes Marina Kitchen something of an outlier among the area's more polished marina restaurants. It draws a mix of local families and visitors staying nearby who come across it through word of mouth rather than signage, and the pace of service reflects that: dishes come out as they're cooked rather than all at once, in the manner of a kitchen more used to feeding regulars than managing a dining room.
Contact information
- Address: 5/3, Moo 4, Koh Kaew, Phuket Town, Phuket 83000, Thailand
- Phone: +66872809343
