I was watching a show on the Food Network (yes here in the states we have
an entire television network devoted entirely to cooking) and there is a
show which I believe is called Extreme Cuisine (or at least that was the
title of yesterday’s installment of whatever show it was).
In any event, there is apparently a restaurant in Bangkok, Thailand where
roast chicken is served. The presentation involves the chickens being shot
from a catapult into the air and caught on a plate by unicycling waiters
who flip the chickens around the plates as they take them to the tables.
I’d very much like to see the classified notice advertising this job.
> In any event, there is apparently a restaurant in Bangkok, Thailand > where roast chicken is served. The presentation involves the chickens > being shot from a catapult into the air and caught on a plate by > unicycling waiters who flip the chickens around the plates as they take > them to the tables.
I don’t think I would have believed this had I not seen it myself. No, I
haven’t been to Bangkok (though my luggage was once), but I saw it on TV.
Not only do these guys have to get under the flying chickens, they have to
do it without knocking down tables or customers. All this on an outdoor
paved surface that looks like it’s probably very slippery, what from being
a restaurant and the chickens being greasy and all.
My dad went to Bangkok last December. I’m bummed because I forgot to have
him try to find this place. I would be very curious to know how this crazy
tradition got started!
“Rain, slickrock, and unicycles. Bad combination.” – Tison, a Moab bike
shop employee (who also unicycles and does Trials) advising Brett Bymaster
on a tire purchase for the Slickrock Trail
“This rock is hard.” – Brett Bymaster (who rode every inch of the
“hard” stuff)
> In any event, there is apparently a restaurant in Bangkok, Thailand > where roast chicken is served. The presentation involves the chickens > being shot from a catapult into the air and caught on a plate by > unicycling waiters who flip the chickens around the plates as they take > them to the tables.
This sounds like the same place that I saw on TV one time a year or two
ago, I think it was on “Real TV” or whatever the show was called. And it
was even better than that; not only were the waiters - at least some of
them - dressed in clown gear, but the chickens were SET ON FIRE before
being shot through the air. The effect was quite spectacular, a bit
surreal, and more than a little unnerving. Unfortunately (?) our fire
safety regulations probably prevent restaurants in this country from
serving their dishes in this manner.
Sorry to drag up this old thread, but does anyone have the address for this place? Sounds intriguing…unicycling waiters/flying chickens- my kind of restaurant at the end of the universe.
Seeing is believing: your cooked chook can still fly. You are sitting in the garden restaurant Suan Arahan Kratorn. A bell rings. A waiter loads a flambe chicken on to a hefty metal catapult. From the other side of the restaurant another waiter enters, pedalling furiously on a unicycle and wearing a helmet topped with a spike. The chicken sails into orbit. The helmeted waiter stabs it in mid-flight with his spike. Voila! One flying chicken is delivered to your table.
Details: 99/1 Bangna-Trad Rd, Bangna
From another article: Kathorn, on Bang Na-Trad Highway, near the intersection with Sukhumvit Road
In case I’m not stating the obvious, Bangna is apparently a district in Bangkok.
Oh, and in case the unicycling chicken catching waiters aren’t enough, “the restaurant also has pretty girls singing to karaoke tracks on stage, along with private karaoke rooms.”
Speaking of Food Network, I was watching “Good Eats”, a show about the science of food, last week and they were doing a show about Wontons. The host is talking about balance in chinese cooking and then they pan down and he is idling on a uni. Looked like a schwinn from the 2 seconds they show. Just thought of it after seeing this thread. The episode was called “Wonton Wrappers”.
Heh… The earliest post on that list is mine, as is the one from “Joe” a few posts above. The waiters that I saw on TV back then weren’t catching the chickens on spiked helmets, so their act since then may have evolved, in what we must concede is a logical direction.
1998, that was? That was so unimaginably long ago.