Zaap Thai Market on Upper Parliment Street in Nottingham opened back in the Summer selling a good range of Asian Food products alongside Zaap Thai ready meals from the Zaap Thai Restaurant just around the corner.

In the past I have restricted my purchases from this place to my not so secret guilty pleasure of packet ramen noodles of which they have a really good range 😍😎

Now though I have found a whole new reason to shop here as I found that they have launched a ‘Grab and Go Food Menu’ offering hot food and Asian snacks such as filled Bao and rice dishes freshly made in the cafe section to take away.

GRAB AND GO MENU

The menu looks great with six different Bao buns on offer each priced at £4 each. The Bacon and Egg Breakfast Bao with Sriracha sounds a bit left field but could be just the thing to get you started in the morning but Grilled Pork, Crispy Chicken, or Chicken Satay are more likely candidates for my attention.

Today though I was keener to try some thing a bit bigger so was choosing between one of the Roasted Meats served with Jasmine rice, the options were Crispy Pork Belly, Roast Red Pork, or Roast Duck all priced at just £7.50

CRISPY PORK BELLY WITH JASMINE RICE

It was an easy choice in the end, I love pork so ordered a bowl of the Crispy Pork Belly with Jasmine Rice.

The menu has said ‘grab and go’ so I wasn’t sure if this was pre-made or a ding ding meal coming from a microwave so I was delighted to see them prepare my meal from scratch.

The pork belly was being deep fried to order so it did take a little longer to cook and I was perfectly happy with that, very happy to be truthful, fresh is best.

SUPER CRISPY PORK

I was amazed just how big the serving portion was, it was easily enough to share between two people. Obviously I wasn’t splitting my bowl with anyone, nope I was scoffing it all myself.

The pork was excellent, the rind perfectly crispy. It was just on the edge of being too hard which is a really hard balance to get to and I loved crunching my way through the layer to get to the soft pork meat.

The dish came with two sauces, one some kind of dark sweet soy mix and a second that was a green vibrant chilli, garlic, coriander kind of affair.

I attacked the dish from two angles initially dipping bits of pork into each dip using my chopsticks to just enjoy the full on meatiness of the meal.

Once I had halved the pork portion I started work pouring the sauces into the jasmine risk so that I could spoon up mouthfuls of rice, meat and sauce all mixed together.

The mix of sweet, sour, tang, and spice from the two sauces had my mouth watering as I worked my way through the bowl.

The plain soft white rice gave some respite from the heat but to be honest I was happy enough when I hit each pocket of flavour and so were my taste buds.

It was a really enjoyable and quite hearty feast and one to savour if you can while devouring!

I was so happy that I decided to check the ‘grab and go ‘menu out.

There is nothing posh about the dining experience sitting perched on your stool in the front of the supermarket, yet everything to love feeling like a winner with this newly discovered food opportunity

In addition to the dishes listed on the menu they were also offering some daily specials including a New Orleans Chicken Thigh Bun (3 for £4) and a Pork and Prawn Bun (2 for £4) both sound like good value as well as Chicken with Garlic over rice.

Next year I will be using a shared office workspace just over the road and I can see myself picking up my lunch on a regular basis from this place.

Zaap Thai Market is located at 95 Upper Parliment St in Nottingham NG1 6LA.

Check them out through their website and also through their Instagram profile and Facebook page