Quick Sunday Dinners 1: The Rising Sun

The concept of the traditional English Sunday roast is all rather ho-hum to the septic tanks and colonials , but it’s a sacred ritual for those of us from, “This royal throne of kings, this scepter’d isle, This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars … This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England, ” – in other words, people like me.

So I’ve started visiting that legendary riverside greasy spoon known as the Rising Sun again and am fairly impressed. Having not been there for years I was half expecting it to be fairly tired looking and yes, Basil Fawlty, the cast of Quadrophenia, Dennis Waterman and John Thaw and all the other 1970’s English icons are still in their decade-old frames staring down at you from the walls and the place remains a broiling stream room (you get a free sauna with your dinner), but it was a pleasant surprise to see the same waitress and cook as years ago (still wearing their big welcoming smiles) and the food is pretty much the same as I remember it. Walk through the door and due to the staff’s delightful smiliness, you are straight away in a purer gentler world than that of the shoe shine boys, grizzled amputees, child beggars and their ilk hustling away outside.

Portions are still massive and that, I believe, is the Rising Sun’s unique selling point – well that and the staff’s permanent, never ending chirpiness. If you order a cottage pie, it fills your plate (and they use big plates) so to put it another way, your dinner never looks looks lonely on its platter. On a recent Sunday I tried the roast chicken dinner – an old favorite of mine – and it wasn’t only the chicken that was stuffed – I was too after eating it and adjusting my belt by a couple of notches.

Now for the high and lows.

Minuses – Firstly, although mostly succulent, the meat around the breast area was just a touch less moist than it needed to be – not exactly a debacle, but certainly worth noting. Secondly, I can make far better roast potatoes myself and these, whilst appealing to the eye, may not have been par boiled or could just have been pre cooked and reheated. The spuds lacked that oomph factor of outer crispness and inner fluffiness. Finally, as previously mentioned, the venue is a total sweat box and when the ever smiley waitress sashayed over and asked me if I wanted anything else, I was tempted to ask for a jug of iced water to be poured over my head. (If the dining area is a furnace, how hot must the kitchen be?)

Pluses – First of all, the other veg was an absolute winner – streamed rather than boiled thereby avoiding the limp, stewed school dinner veg found at a couple of other places I won’t mention. Next, you most certainly won’t feel like phoning for a pizza later that same day as the portions are gargantuan. Then the stuffing deserves a round of applause as you need plenty of stuffing for half a chicken and that’s exactly what you get. Finally, if you’re a fan of doe-eyed young waitresses then don’t bother coming here – the waiting staff are mumsy but a good deal more deft and efficient than the average Khmer teen, which suits me just fine.

The bill came to a very acceptable $7.25, ($6 for a roast chicken platter and $1.25 for a properly chilled Anchor to slurp down while waiting for my take away).

The Rising Sun, 20 Street 178, Phnom Penh, Cambodia.