The Brightside Bistro, Krabi

Please excuse us while we *completely* lose our minds over our furry visitors!

Our two dogs, Hazel and Brie, are a big part of our lives and we love to take them everywhere we can. So of course, our own restaurant had to be pet-friendly!

And it really makes our day when you bring your dogs (or cats!) along!

It's lovely to see the lives these dogs get to live with their loving humans. Tsiri the samoyed (pic 1) actually travelled with her pa(w)rents all the way from Cyprus. Yes, the country Cyprus!

And this little grey Iggy's (pic 4) mom always brings a towel and water bowl for her so she has a clean and comfy place to sit with her.

Plus, it's SO satisfying to put our cute little water bowl when there's a doggie visitor!

Thank you for pics 2 and 4!

Today is the 2nd birthday of our little seaside bistro! It's hard to believe that it's already been two years since we first opened with a team of four. And equally absurd that this is the first proper team photo we've ever taken in all this time!

Lots of love to our amazing team who work so hard and make our world go round. 💛

Today is the three-year adoptaversary of our three-legged poster girl, Hazel!

She's the sweetest soul and a wonderful example of how amazing a "street dog" can be. People are always asking us what breed she is (we don't know) and most of the time they are surprised to hear that she's a rescued dog! People often have the misconception that street dogs are dirty, aggressive, untrainable, etc., but that is so far from the truth!

Hazel was rescued by , who found her with wires tangled tightly around her leg that had created grave injuries, and they had to amputate her leg right away. But she learnt how to walk/run on three legs in a few days and doesn't seem to miss her leg at all. It just makes her even more special to us and she's a real sweet who makes friends everywhere she goes!

*Hazel was named Kodyva by Soi Dog, but we changed her name
Some other people we know that do amazing work for rescued dogs are streetdogs

🌞 Golden Milk, aka Haldi Doodh! 🌞

Did you know that the now-internet-famous turmeric milk has been around for centuries in the Indian subcontinent?

Seeing as it's Diwali (the Hindu 'festival of lights') and one-half of our bistro's founding duo is from India, today seems like a good day to talk about our version of this delicious drink!

Unlike most versions that are watery, powdery and chalky, we make ours creamy, lightly sweetened, and fragrant with a host of other spices along with turmeric for a drink that's truly enjoyable.

We also add a pinch of black pepper, which you can't really taste, but is essential if you want to extract as many of the health benefits of turmeric as possible! Without pepper, the curcumin in turmeric can be hard to absorb.

So come give our Haldi Doodh a try and let us know what you think!

✨ A moment of appreciation for our Pasta Bolognese! ✨

This dish is always a favourite on our menu, but maybe because of the cooler weather these days, it's just really hitting the spot for many.

We often enjoy this dish during our travels in Italy, so it's great to be able to recreate it back home, and to share it with you all. We make ours with premium Thai beef and lots of aromatics, and shower the sauce with Parmesan!

When combined with our handmade fresh pasta, this is just *chef's kiss*!

The sun is finally out again after a string of rainy days! Though we usually shy away from the strong sun in Thailand, on days like this everyone appreciates how gorgeous everything looks under the bright, bright sunshine.

This sun-drenched Caesar salad is light, fresh and flavourful, made with our homemade dressing and sourdough croutons and local cos lettuce, and showered in lots of parmesan, of course. What a perfect dish for a day like this!

Our Kimchi Grilled Cheese has been one of our most-loved sandwiches since we opened last year!

We make ours with kimchi prepared specially for us by a Korean family living in Krabi. That goes into our homemade sourdough bread with lots of cheese, and gets grilled till it's all gooey inside, and crisp outside!

Come give it a try, we're located just across the road from Ao Nang beach!

Finding food that suits your needs can be hard while travelling, so we're trying to make it as easy as possible for you to find dishes that are vegan, vegetarian, gluten-free, dairy-free, shellfish-free and more!

Our menu lists which diets each dish is suitable for, or how it can be tweaked to make it suit you! Our team is also well-trained to help you find the kind of food you need, so feel free to ask any of us if you need help choosing!

Pictured:
✨ Grilled eggplants with romesco (vegan, gf, df)
✨ Lemon cake (vegan)
✨ Mediterranean veggie pasta (vegetarian, gf, vegan option available)
✨ Garden salad (vegan, gf, df)
✨ Caprese salad (vegetarian, gf)
✨ Tropical fruit bowl (vegan, gf, df)

✨ Top-notch Thai craft beers ✨

We love to , and that goes for our beers as well! We stock a variety of interesting beers brewed in Thailand, and some limited-edition seasonal ones too!

At the moment, we have a German-style Hefeweizen, an IPA, and a Hazy IPA from , one of the coolest breweries in Thailand. And we also have a wheat beer with a bit of passionfruit flavour, which is so refreshing in this hot weather! Come give them a try!

Visiting Krabi? Come visit us at The Brightside Bistro, just a few steps away from Ao Nang beach!

We've got some of the best breakfast in Ao Nang, handmade pasta, sandwiches with our homemade sourdough, lots of Mediterranean-inspired small plates, and more!

We focus on local produce, and try to be as eco-conscious as possible while serving up a delicious menu made almost entirely from scratch. There are plenty of gluten-free, vegan and dairy-free options too. And we're pet-friendly!

We're located next to McDonalds on the Ao Nang beach road. come say hi!

See you soon! ✨

After a busy first year, it's time for us to have a bit of a rest! We've decided to give our entire team a 1-week break so we can come back recharged for another fun year. And we'll be turning 1 on April 12 so come celebrate with us when we reopen!

(This is paid time off for our staff, above the usual paid leaves they have throughout the year)

^ Come try all this and more just a few steps away from Ao Nang beach!

We make our own bread and fresh pasta, and offer a number of appetisers, sandwiches and desserts inspired by our travels around the Mediterranean.

We try to support our local community and environment by
- avoiding single use plastic as far as possible
- using local ingredients to create delicious Western dishes
- composting our food waste
- avoiding aircon (using fans instead)
- hiring locals and training them
- fair wages, humane work hours and benefits for our staff.. and more!

We're not perfect but we're always trying. Come grab a bite and support this ethos with us at The Brightside Bistro!

✨ Our gorgeous handmade pasta getting a moment in the sun ✨

If you didn't know, we make fresh pasta daily in our little kitchen, using just local eggs and flour.

If you've never tried fresh pasta, it's a revelation! It has more flavour and a lovely texture too. We use this for all of our pasta dishes such as Tuscan Chicken Pasta, Pasta Carbonara, Pasta Vongole, Mediterranean Veggie Pasta, and more.

*We also have gluten-free and vegan pasta available at no extra charge

A very happy new year from all of us at The Brightside Bistro!

We opened in April '22 and it's been such a fun journey to meet so many lovely customers (from over 43 countries!) and to serve you our handmade pasta, homemade bread and so much more! We couldn't have asked for more from 2022.

Best wishes to our friends and neighbors too! Looking forward to what 2023 has in store for us all!

New on the menu - our Rustic Ratatouille!

This French style dish of slow-cooked veggies is so fresh and flavourful, and of course really healthy too! We make ours with tomatoes, onions, eggplants colourful bell peppers and aromatic herbs.

You may remember this dish from the movie of the same name, with veggies thinly cut and layered. But our rustic version is closer to the humble origins of this dish. Come give it a try!

No better way to get into a sunshine state of mind, than with a chilled Thai coconut!

Coconuts are so refreshing in this tropical weather, and they're eco-friendly as a takeaway drink too. They're also full of electrolytes and downright delicious.

We get ours from a local seller who sources coconuts from different areas in southern Thailand, as not every province has the right weather and soil conditions for good coconuts year-round! While coconuts can be synonymous with a tropical vacation, there's also so much more to get to know about them!

* We offer glass straws for dine-ins, and paper straws for takeaways

When we can locally source these gorgeous juicy tomatoes and bouncy bocconcini, and we have homegrown basil, what can we do but make a lovely Caprese Salad?

It's a matter of pride for us to showcase these Thai-made "foreign" ingredients, rather than using imported ones that come from hundreds of miles away! They create a dish that is top-quality, low on food miles, and as one customer described it, "Magnifique!".

A recent addition to our desserts is this Panna Cotta Affogato!

It combines our creamy homemade panna cotta with a fresh shot of strong espresso from our neighbour , who make the best coffee in Ao Nang!

You can pour the coffee over, or sip it on the side as you enjoy the panna cotta. And if you would rather have it without coffee, we do serve Vanilla Panna Cotta topped with fragrant lemon zest too!

We've had four days of incessant rain, but luckily it's still cosy in here!

New dessert alert - we now have a lovely Soft Lemon Cake with a Mulberry Glaze! Homemade from scratch, of course.

It's full of lemon flavour thanks to lots of zest and freshly squeezed juice, and has a lovely light but gooey texture... You'd never know it was vegan!

Here's Charlie having a grand old time at the restaurant, distracting everyone with his cute self!

In case you didn't know, The Brightside Bistro is pet-friendly! We love to meet new furry friends, and we can even make them some pet-safe bites to eat.

We would love to see more and more spaces become pet friendly in Krabi!
Pets are welcome at our outdoor and semi-outdoor tables. Please ensure they are well-behaved and on leash.

Thank you .weeat for this lovely photo that showcases some of the local produce we use in our dishes!

✨Southern Thai clams
✨High-quality Thai beef
✨Handmade fresh pasta with local eggs
✨Local salad greens and veggies
✨Krabi cashews

Here we've used them to prepare Clams in White Wine Sauce, Pasta Bolognese, and the Gardens by the Coast salad. Come try them at The Brightside Bistro, just a few steps away from Ao Nang beach!

✨ It's always golden hour at The Brightside Bistro! ✨

If this cloudy weather is getting you down, our gorgeous grilled sandwiches might be the perfect antidote!

Seen here is the Egg and Cheese Sandwich starring our signature sourdough bread, local eggs and lots of cheese, served with our homemade Sriracha Mayo.

It's almost the end of , a wonderful global campaign that encourages people to reduce and refuse plastic. Though we take lots of individual action to reduce plastic in our personal lives, it's a whole other thing in a restaurant kitchen. We can so easily create a big demand for plastic, and in turn a lot of plastic waste. Restaurants often use tons of single use cling film, vacuum bags, branded packaging etc, which the customer often can't see but also can't avoid.

We are always trying to take measures to keep plastic out of our work flow. As a business, we can't avoid some things that come to us delivered in plastic, but we can help break the cycle and avoid adding more to the mix! We're not perfect by any means, but we wish more businesses in Thailand would try harder to reduce their impact on the environment!

For us, its not just for July, but trying to be plastic free is something to focus on all year round.

Why drink regular lemonade when you could have Amethyst Lemonade?!

We make this daily with freshly squeezed lemon juice and add the magical colour-changing twist of butterfly pea flowers.

Thank you for all the love on our Tuscan Chicken Pasta recently! With its creamy herb sauce flecked with sundried tomatoes, we can see why it's so popular.

We also have a version without chicken for vegetarians, and a version without the pasta for those who just want to dig in to the sauce and chicken, with a side of our homemade sourdough bread.

Thank you for visiting us and for taking this photo!

It's now easier to send The Brightside Bistro, Krabi a message.

Here's our Honey-Oat Brown Butter Cookie, basking in the sun. A lovely little pick-me-up for any time of the day!