After a really delicious Thai meal at a fully vegan restaurant earlier in the year (read about Mali Vegan Thai here), we were champing at the bit to get more vegan Thai food in Berlin a few weeks ago. I’d seen Li.Ke recommended online many times, and it seemed like our best bet. It was absolutely jumping on a Saturday evening, so reservations are definitely recommended (though it took a few days for our online reservation to be confirmed). It was busy and noisy and quite casual, with really fast service, so not necessarily the spot for a quiet conversation or fancy affair. The menu includes small and large plates, but generally it seemed to have a Thai tapas vibe to it.

You place your order by filling in a form marking which dishes you want – I love this way of ordering! We got six dishes to share, which was plenty because I was not hungry at all.

I almost overlooked the prawn dish on the menu, but fortunately Dr HH spotted it in the description of the thod gratiem. This was battered prawns with stir-fried vegetables. The prawns were tasty, but the batter was a bit too thick and lessened their impact. The stir fry was really flavoursome and well seasoned.

Dr HH had actually been to this spot before on a solo jaunt and recommended the tau hu thod, which was tofu in a crispy coating with peanut sauce. The peanut sauce was tasty, but the tofu was underseasoned. The crispy coating was great. It was a fun little morsel.

I personally didn’t try the gari fak thong (yellow lemongrass curry), but Dr HH was a bit underwhelmed by it. The sauce was not as flavoursome as he had hoped. There was some lemongrass coming through, but the overall flavours were not strong enough for his liking.

We gambled on the gui chai, which is something I don’t think I’d really seen before: baked rice cakes with spring onions and soy chili sauce. The rice cakes had a lovely gelatinous texture, with a crisp edge too. The dipping sauce brought some lovely flavour.

Dr HH’s favourite dish was the Matsaman curry, which involved coconut milk, carrots, tofu, jackfruit, potatoes, onions and peanuts. He thought it was a lovely rich sauce with lots of flavour. The vegetable chunks well cooked and there was a good amount of tofu and jackfruit, so it felt quite substantial.

And I never thought I’d say it, but my favourite dish was…a salad! The kao nem was billed as a crispy baked curry rice salad. The rice had a nice crispy texture in the places where it had caught. The dish was really tasty from the fresh herbs and had some zingy citrus flavours too. I might have to find a recipe so I can make this at home!

We had such a great time at this restaurant. I love a menu that enables you to try lots of different dishes, and just getting some good quality Thai food was a real treat.