Somboon Thai Shop

Half Thai grocery, half noodle bar, and easy to walk straight past - which is exactly why it belongs here. Somboon sits on Sidwell Street doing one thing seriously: proper Thai noodles, made the way they would be made at home.

Linda runs it, and everything is made in house, fresh, every day - the noodles, the dips, the sauces, all of it. You eat among the shop shelves, and with a hot bowl in front of you it feels closer to a Bangkok street counter than an English high street.

Go at the weekend and there is one more reason: Hainan chicken rice, the weekend special the regulars plan around. Open every day of the week.

The people who find Somboon rate it 4.8 stars. The problem is finding it - and that is the whole point of this guide.