This two-story venue is hardly the most original opening on Silom. With its glassy European bistro facade, it immediately strikes you as a poor man’s Vesper, the stylish cocktail bar some 500 meters away on the same street. Inside, too, the artcovered walls bring to mind neighboring Eat Me, only we doubt the stuff here sells. (On a completely different tack, its soundtrack of ’80s power ballads, and their modern popsanova renditions, is fairly endemic of the neighborhood, too.)

 

While Heritage’s food doesn’t come anywhere near these Bangkok dining touchstones’, there is a certain charm to its European deli staples and baked goods, if you can navigate past the mediocre French dishes and fusion kee mao-alikes of the menu. It’s hard to go wrong with simple, produce-driven dishes such as parma ham with melon (B380) or burrata rocket salad with walnuts and pomegranate (B290), with its huge dollop of gooey cheese from Hua Hin’s Del Casaro. Both dishes are unassuming and bursting with freshness, if a tad pricey.

 

The heartier mains, however, reveal a lack of finesse in the kitchen (though, rest assured, all dishes come plated up with massive sprigs of rosemary). The Australian Angus beef steak (B540) may be generously sized for the price, but our medium-rare ribeye was gristly, underdone, unseasoned and a little buttery on our last visit. The side of “rustic fried potato” suffered a similarly flavorless fate. Better is the homey coq au vin (chicken braised in red wine, B490) which, though one-dimensional with only massive hunks of potato for accompaniment, features a thick gravy that’s rich and salty, as well as juicy, tender chicken.

 

The bakery display case is not just for decoration, showing off a decent range of breads (from B60), tarts, eclairs (both from B80) and croissants (B40) that come from the same kitchen as Heritage’s smaller Ekkamai establishment. The croissants, especially, are decent, and at B40 the pain au chocolat represents good value.

 

This is not fine dining—for a self-proclaimed French bistro, the wine list is downright sad—but we’ll take Heritage’s attempt at handcrafted fare over the lipservice paid by similar bistros in Silom and beyond (looking at you Bitterman, Dexter).

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This review took place in May 2015 and is based on a visit to the restaurant without the restaurant's knowledge. For more on BK's review policy, click here.