A Thai chef shaped by kitchens across seven countries is bringing global techniques, family memory and personal attention together to create food that makes diners in Qatar feel at home.
Somruethai Suksamai, known as Chef Ninja for her speed in the kitchen, has spent nearly 26 years building a career that began with Japanese cuisine and developed into a personal interpretation of Thai cooking.
Now leading the culinary team at Benjarong Doha, she told Gulf Times that her journey started in 2000, when she trained in Japanese cuisine for two years. She later spent seven years cooking Thai food in Thailand before working in India, Mexico, Switzerland, Sri Lanka, China and Nepal, arriving in Qatar in 2021.
“I learnt techniques from Japanese and Chinese cooking and adapted them into Thai cuisine,” she said.
By 2017, those influences had encouraged her to explore a modern style while keeping Thai flavours at the centre of each dish.
The food that best represents her, however, comes from home. Chef Ninja said diners often remember her homemade curry paste, based on a recipe passed down by her mother from southern Thailand.
“My curry paste is my mother’s recipe, and that is why it is different,” she said. “It is a little spicier and has a stronger taste.”
Working in Qatar has also taught her that authenticity does not mean serving every guest in exactly the same way. Diners have different preferences for spice, sweetness and sourness, so she makes conversation part of the cooking process.
“I go to the table and talk to the guest first,” she said. “I ask whether they like spicy, sweet or sour flavours, so I understand exactly what they need.”
That attention has helped her build relationships with returning diners. Some describe the restaurant as a “second home”, she said, while she makes an effort to remember names and individual preferences.
During a recent cooking class, Chef Ninja selected Tom Yum because of its place in Thai culinary identity and its aromatic ingredients, including lemongrass and galangal. The second dish was deliberately simple, using ingredients participants could find in Qatar supermarkets and recreate at home.
She also sought to challenge the belief that Thai curries should always be very thick.
“Thai curry is different,” she said. “It is not too thick and not too light. It is balanced, and we use Thai herbs such as lemongrass, galangal, garlic, shallots and chilli.”
For Chef Ninja, preserving tradition is not about refusing change. It is about carrying family memory forward, learning from every kitchen and listening closely enough to make each guest feel understood.