Leng Kee

About

Every city has its dependable any-time kitchen, and in Central Pattaya it’s Leng Kee. This long-running Thai-Chinese institution trades atmosphere for reliability: honest cooking, generous portions, fair prices, and famously long hours — the current Google listing still says open 24 hours, seven days, and nobody in town seems to remember it ever being dark.

The setting tells you everything: a big, open-fronted, air-conditioned hall on Central Pattaya Road with lacquered roast ducks hanging at the entrance and live crab and prawn tanks beside them. It sits within the LK Hotel group’s cluster of buildings (same family of businesses), and it feeds everyone — Thai families after temple visits, night-shift workers, expats with 3am noodle cravings, and tourists who wandered in because it was the only proper kitchen still lit. Google has it at 4.0 across more than 2,000 reviews, TripAdvisor the same across 300+ — the profile of a place that’s been feeding a whole city for decades rather than chasing stars.

Menu highlights & prices

The menu is enormous — hundreds of items across roast meats, noodles, rice plates, congee, tom yum, stir-fries and tank-fresh seafood. Don’t overthink it. Approximate prices from 2026 reviews (menus change; seafood is priced by size):

• Roast duck — the calling card. A large sharing plate runs about ฿510; the single-plate duck rice (khao na ped) is the budget classic, historically well under ฿150.
• Khao moo daeng — red BBQ pork on rice; the other single-plate staple.
• Poo pad pong karee — whole crab fried in curry powder, about ฿1,500. Superb, and the single biggest cause of bill shock — that’s the price of a whole crab, so order it knowingly.
• Goong ob woonsen — prawns baked with glass noodles, around ฿750.
• Whole fish, steamed or fried — from roughly ฿410 depending on the fish.
• Noodle soups and congee (jok) — mostly around ฿90–150; the reason the 24-hour opening matters.
• Stir-fry standards — pad kra pao around ฿140, morning glory around ฿105.
• Massaman curry — a quiet favorite in recent reviews.

The pattern: eat single-plate Thai-Chinese comfort food and it’s cheap; go for the duck-and-seafood banquet and the bill climbs to real-restaurant territory. Both are fair for what arrives.

Hours & practical info

• Hours: open 24 hours, daily, per current listings. Still worth confirming for odd hours; one 2026 reviewer noted the hall is quieter these days than in its packed heyday.
• Phone: 038-426-291, 038-429-141 or 083-000-8388
• Price band: ฿฿ — cheap plates, mid-priced feasts
• Setting: big, bright, functional — air-con, fast turnover, zero romance

Location & getting there

Leng Kee is at 341/3-6 Moo 9 on Central Pattaya Road (Pattaya Klang), on the stretch beside the LK Hotel group properties a short walk west of the Soi Buakhao junction — you’ll spot the hanging ducks before the sign. Getting there is as easy as it gets in Pattaya: any baht bus running Central Pattaya Road passes the door, it’s under ten minutes’ walk from both Soi Buakhao and Second Road, and drivers know it by name. There’s parking in front for those with wheels.

Tips for ordering

The duck is the benchmark — order it your first visit, either as the ฿510 sharing plate for a table or the single-plate duck rice if you’re solo. Congee with the works is the local move at breakfast or after midnight. On the seafood side, know the prices before you point at the tanks: crab and river prawns are priced per piece or by weight, which is where surprised-tourist reviews come from. Portions run large, so order fewer dishes than a hotel restaurant has trained you to. Service is fastest at the odd hours the place was built for; peak dinner can mean a short wait for a table despite the hall’s size.

Worth knowing

It’s functional and busy rather than romantic, and its long hours make it a lifesaver for a late dinner or an early start. The honest read of recent reviews: the duck and seafood still earn their reputation, but seasoning runs sweet-salty in the Thai-Chinese way, service is brisk-to-indifferent when the hall fills, and the whole-crab and prawn plates now cost enough that some visitors leave calling it “overpriced” — usually because they ordered a ฿1,500 crab in a strip-lit hall. Judge it as what it is: Pattaya’s great any-time kitchen. Order the duck, add a noodle soup at whatever hour you like, save the crab for when you’re celebrating, and Leng Kee does exactly what it has always done.