Walking up to the YumYum gates you are instantly wowed by the grand entrance of this historic Georgian building and beautiful courtyard.

Set in the hustle and bustle of Stoke Newington, one of London’s trendiest areas, I knew that my experience was going to be a delight.

With the very English exterior came a very traditional Thai interior from the Koi carp fish residing in the oriental section, where diners are to remove their shoes, to the Asian ornaments and wooden natural furniture.

The courtyard also features a couple of huts, named after Thai islands Koh Samui and Koh Tao, where you can dine al fresco.

Built in 1712, originally as a home for a wealthy family, it was then used as a female mental asylum. I was instantly drawn into the history of this amazing building, studying the plaque on entrance wall.

And with all this info swirling around in my mind, my thoughts turned what an excellent job owner Atique Choudhury has done in restoring this Grade ll listed delight. Mr Choudhury greeted us and showed us to main bar lounge, where we were served spiced prawn crackers and chose between a menu of more than 60 cocktails.

We sampled a few, including the YumYum Mojito, the restaurant’s most popular, which was fresh and minty and a perfect a for sunny day.

We wanted to sample everything on the extensive menu and vowed to keep coming back until we had.

We got through a few though; namely the lamb and peanut butter curry, the Yum Neau (spicy beef salad), the steamed sea bass with chilli, lime and coriander and spinach with garlic and yellow beans.

All of it tasted fresh, authentic and full of vigour. YumYum has many award-winning dishes, including their lamb mussaman, and the ingredients are seasonal.

Dishes like these have helped YumYum to secure a few accolades, their most recent being the Asian Curry Award for best Thai restaurant in 2012. They are also one of the largest Thai venues in Europe.

YumYum has now been open for 21 years and moved to its current abode in 2006, quickly becoming a Stokie institution.

The restaurant will be running competitions over the coming months with some fabulous prizes for readers to win.

Keep your eyes peeled for questions in YumYum’s weekly Gazette adverts – the answers maybe closer then you think...