Bangkok food courts Vs mall based restaurant branch recommendations

[windy_city_fan]

We are visiting Bangkok for about 2.5 days in December with friends (also headed to Hua Hin for a day and half). Between our 2 families, we have 2 kids aged 5 and 7. The kids are perfectly comfortable eating mildly spicy Thai dishes or satays, Roti Mataba etc. We are staying at the Intercontinental near the Chit Lom BTS. Given our extremely short stay, whats the best places to eat great Thai food? We've heard that food courts can be a decent alternative to eating off the streets (probably the best places to eat). We noticed several eating options around the Chit Lom and Siam BTS stations viz. food courts like Eathai at Central Embassy, Food Loft and food courts in nearby malls like Amarin, Central World, Siam Paragon etc. To add to our confusion, there are also mall based branches of popularly recommended restaurants like Kalpapruek, Taling Pling and Somboon Seafood etc.

We have a couple of questions:

How do these latter restaurant branches compare with the above food courts? 

What would be the best food courts or sit down restaurant branches to eat at in that area (vicinity of Chit Lom and Siam BTS) if we had to narrow down to just 3 meals?

 

We wouldn't mind paying a premium if a particular food court or restaurant offered better quality (fresher) food that isn't dumbed down for farangs but we've also heard that a higher price in Bangkok doesn't always mean better quality!

 

Thanks in advance!

Edited November 5, 2015 by windy_city_fan (log)

[KennethT]

I'm sorry I can't answer your question directly, since I haven't been in a food court in BKK, although I've heard that many of them are quite good.

2.5 days in BKK is not a lot of time, as transportation is not very efficient, unless everywhere you plan to go is directly by a skytrain stop...

To give you some other options - a couple of years ago, I made a detailed food based trip report here: http://www.fodors.com/community/asia/bkk-for-a-couple-of-foodies.cfm