Brink15 Posted February 15, 2003 Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 For those guys who don't live in the LOS how are the Thai restaurants in your home country? Are they authentic or greatly adapted to local tastes? What types of things do they specialize in? Have they borrowed from other cuisines? Also, what is the availability of Thai products in grocery stores or Asian markets in your area? Where I am, Tampa Bay Florida, the Thai restaurants range from abysmal to fairly good. I'm biased as nothing is as good as it was in Thailand. My wife is actually a chef in a Thai restaurant and has worked in another here and one in Maine. Do to our connection with the industry I?ve had a chance to check out most of the restaurants in our area. Unfortunately too many Thai chefs assume, often times incorrectly, that their customers want something that tastes like Chinese food with a Thai slant. In most cases they survive only due to the ignorance of their clientele. As soon as any of their customers taste real Thai food they are gone for good. The restaurants here borrow a number of dishes from Chinese cooking especially when it comes to appetizers. Things such as dumplings, crab rangoon, and other non-Thai crap show up on menus all the time. Even Thai dishes like Mee Krob are so altered as to bear no resemblance to their origin. Ahhh, but we have great Asian markets. Lots of Lao, Vietnamese, and some Thai stores. I can get great "new crop" Jasmine rice - khao hormalii, mae sri curry pastes, and most of the other jarred and canned ingredients. The one thing we lack is produce. Yes we get plenty of the usual cilantro, mint, lemongrass, basil, and even makrua (the small eggplants). But kafir lime leaves are very hard to find. I usually buy as much as I can and freeze it. Kar or galangal root is next to impossible to find. But above all I miss the fruit. Once a year we get lychees and "lumyai" (I think the English is longan or something like that). But we almost never get rambuttan or mangosteen. I really miss the fruit more than anything. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest lazyphil Posted February 15, 2003 Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 My Mrs works at a Thai restaurant in our neighboring village and brings home authentic food after every shift, the food is pretty authentic, either she or the other Thai chefs cooks it. As for Asian shops, we have a couple of decent shops stocking pretty much everything for Thai food (just rather expensive), she likes to do more cooking at home as well as bringing food home from the pub. We just bought a new bag of Jasmine rice today, trouble is our rice steamer packed up the other day and we need a new one... FAST , a major pain in the ass! Her pub/restaurant doesn't do the Chinese slant thing either, its a very old (17th C), low beam olde worldy place which used to do sunday roasts and the like and the Thai transition has gone down very well indeed!! Kafir lime leaves and galangal are readily available here, thankfully!...she called me a few hours ago from getting home from work telling me she has a bowl of Masaman curry waiting for me, even our littlun (16 months) eats spicey Thai!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jp1 Posted February 15, 2003 Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 Hi Brink, over here in Tokyo there are numerous Thai restaurants and the price range varies from inexpensive to rather expensive. So far I?ve visited 4 different restaurants. What can be said is that all of them serve great Thai food with original Thai flavor and no concessions to Japanese or Chinese tastes. My favorite restaurant is the ?ERAWAN? which is located in the Roppongi district of downtown Tokyo. This restaurant not only has great Thai food but also a nice Thai ?ambiente? and moreover very cute waitresses from Thailand and Laos. Really a place to enjoy. The ?Erawan? is rather expensive. Prices are very Japanese, the average price p.P. is about 50 ? 60 US$. This includes a beer and service charge. There is no tipping in Japan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rovineye Posted February 15, 2003 Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 The Asian grocery stores are similar to what you describe. Maybe a little better on the produce. Kafir lime leaf and galangal is 50/50 (but both these freeze great!). kafir lime fruit very rare, but the peel is easly substituted. I now have my own kafir lime tree and it is holding its own. Baby makrua (little pea looking eggplants on the stem) only once a year. Green papaya daily . Garlic chive yet to see ever and the coriander/cilantro never comes with the roots. Just about every fruit comes around in turn. No complaints. The restaurant thing is another story. Many many many "Thai" restaurants, and about half a dozen that have Thai food (at the most). Luckily, one of those is a cafe 1 block from my house! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chilli13 Posted February 15, 2003 Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 great posts as I relate to it 100% everyday away from LOS as a solid craving thaifood lover... central Copenhagen where I used to live was actually great for thai food & markeds. unfortunately many restaurents who cater to mainly locals or upmarket are so 'localized' that I can cook much better myself. still plenty of reasenably priced authentic joints each specializing in certain parts of thailand. the markeds ususally stock all you need incl. galanga, kafir leaves, fresh & canned fruits the works. however fresh fruits of the season don't last long are are even already half rotten, but it's nice to see the availability... the UK thai offerings living in the london area it's not too bad, but still I'm a bit dissapointed I must say even I admit I might not have discovered some possible 'gems' yet my local town offers a few thai restaurents, but nothing to scream about. no markeds at all except one next town so depend on the supermarkeds lousy & far between offerings! london china town/leicester sq. area offers a few thai/chinese shops & the selection is ok. as to restaurents I have yet to find some outstanding ones, but there's severel that's not half bad. anyways compared to the local fare on offer it's actually great Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brink15 Posted February 15, 2003 Author Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 Phil, You must reside in a parallel universe to me. Both our wives work in Thai restaurants in Western countries and we both have kids who are 2 months apart. Weird. I envy you the kafir and galangal. Are rice steamers not readily available there? Just about every Asian market here carries at least two or three varieties. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brink15 Posted February 15, 2003 Author Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 jp1, I envy you for two reasons. 1) You get kick ass Japanese food, which I love. and 2) the Thai food you get is prepared for Asians, and therefore not adapted to Western tastes. I don't know if you follow Iron Chef, one of my guilty pleasures, but Morimoto-san (the Iron Chef Japanese at the end of the series) has moved from Nobu (Robert DeNiro's place) to his own restaurant entitled, funnily enough, Morimoto. It looks amazing. I'm dying to try it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brink15 Posted February 15, 2003 Author Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 I now have my own kafir lime tree and it is holding its own That's a great idea. I bet I could grow one here in Florida if I could find a plant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest lazyphil Posted February 15, 2003 Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 <<You must reside in a parallel universe to me>> Yeah, a bit spooky! <Are rice steamers not readily available there?> It does seem that way, the one we had was a 'Tefal', worked a treat (poor little thing got over worked I guess!!), then today at the Asian store we looked at 'National' cooker, 120 quid!!!...can you f**king believe that :cussing:....I'm gonna go for a scrounge in town tomorrow for one because this aint funny anymore :banghead: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brink15 Posted February 15, 2003 Author Report Share Posted February 15, 2003 What kinds of things do you cook for yourself? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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