Midtown Lunch

When Grub Street reported back in September that a place called Thai Market had opened on Venice and Sepulveda, I got pretty pumped.  Not only was the place going to be an actual Thai market, where dry and fresh Thai ingredients could be purchased, but it was also going to feature a “selection of very low-cost traditional dishes made in the kitchen and left heated at a counter up front”.  Because as much as I love Thai Town, how could I not be excited by the possibility of having decent (read: authentic) Thai food on the westside.  (Sorry Natalee Thai… you just don’t cut it.)

Sadly the Department of Health made it over there before I did, and they were forced to close down and renovate the space before they could serve hot food.  (I’m guessing hoping it was just a permit issue?)  Anyway, after months of waiting it appears as if they finally have the hot food bar back up and running and-brace yourself- it’s 3 items for just $5.

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I don’t know about you, but when eating out at Thai restaurants that don’t have a signature dish I’m always tempted to ask the employees or the chef or whomever is serving me what they like to eat. What they would order. After all, if you work at a restaurant you’re going to eat the best thing they serve, right? It’s a foolproof plan to get the best dish on a menu. Sadly, “What do you recommend?” almost always gets mis-translated as “What do you think somebody who looks like me would like?” Which for this short fat Jewish guy is going to always be something safe. Something boring. “Seriously. When your shift is over you sit in the back and eat a plate of pad thai with chicken? I find that hard to believe.”

But there is one way to ensure that you’re eating what they’re eating. Ensure that they’re not toning it down, or replacing the “real” food with the short fat Jewish guy food.  Go to a place where only restaurant employees eat. And LAX-C might be just that place.

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Back in April, Savuer put together a 24 hour guide to eating Thai food in Los Angeles with dishes and restaurants for every conceivable time and mood.  For lunch they suggested a bowl of khao soi from Spicy BBQ (Noon), the steam table at LAX-C downtown (1pm) and the pad thai salad from Essan Thai (2pm).  But there was plenty more on the list that could be eaten for lunch, including Ruen Pair’s chicken prik king- which totally caught my eye.

Ruen Pair is known primarily as a late night place (Saveur suggested 10pm as the ideal time to eat there), but they are open for lunch.  And even though there is no lunch menu specifically, almost all of their dishes are under $10.

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Back in January I was pretty excited to read about a new Thai place Downtown called Esaan: A Taste of Thai.  From the sounds of the Squid Ink article (which I now realize I might have only skimmed) it sounded like Essan would be perfect for Downtown lunchers who didn’t want to make the trek up the 101 to Thai Town.  The name didn’t hurt either.  I’m no expert on the regional cuisines of Thailand but “Esaan” sounds pretty authentic- right?  Inclusion in Saveur’s 24 Hours of Thai Food in L.A. sealed the deal- I needed to check this place out.

Sadly, on my first visit I realized the truth.  There is no mistaking Essan for a real taste of Thailand (or even Thai Town.)  It’s a straight up fast casual sandwich and salad place that transforms Thai (and Vietnamese) dishes into yuppified lunches that would be deemed acceptable by the Downtown L.A. lunch crowd.   Case in point?  The “Pad Thai Salad”, a salad featuring “classic pad thai ingredients” tossed with spaghetti (yes, you read that right.)   It could easily be considered an abomination, except for one thing.  I kind of loved it.

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Don’t know I how I missed this one (probably had something to do with this) but two weeks ago Savuer published a 24 hour guide to the best Thai food eating in Los Angeles. It included Midtown Lunch Thai Town favorites Sapp Coffee Shop, Pa Ord, Hoy Ka, Spicy BBQ, Ganda, Siam Sunset and Jitlada, plus NoHo stand out Sri Siam.  But it also added a few new places to my list, like Essan Thai in Downtown L.A., LAX-C in Chinatown, and the prik king from Ruen Pair in Hollywood. Related: Midtown Lunch Thai Food Posts

Ever since visiting Thailand back in 2007 I’ve been on a futile quest to recapture some of the great meals I had there, minus the expensive plane ticket.  Pad thai from a street cart in Bangkok, khao soi from a night market in Chiang Mai, rice noodle soup from a shack in Phitsanluk (oh, how I miss you legs hanging rice noodles.)  So back in July when The Guru called Siam Sunset, a coffee shop looking restaurant connected to an America’s Best Value Inn,  the Thai-est Thai restaurant in Thai-Town I was instantly interested.  He described it as being the cafe you’d find around the corner from your apartment in Bangkok, but the thing that got me most excited by the review was the fact that they have a menu of specials for just $3.95.  That’s right.  4 bucks!

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Last month I indulged my new-found craving for Thai boat noodles by embarking on an epic crawl across Hollywood’s Thai Town.  My goal? To help people determine which boat noodle soup was right for them based on personal taste.  The conclusion?  After 9 bowl of boat noodles, eaten at 5 different restaurants, in less than two weeks, I could conclusively say that… I probably wouldn’t need to eat boat noodles again for a long time!  Or so I thought. I’ve been finding it hard to stay away from Sapp Coffee Shop since then… the bare bones boat noodle spot on Hollywood Blvd. that was featured on No Reservations and comes highly recommended by The Guru.  And yet, it’s not the boat noodles that keep bringing me back (even though their version is arguably the best.)  It’s actually the rest of the stuff on the menu that has me going back to Sapp again and again.

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