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The Latest from Jitlada

Jitlada's menu is so long--200 dishes plus other specials posted in the dining room--that you wonder how any kitchen can master so much. 

Perhaps it can't, because you'll see variations, depending upon who is cooking. Still, the food is good enough to keep the restaurant full day after day.

If it's hard to cook such a vast collection of dishes, it's even harder to decide what to eat.

Here are four picks from my last dinner there. 

No. 99, pork short ribs with garlic (at top), is really good, if the cook puts on enough crunchy browned bits of fried garlic. The meat, cut into bite-size pieces and deep-fried, would be good even without the garlic.

Think about ordering No. 145, spicy lamb noodle (above), instead of the usual pad Thai, rad na or pad see ew. You'll get wide noodles with lots of tender chunks of lamb and fresh basil.

Several meats are cooked with garlic and peppper (No. 52), but the kitchen sent out red snapper (above), although it wasn't listed. What really stood out was the bowl of morning glory vine in lemon sauce that came with the fish.

The restaurant can get mildly creative, as in combining two sticky rice desserts, Nos. 170 and 173, so that you could have both mangoes and coconut ice cream on the same plate with the rice.

But why stop there, and Jitlada didn't, adding palm seeds and golden, syrupy garbanzos. That's the sort of surprise that turns up, once the restaurant gets to know you. 

Jitlada Thai restaurant, 5233 1/2 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, Ca 90027. Tel: (323) 667-9809.

Thai Food: Some Like It Crisp

Thai cuisine is famous for its intricate blends of flavor--sweet, salty, sour, bitter, spicy, pungent and so on.

The Thais do a good job with textures too. The one I can't resist is crisp, like in a couple of dishes at Jitlada the other day.

The menu describes koong pear (at top) as deep fried shrimp with a southern curry sauce. No mention of what makes this dish really intriguing--golden fried crispies made from coconut flakes and spices. They ought to bottle those and sell them as cocktail snacks. Crisp fried shallots come with the shrimp too. 

Fried morning glory vine leaves coated with crunchy golden batter go into yam pak boong (above), a sweet, sour, spicy Thai salad. Fried basil leaves add still more crispness.   

This crisp high plunged to a soft finish with Thai coconut custard surrounded by mounds of sweetened sticky rice. It was the same custard that usually comes in a wedge of kabocha squash, minus the kabocha container and covered instead with diced squash.

Jitlada, 5233 1/2 W. Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90027. Tel: (323) 667-9809.

 

Fruit Salad: A Top Thai Dish

Why on earth would anyone order fruit salad in a Thai restaurant?

My lunch companions were not happy when this happened at Lanyamo on Western Avenue.  However, the person who asked for the salad was Thai, and she knew what she was doing.

Her fruit salad turned out to be the best dish we had that day. The other food was OK, but I can hardly remember it thinking about that glorious bowl heaped with fresh fruit, nothing canned. 

The combination included pineapple, mango, apple, cantaloupe, jicama, blueberries and even a few cherry tomatoes, sprinkled with crushed roasted peanuts. 

What made it stand out was the salty-sweet dressing. Thais season fruits with a blend of sugar, fish sauce, lime juice and garlic, and a dash of hot chile. 

Fish sauce with fruit may sound odd, but it works, more effective than salt by itself.

The fruit becomes even more sweet and refreshing, which is a good thing in Thailand's steamy climate, and in hot weather anywhere. 

Lanyamo Thai restaurant, 946 N. Western Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90029. Tel: (323) 466-2958.

Where to Eat Thai in Taipei

Sukothai's food is gorgeous, like palace cuisine, and so delicious that I ate there as often as I could.  

The restaurant is gorgeous too, constructed of polished woods that give the impression of an aristocratic Thai house.

But Sukothai is in Taipei, not Thailand. This is not unusual. Thai food is everywhere, from Bangalore to Great Britain and all over the United States. It's not always well done, but Sukothai could handle the competition if it were in Bangkok.

Chef Phonlaphat Sudsaidee, from Surin province in northeastern Thailand, has put together a menu that samples all regions and ranges from imperial cuisine to street food.

The menu is in English, Chinese and Japanese, but not Thai. Nevertheless, tables are set with forks and big spoons so that one can eat Thai style, pushing food gracefully into the spoon with the fork.

Ordering at random, I chose spicy shrimp with lemongrass--four large, juicy shrimp balanced on a chile-hot, sweet and sour lemon grass mixture (at top). 

It was impressive. And so was stir-fried morning glory vine with shrimp paste (right), an everyday dish in Thailand but not always so well prepared as at Sukothai. 

Grilled beef with lemongrass, shallots and a red chile dip (in the photo below)  stood out because the beef was so good.

About 80 % of Sukothai's ingredients come from Thailand, but this beef came from the United States and was much better than the beef that I've encountered in this dish at home.

And in L.A., I've never had anything like stir-fried slim asparagus stalks with white lily buds, fresh young corn and grape tomatoes, subtly seasoned with the tantalizing flavor of the wok. 

Green papaya salad (som tam) is fine, combining the taste of dried shrimp with fresh shrimp on top (right).

It ought to be good, because it comes from the chef's home region, the northeast (Isaan). 

There are green beans in the green curry, along with round Thai eggplant and peas. Thick and creamy, the curry comes in a heavy black stone bowl that keeps it hot until you finish. You can see it above, with the restaurant in the background.

Desserts are imaginative, like taro cakes (right) topped with coconut cream and presented as if they were petits fours on a plate with Thai marzipan fruits, a fresh strawberry, a tracing of sweet pink sauce and a scattering of coconut chips.

A tall glass of cool, thick coconut milk contains a little of everything that turns up in icy desserts throughout Asia--tiny sago pearls, jackfruit, cantaloupe, translucent palm seeds, pineapple-stuffed lychees, strands of fresh coconut, taro cubes, red and green gelatin strips  and a few large beans.

And then there's the banana cheese roll--yes, bananas combined with mozzarella in a crisp fried spring roll (right).

If you don't like that combination, you would certainly like the bowl of housemade coconut ice cream topped with slightly salted jackfruit shreds that comes with it.

Sukothai Thai restaurant, Sheraton Taipei Hotel, 12 Zhongxiao East Road Section 1, Taipei, Taiwan.  

Don't Miss This Spicy Chicken

You have through Monday to taste really good spicy chicken at Esaan, a Taste of Thai.

Minced chicken with Japanese eggplant, basil and slivers of red and green sweet peppers is a February special at this downtown restaurant. Slightly sweet and  definitely spicy, it's a great buy for $8, which includes rice, either white or brown.

And if you miss the chicken, don't worry. March brings another special, pork panang.

Open for a couple of months, Esaan has expanded its original menu with the new specials and a dessert, taro bread pudding with coconut sauce (at right).

The pudding uses up extra baguettes purchased for sandwiches. And those aren't ordinary sandwiches. One is a Thai version of Vietnamese banh mi. Another contains Thai satay.

For a small takeout place, Esaan puts out serious food. Owner Nattha Quan (bottom, center)  was born in Laos and lived in northeastern Thailand (the area known as Esaan) as a child, so this is her native cuisine.

Some of her dishes are fusion, like pad Thai salad with spaghetti (at right).

And then there are classics such as tom yum soup, green papaya salad and yellow curry with chicken,  sweet and regular potatoes, onions and carrots.

If you're in a hurry, spring rolls are packaged and ready to go, but there's only a short wait for any dish. 

Esaan faces the Central Library and caters to the downtown working crowd, so it is closed on weekends. That's why only two days are left to get the February special.
  

Esaan, a Taste of Thai, 601 W. 5th St., Los Angeles, CA 90071. Tel: (213) 488-9995. Open Monday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Head to Vegas for Thai Food

It's a long drive from Hollywood's Thai Town to Las Vegas, but if you're after really good Thai food, you won't mind the trip.

The place you'll eat is Lemongrass, the first Thai restaurant to open in a Strip hotel, the Aria Resort & Casino. Not everything is perfect, but you can get some real standouts.

One is bua loi, a dessert that is totally unglamorous, it's so white and bland. But dig in, and you'll go into raptures over this soft, warm comfort food.

Tiny, chewy glutinous rice dumplings flavored with pandan, taro and pumpkin float in sweet warm coconut milk along with slices of fresh young coconut meat.

Thai Town bua loi can be good, but it doesn't measure up to this one.

The northeastern minced meat dish larb is excellent too, nice and acidic, with an underlying earthiness from ground roasted rice. 

Not on the menu when Lemongrass opened last December, larb had to be added because so many people asked for it.

The executive chef is Krairit Krairavee, from Bangkok.

I heard about him from Chef McDang, who tours Le Cordon Bleu Colleges of Culinary Arts in the United States once a year, teaching the principles of Thai cooking. There's a Cordon Bleu in Las Vegas, and while there this summer, Chef McDang ate at Lemongrass.

Chef Krairavee, he said, gets the Thai flavor profile right, so that even when he puts together something original, it has true Thai taste.

Given the Las Vegas location, however, the restaurant has to consider the tastes of its clientele.

Spring rolls filled with salmon, Cheddar cheese and basil (above)? That's a long way from Bangkok, but such a dish wouldn't scare off a tourist leery of anything too foreign.

Chef Krairavee says, and I think I detected a note of apology, that Vegas diners want their green curry thick and creamy. The Lemongrass green curry is as gorgeous as the rest of the food, but those of us who eat in Thai Town, or Thailand, would like it a little more green and a little less creamy.

No quarrel with the shrimp spring rolls. Large shrimp are neatly wrapped, then tied with  a noodle, deep fried, and served with syrupy plum sauce. That, larb and bua loi would make a perfect meal, in my opinion.

Lemongrass has added more Chinese dishes than were on the original menu. On weekends, there's midday dim sum--they'll even pull a cart up to your table.

Although it's Hong Kong style, the dim sum has some Thai touches, such as spicy red curry siu mai and buns filled with minced chicken and Thai basil (right). There's a minced pork red curry bun too and green curry mushroom caps.

The restaurant looks sensational, as you would expect from its glamorous location.  Design elements were drawn from the Thai silk weaving industry. Square fixtures modeled on handlooms dangle from the ceiling of the dining room. Spools are stacked high on a wall.

The look is dark, which is cool and soothing, but strategic lighting lets you see what you eat.

If you're alone or want to watch cooks in action, you can sit at a satay bar.

I haven't seen bacon satay (right) in Thailand, but it's at Lemongrass (also lobster satay for high rollers.)

The bacon isn't Oscar Mayer but pork belly grilled on sticks. You have to relish fat to enjoy this, but the cucumber relish and peanut sauce that go with it are first rate.

You could have Thai iced tea with your food, but the proper choice is the signature drink, lemongrass tea--hot tea brewed with fresh lemongrass. It's a nice restorative, if you've whiled away too much time at the gaming tables.   

 

 

A Meal for the Buddha at Yai

I was the first person to walk into Yai for lunch, only to find that one table had already been set with food.

It wasn't for me or any other customer. It was an offering to the Buddha, placed so that it faced his shrine.

Offerings in Thai and Chinese businesses are usually less conspicuous, placed on the floor, or on a ledge. This was the first time I had seen one arranged as if the Buddha himself had made a reservation for lunch. 

It was a nice, light meal--a bowl of noodles with chicken and soup, a fat green apple and a bright drink of red syrup diluted with water.  Another glass held incense sticks.

Thais are so devout, they wouldn't think twice about giving up space that could have been occupied by at least four paying customers for a religious tribute. 

It was a good sign that my lunch would be prepared by cooks with such spirit. The food, crispy pork, jungle curry, grilled shrimp and stir-fried noodles, was delicious. But that is usually the case at Yai.

Yai Thai-Chinese restaurant, 5757 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90028. Tel: (323) 462-0292.

Nam Tok--A Winner at Yai

Any assortment of dishes will include one that stands out.  Maybe it really is better than the others. Maybe it just suits your taste that day, while another time you'd  rave about something else.

But let's skip the intellectualizing and give an example.  The winner at Yai in Hollywood the other day was the spicy northern Thai beef salad nam tok.  The name means waterfall, perhaps linked to the juices that drip out of the meat as it is grilled.

Yai's nam tok looked so good, with bits of red chile and chile seeds clinging to the sliced meat, crunchy ground roasted rice adding texture and toasty flavor, sliced red onion and lots of zingy lime dressing to eat with rice and strips of raw cabbage.

It would have been a winner no matter the competition.

Nam tok is $7.25 at Yai Restaurant, 5757 Hollywood Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90028. Tel: (323) 462-0292. Open daily from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.

 

 

Road Food in Chanthaburi

Eating on the road guarantees some of the best food you can get, that is, if you are on your way from Bangkok to the east coast resort island Koh Chang.

This is judging by the two places my van stopped going and coming from the island. Both were in Chanthaburi Province.

One restaurant turned out beautiful fresh seafood. The other offered regional dishes. Both were charmingly local, not tourist places that water down food to please foreigners.  

At the first stop, Pooja Thachaleb, I could look into the open kitchen, where women were cutting up vegetables and frying freshly caught seabass that would come to the table with a spicy shredded green mango sauce. 

Pooja means crab, and the restaurant logo is a smiling cross-eyed crab wearing a chef's hat. Perhaps he's smiling because he's the only one who escaped the cookpot.

My table was almost overwhelmed with big platters of cracked crab and crab cakes with plum sauce that showed how well the restaurant cooks its signature dishes.

More platters held huge whole prawns, prawns stir-fried with very fresh crisp peapods and jumbo-sized prawn cakes that could have passed for donuts.

The restaurant sent out big bowls of fried rice too and, for dessert, chunks of watermelon, pineapple and green mango to dip into a mixture of  sugar, salt and red chile.

I don't imagine there are many roadside restaurants where you can eat your fill of such luxury dishes for about $8 a person. 

Pooja Thachaleb Restaurant, 136/2 Moo 9, Thachaleb Bangkaja,  Muang Chanthaburi, Chanthaburi, Thailand. Tel:  (039) 391129.

After a couple of days in Koh Chang, it was time to move on to Pattaya. The first stop after getting off the ferry was the town of Chanthaburi, which is known for gems. Few shops in the wholesale jewelry district were open that day, and I only bought a stuffed cloth cat from a sidewalk stand.

But Chanthorn Phochana was open, and my group went in to try such local dishes as fried Chanthaburi style noodles with crab.

The noodles were soft but chewy, and the tiny fresh water crabs had been deep-fried in their shells. The sauce was spicy and slightly sweet.

Deep-fried Vietnamese spring rolls had been prepared Chanthaburi style, hardly an exotic dish because Vietnam is so close to Thailand.

What stood out was an extraordinary crab dip flavored with kaffir lime leaf, lemongrass and shallots.

Set around the bowl were the dippers--not carrots, celery and broccoli, but bitter melon, okra, winged beans, corn, cabbage and an intensely bitter herb, maera kaenuk (that's only a guess at the spelling) that Thais think can prevent cancer and HIV.

Bai cha muang, another herb that I hadn't seen before, appeared in a soup and in a pork curry that was so good I was delighted to learn that the restaurant sells it canned.

As soon as I had the tempting can in my hand, ready to impress my friends back home with this unusual dish, I remembered that meats aren't allowed into the United States. I put it back and bought instead a crisp durian snack with coconut and Thai herbs to eat on the road.

Drinks and desserts were limited. We ordered canned mangosteen juice and sala in syrup. Sala, a small tropical palm fruit, is fairly common, but the rest of our lunch was not.  To find food of this type, you have to get off the tourist track, and Chanthaburi is a good place to do that.

Chanthorn Phochana, 98/2 Benjamarachuthit Road Watmai, Muang Chanthaburi, Chanthaburi, Thailand. Tel: (039) 02350.

From Bombs to Wine at Naj

During World War II, Thailand formed an alliance with Japan and therefore was bombed by the allied powers. 

The Thai historical novel "Si Phaendin" (Four Reigns) by Kukrit Pramoj, which touches on this period, describes the raids, the damage and the shelters constructed for protection.

You can see evidence of this today if you go to Naj restaurant in Bangkok. Naj opened in 2004 in a house that dates back 120 years. Through glass panels in the floor of the dining room, you can look down into what was once a bomb shelter. Today it has a much better use. It's a wine cellar.

But you may not want to order wine at Naj, because the restaurant has such interesting cocktails. Its tom yum tini made it into my Bangkok top 10 list. There's a lemon grass and lychee gin fizz (right) that is also worth consideration. And a tom kha tini made with vodka, coconut rum and galangal. And--the name is no surprise--a My Thai that combines rum, lime and pineapple juices and basil leaves.

The food at Naj is Thai, not fusion like the cocktails. Some say Naj has the best pomelo salad in town. It certainly was good, and it too went into my Bangkok best list.

Another specialty is pork spareribs in panang sauce (right). The ribs are cooked for hours until the meat is fork tender, and the sauce goes light on coconut milk. Both panang and massaman sauces at Naj are less sweet than their counterparts in the United States.

Another standout is prawns with cashews and minced chicken in a sweet sauce that combines tamarind, fish sauce and palm sugar.

Sweet-sour garoupa (right) is almost like candy. But not everything is sugary.  Naj does an excellent tom yum goong, the classic hot and sour shrimp soup with straw mushrooms, lime leaves and slivered lemon grass.

Four people who are willing to pay $100 (1,200 Thai baht)  can have a platter of grilled seafood including crab, a whole fish, prawns and scallops in a spicy sour sauce, accompanied by four glasses of Chardonnay--whose Chardonnay the menu doesn't say. 

The grill extravaganza is the last in a group of 23 recommended dishes, just part of a menu so long that almost every Thai dish you've ever heard of is on it.

Naj is named for its founder, Luckananaj Markawat, who trained the staff in cooking. It's her second restaurant, following Oam Thong, a smaller place that she opened off Sukhumvit Road in 1984.

With Naj, she stepped up to a grander, dressy place. The atmosphere is colonial, with burnished teak floors, a profusion of orchids and, along one wall, a row of golden pagodas. It's a pretty place  that makes a nice escape from Bangkok crowds and traffic.

Naj Exquisite Thai Cuisine, 42 Convent Road, Silom, Bangkok 10500, Thailand. Tel: (662) 632-2811.