It’s a sign of maturity to be able to admit you’re wrong, and I’m hopefully creeping a bit closer to behaving like an actual adult by acknowledging that I had it all wrong about Taste of Thai. I don’t remember exactly how my negative bias formed, but prior to last week, I hadn’t been there in years and had no plans to return. Thankfully, a friend offered to pick up a Thai dinner for us, denying me — out of Midwest politeness — the ability to decline and affording me the opportunity to eat a healthy serving of crow.
I selected the Pad Kee Mao, also known as drunken noodles due to its popularity and efficacy as a meal to gobble up during or after a night of heavy alcohol consumption. Though I was stone-cold sober, I can see why it would be the perfect pairing. The thick, chewy rice noodles, bathed in a rich and slightly spicy gravy and heavily laden with fresh Thai basil, delivered a wonderful, carb-heavy mouth feel. You have your choice of protein, and though I’m a habitual tofu or chicken person, I opted for beef this time. For this dish, I think beef is the best choice. The meat was perfectly cooked, a rarity in stir-fry dishes, and it imbued the delectable sauce with its richness, which was balanced out by strands of green onion, the aforementioned basil and crunchy bean sprouts.
This is a dish I’ve had many times from many different places, but this was the best of them all. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve never had a bad plate of drunken noodles, but sometimes it can taste like the dish itself had a long night — overcooked noodles, cooked-to-death vegetables, et cetera. Taste of Thai’s version was fresh, lively and full of rich textures and flavors.
Now that I know better, I’m excited to go back and look at every menu item through this newly informed lens — especially the Taste of Thai Noodle, which boasts the restaurant’s signature tamarind sauce, a unique, earthy, sweet-and-sour taste I can never get enough of. I’d also like to do some drinking there — the restaurant offers a variety of interesting and lovely-looking beverages, including Thai Iced Green Tea and Butterfly Pea Flower Tea. The point is, Taste of Thai, I’m sorry. I was wrong.
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