Tag Archives: Thailand

Thailand Yums 2

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I really wanted to title this “Thai 2, the Eclectic Bugaloo” but it didn’t look quite right on preview.

Since the Yum boxes were in repeats and I canceled the subscription after the current one runs out I had pretty much decided to stop reviewing them. Indeed, the UK box was thoroughly un-photoed and un-remarked on but the Thailand box flipped that script after I tried the first 2 items. The first one had me nibbling the hook and the second one set it.

The first one I grabbed was the bag of Tasto Devil potato chips. They were supposed to be spicy with flames on the bag and blah blah blah. Everything that has ever been “spicy” was medium at best in all the months I’ve been trying these. Imagine my surprise when I reached in and grabbed a couple of chips, tossed them in my mouth and before I could finish the second crunch I was feeling the heat. Wow these did have Thai chili flavor going on. I was impressed as I felt my scalp beginning to tingle. Then I discovered they didn’t just have powdered chili coating the chips they included a goodly amount of dried chilis in with the chips. I found this out when I started chewing on one that infiltrated my mouth by hiding between two of the chips. It was hot. My eyes wanted to help my mouth by providing liquid but since crying wouldn’t really help I vetoed that idea. OK they weren’t quite that hot but they were no joke and I did break a sweat.

The next contestant from the Thai Yum box was the bag of sea salt & caramel coconut chips. These were simply great. Strips of crunchy dried coconut, lightly salted and boldly caramelled (I’m sure that should be a valid word). The caramel was not like chewy gooey caramel but only the flavor so if I hadn’t read it on the package it would have been a total surprise and even knowing it I was impressed with the execution.

Because the folks from Thailand apparently love their salt there were also some salt and lime gummy’s too. Another hit snack. They were about 1/4″ wide (6.4mm) and 2 1/2 – 3″ long (64-76mm) gummy strips lightly covered in a fine powder of salt and sugar and a nice lime taste. I would actually have liked to have someone who drinks tequila eat one of these after a shot just to get their thoughts. Sadly I didn’t save any for my tequila drinking friends.

I didn’t bother taking a photo of what I considered the weirdest of the snacks but it is worth mentioning as a cautionary tail if nothing else. It was a corn flavored chew from the Yum bag. I’ll give them this, it was definitely corn flavored but it was also like chewing wax that started morphing into plastic and I’m sure if I’d swallowed it that thing would have rattled my digestive system for quite a while.

The last one I’ll mention was one I saved for last because I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to care for it and wanted to put off confirmation until there was no other choice.

The name of this is Z Roll Farm Fried Shrimp & Salad Cream. A seaweed wrapped potato stick with fried shrimp and mayonnaise flavors. With that name and description you might understand why I approached this with trepidation. I like the individual elements here but as a combo and based on experience with seaweed and seafood snacks I cringed opening the pack. I had a bit of hope when it didn’t reek like a week old dead fish in a tidal pool. Alas, the first bite confirmed my suspicions that this would not be a snack for me. The unusual texture combination of the semi-pliable seaweed and the powdery crunch of the potato stick followed by the respective tastes was, shall we say, off putting to me. I’m sure if I’d grown up with this as a snack option I’d have a different opinion but as it was this was a big ole “NOPE”.

If the next month is a repeat I hope they deliver as well as the Thai box did. Even the crappy ones were worth talking about.

Thailand Yum

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Siamese Snacks

The September Yum snack box was Thailand themed and continued the streak of fun boxes loaded with interesting and unusual snacks.

 

I’ll continue highlighting my favorite and number two as well as the worst and most unusual but I’m also going to mention a couple of the others that just need to be touched on because they were both weird and weirdly good.

So the favorite was the first one I tried from the box.

Coconut Snack Bites sounded like a can’t go wrong and that big package looked like it was going to be a two session snacking event.  Alas it was a case of excess packaging but the contents were delicious.  They were little round golden brown crispy treats with a nice toasted coconut flavor. Real shredded coconut that was not too sweet so you got the natural coconut taste.  The package says crispy and yummy and I concur.

My number two was the Coconut Cream-O Choco Plus.

This was a five pack of two cookie sleeves so they were easy to parcel out and enjoy several times.  The cookies had chocolate and coconut flavored caramel. The cookie part tasted like a regular butter cookie that had a well in the center lined with a very thin layer of caramel with coconut flavoring at the bottom and topped with chocolate. The chocolate was soft, the caramel was a bit chewy and the cookie was crumbly. All working in harmony to provide an enjoyable snack.

The worst snack was the only snack I haven’t finished from any box to date.

Big Roll Grilled Seaweed roll Tom Yum Goong flavor.  This was the second snack I tried from the box and thank goodness it was not indicative of the rest of the box.  I’m not a seaweed hater but the mascot looks like Eric Cartman so maybe that should have been a hint.  Man was this not good.  It was a thin, fragile seaweed roll that was flaky and on first taste had a strong salty sea / fishy taste and then I forgot about that as the hot and sour flavor came to the fore.  The hot and sour wasn’t bad but trying to get by that fishy salty nastiness wasn’t worth it with a box of other choices.  One of which was the most unusual.

Sticky rice with coconut cream and mango.  Living up to the name it was very moist and sticky.  Unusual but quite tasty.  At first the coconut and mango were both mild flavors but definitely present.  Then as I got into it there turned out to be a very ripe piece of mango in the center of the sticky rice.  The look, feel and texture could easily be off-putting but it was a tasty little snack once you got past all that.

Two others I liked that were just odd enough I wanted to share them as well.

The Juzi-C gummy strip was a spicy pineapple fruit roll up type of snack.  The strip itself was thin, flat and coated with a light dusting of sugar crystals.  A bite of the stretchy treat got you a sweet pineapple taste that resolved into an eye opening spicy sweet treat.  It wasn’t too hot when balanced by the sugar but it was definitely not something you have every day.

The other was a savory snack.  Jack ‘n Jill sausage and sweet chili potato rings.  This snack was on my radar to be in the weird column because it had a hot dog on the package and it was unusual. They were wee little crunchy rings.  After I opened the package the first thing to hit me was the smell.  They smelled like hot dogs so the package was no lie and as I was eating them the immediate impression was the same but a microsecond after they hit your tongue the sweet chili flavor takes over. Not bad but staying in the weird column.

I signed up for a 6 month subscription and this was box 5 and unless box number 6 totally tanks I’m definitely going to let the auto renew go through.  If you’re interested in securing a box or more for yourself use the link below and you’ll get $5 off and so will I on my future purchases.

Universal Yums referral link

 








Thai One On

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Thailand

This restaurant has been on my list since the beginning of the blog but I could never catch it when open when I was in the mood for Thai.  This time though it was an unplanned visit as I noticed it was open when I was on my way to run another errand so I hit the brakes hard and swung into the parking lot (much to the annoyance of the twerp who had been following too close in spite of having a free lane to the left, so bonus).

The restaurant in question is Sila Thai.  I’d seen good reviews for the place on Yelp & Google and it was only a couple of miles from the house so I had great hopes for my lunch and those hopes were met.  First impressions.  The place shares a building with a Chinese restaurant, they are essentially back to back so it made me wonder if they shared a kitchen and my hopes were going to be dashed for authentic Thai.  Upon entering it looks like a lot of other Asian restaurants with some decorations clearly from Thailand.  They do have a bar to the left of the main seating area that is also the counter where you pay on the way out.  I was greeted and seated quickly by a pleasant lady who welcomed me to the restaurant.  There weren’t many people there when I arrived but there were a lot when I left.

They have a nice lunch menu with a two price plan, $8 for chicken or tofu and $9 for beef or pork and then 3 pages of dishes to which you can add one of those.  The list varies from Sauteed dishes to fried rices, curries and noodles.  Plus you got a soup or salad and vegetable dumpling.  I chose the egg drop soup.

This egg drop soup was different than any I’d had before.  Upon first slurp I noticed it had a significant sesame oil component, which I quite liked.  Next was the vegetables which were swimming around in there, carrots, peas, corn & tofu, not a lot of any of them but enough add some color and additional textures.  Enjoyable start.  For my entree I’d chosen the Pad Woon Sen from the Noodle section of the menu since it was something I had never tried before.

I would definitely recommend this dish.  This was a significant plate of food.  The base was clear glass noodles and it also had cabbage, cauliflower, red & green peppers, onions, mushrooms, baby corn, zucchini, sprouts, eggs, and chicken with a brown sauce.  Wow, there were a lot of different textures to go along with the noodles and there was not a lot of any one thing but enough to get a taste of each.  The chicken was grilled and that brown sauce was like a smokey, slightly sweet soy sauce that I found delicious.  Oh yeah and there was a vegetable dumpling that wasn’t bad but it was a vegetable dumpling so I had low expectations anyway.

A couple more general notes.  The staff was all very friendly.  They have spicy dishes and like many Thai restaurants I’ve been too they let you specify the spiciness on a 1-5 scale so you can try those dishes without being afraid of frying your taste buds.  The food was delivered fast and hot, I hadn’t finished the egg drop soup before the pad woon sen was delivered so this is a reasonable option for people trying to grab lunch on a lunch break from work.  They had some deserts that I was thinking about trying but there was so much food in the main meal I just didn’t have the room.

Overall I’d say I’m sorry I didn’t make more of an effort to try them sooner and I will definitely be going back for some non-blog lunches.  If you didn’t check out the Tell Me More page last time Thailand was the subject check it out now.

 








Thai One On

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Thailand

Thailand Stamp

Staying with the warm climate but moving halfway around the globe this week, Thailand was the country and Sunrise Thai Cuisine, #sunrisethai, was the place to eat.  Interestingly (to me at least) an early iteration of this restaurant called Tropical Sunrise was the first place I visited for breakfast when I started posting weekend food pictures.

The name has changed but I believe it still has the same owners as the interior didn’t change and my waitress was the same one who waited on me before so there is definite continuity.

The menu is certainly different and has a number of authentic Thai foods including the ever popular Pad Thai.  I decided to go for the chicken larb with a #3 on the 5 point spicy scale.  My confidence in choosing the dish was reinforced when the waitress smiled, nodded enthusiastically and said “Good choice”.  It was too.

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I’ll admit when I first read it on the menu I thought it said LARP and for the non-geeky that is Live Action Role Playing and I was trying to figure out how that wound up being a salad.  After the double take and reading the description this was a salad I could get on board with.  The salad base was iceberg lettuce and cucumbers and the ground chicken part consisted of; chicken (duh), basil leaves, green onions, lime juice, chiles, fish sauce, kaffir lime leaves and cilantro.  Very tasty combo, throw in the rice and there was no room for dessert.  Which was a shame because I really wanted to try either the mango and sweet sticky rice or the fried bananas and ice cream but it was not to be.

That #3 on the spicy scale turned out to be just about perfect for me as 4 or 5 would probably have made me cry and the two likely would have made me focus on how I could have handled hotter.  As it was I felt the burn on lips and tongue as well as a tingling in the scalp.  Before I finished the meal a bead of sweat ran down my cheek.  It was hot enough to make my mouth sensitive to the other flavors but not so hot as to be painful.

If you are sensitive to spicy go you an do what I heard another staff member recommend at the table beside me.  Go for the one and they’ll bring you spices to tweak it to your level.

My lucky streak continues and overall I’d have to give this place high marks on the food and the staff.  Below is a link to the website and don’t forget to check out Tell Me More.

Sunrise Thai Cuisine