Thursday, January 10, 2013.
All-Day Deluge. A New Thai Restaurant (To Me).
Torrential rain all night and all day was reason enough to avoid the commute into town. Once again I patted myself on the back for having the wisdom fifteen years ago to invest the five grand in the equipment that lets me broadcast from home.
The artist Dawn Dedeaux--my next-door neighbor at 729 Camp Street when we lived there in the pre-Waterhouse District era--once told me that she loved rainy days. "You get a lot more work done, because you don't want to leave your house," she said. Absolutely right--especially for creative types, who can always think of a reason to get out of the workroom.
So all I did was write today. It was such a good stretch that I almost began the book I have resolved to write this year. The project is a long stretch from what I have done in the past, and my instinctive writing methods can't be used for it. Nor can it be folded into my daily work routine. I have to sit and think and take notes and draw diagrams before I can start. I did a lot of such thinking and outlining today. I didn't write the first word of the book today, but like a bubble that rises from the bottom of a lagoon, I can see it coming up.
After the radio show, I went to the only North Shore Thai restaurant (of the eight on this side) that I hadn't tried yet. It's already changed its name since opening a year or two ago. The Thai Kitchen took over an odd, long building on Collins Drive that used to be a coffeeshop. It may also have been a bank, a possibility suggested by the drive-through pickup window on its back side.
The women running the place were exceptionally nice, and made a point of asking (or trying to remember, usually with success) the names of everyone who came in. The menu was the standard list used by most Thai restaurants hereabouts. If it included a dish I haven't had before, I didn't see it.
Began with a Singha Thai beer and a cup of tom yum soup with shrimp. The broth was much darker and more opaque than typical, but tasted good. Pad prik king was the first dish listed in its section, so I ordered it. I like the dish, a soupy stir-fry with an up-front ginger-galangal flavor, green beans and green peppers, and a kind of curry paste with a unique flavor. The closest word I have to describe it is "musky," but that's what I like about it. It was reasonably good, but I was surprised by the serving, which seemed lunch-size. (At $11 it was still, of course, the usual great Thai bargain.) Not bad, but I quickly thought of three places that do this better.
The last bite was a coconut flan brought out at my body's temperature. It registered as neither cool nor warm. Tasted good, though. If this is a true Thai dessert (I've never encountered it before), I wish other Thai restaurants would pick it up. They never have much in the way of dessert.
Thai Kitchen. Covington: 1005 N Collins. 985-809-7886.
