The risk of the new: Manee Thai [pics]

Another lunch with GWiv, and this time Cathy2 as well, for which I hope he will ultimately provide pics. But some background first.

A few weeks back, before the Thai Aree dinner, GWiv had propoed an impromptu lunch there, only to discover that it was now closed for lunch. So a note was left on the door sending everyone to Spoon. Now, as much as I love Spoon, this seemed to me a certain failure of imagination. In a city with approximately 8,434 Thai restaurants, is it really necessary to eat only at those two? Vital Info would say (in fact he did), but if you like the way they make a dish, why do you need to go somewhere else? Is not one perfect rendition enough? But Thai has enough variety that there should be something worth discovering that you haven't had before, at dozens of places.

As it happens, practically the closest Thai restaurant to Thai Aree is one called Manee Thai, at Addison and Pulaski, so that had stuck in my mind as the kind of place we should try and see if they had anything good hidden away on a Thai secret menu. I knew nothing about it, no one had posted on it that I know of, and it had one clear mark against it-- the word "Pan-Asian" on its awning. As well as, it was the recipient of perhaps an unfair prejudice on GWiv's part, since he had eaten at the Japanese restaurant that had preceded it in that spot, or rather, he'd gone there and been unable to get served. So by the time I had him convinced to go try it, I was fully aware that if it sucked severely, I'd be hearing about it for some years to come.

Before it was a Japanese place, it was a coffeeshop, and still has the look. We were given lunch menus which we immediately set aside as being too gringofied, and began tearing into the finer points of the regular menu. Despite the odd chow mein or Miso soup on the menu, it's 90% Thai, and we saw some slightly less familiar things like Hoa Mok on the menu. Armed with a tiny amount of Thai and some food knowledge, we began interrogating our waitress and, eventually the hostess/owner about making us real Thai food, about what she planned to have for lunch today, about a Thai menu (which GWiv may have a copy of, awaiting translation). For a first visit, at least, we seemed fairly successful at getting food that was more Thai than Thai-Am.

One bite salad, which they oddly called "7 Buddies" (there were, indeed, seven on the plate), had a nice fresh flavor, a slightly too sweet sauce, and was served on a mystery green (cut in perfect squares) which they brought to the table to show us but still couldn't put a name to, and which we finally decided was collard greens. Pork larb had very good flavor, we made sure they were not afraid to use fish sauce, and a more conventional ground chicken with basil was also very flavorful. I think the others liked the papaya salad more than I did, I found it not as fresh or bright tasting as at some places. But it had the dried shrimp and fishy taste, at least.

So, all in all, I wouldn't put Manee Thai in the top rank with Spoon, TAC, etc. but it certainly is a quality place capable of very good things, and with an honest approach to Thai food. Worth discovering-- and proof that more are out there and can be uncovered, with a little determination.

Hopefully pics will follow shortly.

Manee Thai
3558 N Pulaski Rd
773-725-0911
http://www.maneethairestaurant.com

I tried this place not long after it opened. It looked very appealing because I had just returned from LA, and Manee Thai *looks* just like a place that might be on Santa Monica Blvd. Maybe an old Bob's turned Thai burger stand and noodle shop. I grabbed quick bite and a menu, but was not overly impressed at the time. I can't remember if I mentioned it on CH, but I did see a blurb from Anna Zabor (sp. ?), Polish food expert.

I also think I remember seeing or hearing that this is one of those modest places run by someone from the kitchen of a fancier, more famous place, like Arun's, though my memory is shot.

I think on the list-serve someone mentioned that the chef or somebody at Manee came from somewhere, it might have been in an announcement from one of those young-singles dining clubs that gets together (as opposed to us middle-aged guys who do that), but when we asked the hostess, she said she had never heard of Arun's, or Erawan's, or any such place we could think of.

Mike G wrote:So, all in all, I wouldn't put Manee Thai in the top rank with Spoon, TAC, etc. but it certainly is a quality place capable of very good things, and with an honest approach to Thai food.

Mike,

I'd agree, not in the top tier, as far as honest approach, yes, but a qualified yes. A goodly portion of Manee Thai's menu is Ameri-Thai standards, with Americanized Pan-Asian tossed in for good measure, and one needs a wee bit of knowledge to separate wheat from chaff or, in this instance, one-bite-salad from crab rangoon.

Speaking of one-bite-salad called, as Mike mentioned, 7-buddies on Manee Thai's menu,


I quite enjoyed the presentation, which was served on squares of blanched, outside, leaves of collard greens and the flavor the slightly more resilient, aggressively flavored collard provided.


Larb had a nice hit of mint, but could have had a bit more lime/fish sauce bump for my taste, was enjoyable as well.


Basil chicken was tasty, but was not up to, say, Thai Aree standards. Manee Thai's version was a bit too corn starch/gummy for me with a subsequent loss of clarity of flavor.


Papaya salad was ok, but the papaya it's self needed a bit of perking up, almost as if it was batch-cut a couple of days before and held.

The strands of papaya themselves were not crisp/crunchy, which Ann, the engaging owner of Elephant Thai in Edgebrook, says is a sign of machine (mandolin or cusinart) cut. She should know as Elephant Thai serves an excellent papaya salad.

I would have preferred more heat in, especially, the papaya salad and larp, but Cathy is a bit hot/spicy adverse. Though the pleasure of Cathy's company at the table more than makes up for any (very) slight deficiency of hot/spicy. Interestingly Cathy's ability to, not only consume, but enjoy, hot and spicy seems to be increasing at an alarmingly rapid level. Watch your back Zim.

Manee Thai's Thai menu.


Enjoy,
Gary

Elephant Thai
5348 W Devon
Chicago, IL
773-467-1168

Thai Aree
3592 N Milwaukee Ave
Chicago, IL 60641
773-725-6751

Gary wrote:I would have preferred more heat in, especially, the papaya salad and larp, but Cathy is a bit hot/spicy adverse. Though the pleasure of Cathy's company at the table more than makes up for any (very) slight deficiency of hot/spicy. Interestingly Cathy's ability to, not only consume, but enjoy, hot and spicy seems to be increasing at an alarmingly rapid level. Watch your back Zim.

Hi,

Probably one of my first adventures in Thai food was about 24 years ago in a Thai restaurant in Arlington, Virginia. I was with my Dad and Charles, a friend of ours who enjoyed nothing better than to tease food knowledge out of me.

Charles is the only person I know who made filo dough from scratch. He was an American raised in France, whose love of country straddled both cultures. He liked to eat, he liked to cook, he liked to talk about food, which pretty much makes him a perfect fit for this forum. Except in 1980, you couldn't find your needle in the haystack friends via internet, you simply plied your avocation alone hopefully bumping into a kindred spirit here and there.

Thai food was a relatively new phenomena, though in the Washington, D.C. area with so many embassies and subcultures, there was a lively following for exotic restaurants.

Charles was our guide to Thai food. He knew what most people know initially, Thai food characterized as being very spicey. My Dad and Charles liked highly chili-spiced food and I followed around for the ride. My first Thai meal was a whole fried fish just swimming in a chili sauce. While the guys enjoyed, I was wide-eyed with pain sucking down all the water and rice, then returning to try to eat more fish. Some would suggest there was no reason, but despite the chilis, there were underlying flavors I found very favorable which I felt compelled to pursue. And maybe I am a glutton for punishment!

My first real foray back to Thai Food was the Chowhound Thai Aree dinner in November, 2002. Thai Aree, which can really crank up the heat, is not really the best place to start when you are chili adverse. Fortunately, I sat between Doug K and Sue, a friend of ReneG, who very nicely helped me navigate the food otherwise known as avoid the hotter upper ranges.

I think my turn-about on Thai food occured at Spoon Thai. It was one of the first meals where there was a heat presence but it wasn't the driving force of the meal. I learned to appreciate the philosophy of Thai Food.

4 Flavors + Heat - In Thai cooking there are four flavors: sour, sweet, creamy and salty. Heat sits on top of the four flavors. The secret of a good dish is the right balance of the flavors -- you will find that there are "sweet spots" where the flavor just tastes right."

Until my Spoon Thai epiphany, I really didn't understand Thai food and really considered it an excuse for people to get all macho challenging themselves to eat as hot as possible.

My tolerance of spicey has certainly increased over the last several years for two reasons: simply eating enough to acclimate myself to stronger tastes and my improved understanding of heat/spice orientation in the Thai food culture.

Zim has no rival in chili tolerance, if I ever reach that level then I can walk on water, too.

&&&

Even by my somewhat wimpy heat standards, the Papaya Salad at Manee Thai was too tame. In my experience, Papaya Salad is one dish I eat gingerly because it tends to be rather spicey. Gary and MikeG were kind to accomodate me with the instruction paradox to the co-owner Wanda: "Yeah, we really love the heat!" They'd look at me, "But not too hot because she doesn't like it too spicey." Such helpful instructions would beguile anyone, Wanda predictably chose in the direction of not too spicey. Maybe what we do next time is order spicey for everyone and one dish for me not-so-spicey.

I any case, I did appreciate the opportunity to lunch with you both.

Regards,

Actually I'm by no means a heat-head, although my tolerance has gone up since I've been forced to accept more, given my dining companions. That said, I would say that both times I've been to an organized dinner at Thai Aree, the point came where I just couldn't taste much any more, my mouth had been cauterized.

As far as the papaya salad goes, I don't know that I think how you slice it should affect crunch. That seems pseudo-science to me. What I thought about Manee Thai was that they were probably serving the papaya out of a bag of presliced stuff, like you see at some of the Asian groceries. When they do that, you definitely get a softer texture that lacks the appealing crunch of freshly sliced papaya.

Speaking of papaya salad, here are a couple of photos I had on my pre-LTH photo page of papaya salad from Sweet Tamarind:





Sweet Tamarind is to my mind another place like Manee, a bit more Ameri-Thai than it should be, considering that some things are done very right, with fresh flavors and ingredients. What was interesting there was that they used beet in their papaya salad (look for the purple strands). What wasn't so interesting was that they used fresh shrimp instead of dried or preserved or whatever they are. Sweet Tamarind has a very pretty room, and generally speaking makes things with lots of fresh and high quality ingredients, but it's very much an above average Ameri-Thai restaurant, not a Thai Thai restaurants. (One other thing it and Manee both have in common-- no sticky rice. Maybe that's a determining sign of an especially good restaurant, their willingness to take the trouble to make sticky rice the labor-intensive Thai way and not just accept standard rice as close enough.)

Sweet Tamarind
1408 W. Diversey Pkwy.
773-281-5300

By the way, here's the link for the earlier mention of Manee Thai re: a planned buffet dinner. The guy who organized it says the chefs came from Arun's but as noted, they said no when we asked.

JDFun.com

Mike G wrote:As far as the papaya salad goes, I don't know that I think how you slice it should affect crunch. That seems pseudo-science to me.

Mike,

Pseudo-science, possibly, but as it came from a Thai cook of some merit, in her 40's, I tend to give it credence. It may be what she, Ann of Elephant Thai, meant was the irregular cut of using a knife gives more texture/contrast/crunch as opposed to the even strands of mandolin or cusinart.

Mike G wrote:What I thought about Manee Thai was that they were probably serving the papaya out of a bag of presliced stuff, like you see at some of the Asian groceries. When they do that, you definitely get a softer texture that lacks the appealing crunch of freshly sliced papaya.

Actually, I thought that as well, but saying Manee Thai bought bag-o-sliced-papaya seemed noticeably more damning than saying they machine cut, then held the strands of papaya.

Enjoy,
Gary

I can agree with that, didn't Wanna at Spoon say the same thing? That it's more interesting texturally when it's knife cut and irregular, as opposed to mandoline-cut. I have not been to Thailand, but the descriptions of it being done to order on the street make the knife-cut salad infinitely more appealing than something coming from a bag, which is, however, so common a restaurant practice these days that I can't imagine anyone successfully taking it as an accusation unless they had a Trotterian reputation for hand-crafted food in the first place.

G Wiv wrote:

Mike G wrote:As far as the papaya salad goes, I don't know that I think how you slice it should affect crunch. That seems pseudo-science to me.

Mike,

Pseudo-science, possibly, but as it came from a Thai cook of some merit, in her 40's, I tend to give it credence. It may be what she, Ann of Elephant Thai, meant was the irregular cut of using a knife gives more texture/contrast/crunch as opposed to the even strands of mandolin or cusinart.

This is easy to test at home -- buy anything with some crunch (if papaya isn't handy, cukes, celery, carrots might all provide valid comparisons), cut it both ways, and see what the difference is first-hand.

As a longtime mandoline user, I agree with Mike -- the method of cutting doesn't seem to me to be able to affect a crunchy texture so easily. And a mandoline just wouldn't; it *is* a knife, just one held in a frame while the prep cook moves the food instead of the other way around.

Anyway, again, I just can't see how the method of cutting or chopping could make any difference, especially compared to the means of storage or the time passed since the preparation.

Mike G wrote:What I thought about Manee Thai was that they were probably serving the papaya out of a bag of presliced stuff, like you see at some of the Asian groceries. When they do that, you definitely get a softer texture that lacks the appealing crunch of freshly sliced papaya.

Actually, I thought that as well, but saying Manee Thai bought bag-o-sliced-papaya seemed noticeably more damning than saying they machine cut, then held the strands of papaya.

Enjoy,
Gary[/quote]
Again, I'll concede on a food processor, but I can't see calling mandoline use "machine cut," since it's the prep cook, not the device, doing the work.

Bob (perhaps a little defensive about one of his favorite kitchen tools, but honestly so)

Hi,

I heard this on the radio early yesterday, but confirmed via the Chicago Tribune. Manee Thai was destroyed by fire on Friday evening after closing hours.

Regards,

The GF and I have been wanting to try the new Manee Thai at the Chicago/Ashland location since we've been needing a good Thai restaurant in our neighborhood, and she said the restaurant that was in this space before was very not good.

We went with a few friends last Friday night and had a great meal. We did the usual starters: chicken satay, vietnamese spring rolls and nam sod salad. All very tasty and fresh, and there were 4 big spring rolls for $5.50 which was great since there were 4 of us! The chopped chicken salad was very savory, with a touch of spice. Of the 3 starters, the satay was probably the weakest, even though it was good...it was just standard. not really a char to the meat, and the peanut sauce was fairly tame.

For entrees we chose Mango Chicken, Sizzling Duck a la Chinoise, and Penang Curry with pork. These were all very tasty and large portions (about $8 to $12 range for entrees), and we managed to just about finish everything and not have room for dessert.


From top: sizzling duck, mango chicken, and panang curry

Atmosphere was nice and warm, with about 1/3 of the tables taken at 9ish on a Friday night. Service was warm and friendly, the food arrived fairly quickly and they were very accommodating with our wine needs (glasses, ice bucket). I guess my only complaint would be that we needed a bigger table for all the dishes

They also do a $6.50 lunch special from 11-3pm M-F, dine-in only: egg roll or crab rangoon plus choice of a bunch of entrees, and they deliver! The take-out menu map shows Clark to California and Roosevelt to Fullerton as their delivery area. Pretty sweet!

We've found our new local Thai restaurant, hooray!

Manee Thai #2
1546 W Chicago Ave
312-733-3339
BYOB
http://www.maneethairestaurant.net