 Newspaper View
 Print
 Email
 Comment
 RSS
 Bookmark
If you would like to bookmark this article you will need to Login to your tulsaworld.com account
close
Video: Thai Village offers mild to fiery dishes
Restaurant owners bring nice variety of menu items to Tulsa
The red curry dish features chicken, coconut milk, eggplant, onion, mushrooms and bell
peppers. STEPHEN PINGRY / Tulsa World
By SCOTT CHERRY
Published: 10/22/2009 2:21 AM
Last Modified: 10/22/2009 6:49 AM
Toan Nguyen and Tong Vang both came to the United States as children about 20 years ago, the former from Vietnam and the latter from Thailand. Their families settled in Michigan, and Nguyen and Vang became high-school buddies in Lansing.
"We played soccer together and kept in touch after high school," Nguyen said.
Nguyen was managing a Cantonese restaurant in Grand Rapids and Vang was cooking in a Thai restaurant in Detroit when they got together for a visit, which led to the idea of opening their own restaurant.
"It was very hard making a living in Michigan the last couple of years because of the bad economy," Nguyen said. "Vang's uncle had bought Thai-Siam in Tulsa a couple of years ago, and we thought this would be a better place to start our business."
The two opened Thai Village about a month ago in space that formerly held Mack's Bar & Grill and Da' Boat. A fire destroyed most of what had been Mack's.
"We had to replace everything," Nguyen said. "Everything was like charcoal in here."
They have turned the cozy space into an inviting dining room with black and red as the dominant colors. Those two colors, along with white, show up also in all of the dinnerware. Wall decorations include brightly colored silk paintings of Thai scenes.
I was with a group that mostly had come to try the pad Thai, but we managed a nice variety of items. Our friendly and efficient server, Yeng, told us most dishes could be ordered mild, medium or hot, and we got a taste of
all three.
Pad Thai ($9.99 with chicken, pork, tofu or vegetarian, $10.99 with shrimp or scallops) is a traditional noodle dish, and here it was made with rice noodles, bean sprouts, green onion, white onion, ground peanuts and egg. The person who ordered pad Thai shrimp counted seven pieces of medium-sized shrimp in her dish.
For me, the fiery Thai peppers in the hot version overpowered the flavors of the other ingredients, while the mild was a little bland and lacked that nutty flavor we usually find with this dish. The medium seemed to have just the right amount of heat to meld with the other flavors.
Pad cashew with beef ($9.99) included generous servings of roasted cashews, thin-sliced pieces of beef, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts, baby corn and chopped green onions mixed in a thin, mellow brown sauce.
Kow pad with chicken ($9.99) was a standard Asian-style fried rice dish with peas, carrots, onions and eggs. It benefited from a little extra soy sauce and was moist and flavorful.
We started the evening by sharing a large bowl of tom ka ($8.99) with pieces of chicken floating in a spicy broth of coconut milk, lemongrass, lime juice and herbs. Like another familiar Thai soup, tom yum, this one had a slightly sour edge and a flavor that was unusual yet strangely appealing.
The fresh roll appetizer ($3.99) featured two fat rolls in translucent rice paper wrappings that included two pieces of shrimp and otherwise mostly shredded lettuce with a tiny bit of noodles, onions, cucumber and cilantro. The rolls came with a much-needed sweet-and-sour sauce.
Sweet Thai iced tea ($2.50), served in red plastic tumblers with shaved ice, was a favorite around the table. For hot tea ($2), diners dunk a tea bag into a silver pot filled with steaming water themselves. Tea is served in pretty red coffee cups with black saucers.
Although Thais tend to use soup spoons and forks for most dishes, wooden chopsticks were available.
Table condiments included soy sauce and a hot chili sauce.
Vang said he acquired many of his Thai cooking skills from his mother, who spent the first three weeks at the restaurant ensuring he was doing things correctly.
Period of
adjustment
Vietnamese native
Toan Nguyen said he
was 7 years old when
his parents immigrated
to the United States, but
first they had to spend
two years waiting in the
Philippines before the
trip got worked out.
“We were sponsored
by a Methodist church
in Michigan, so that is
where we lived,” Nguyen
said.
“When we arrived in
Michigan, it was snowing
and we’re in shorts and
T-shirts and thinking,
‘What’s this?’ Then the
family who picked us up
took us to a McDonald’s,
and they put Big Macs
in front of us, and now
we are thinking, ‘What’s
this thing with meat and
cheese and bread?’
“It seemed very
strange to us at the time,
but it really didn’t take
long to catch on to everything.”
THAI VILLAGE
8102 S. Lewis Ave.
528-3311
Food: Thai
Price: $9.99 (pad Thai) to
$13.99 (seafood combo in
brown sauce); lunches, $6.99
to $8.99
Credit cards: All major
Hours: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday-
Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.
Friday-Saturday
Food:  
Atmosphere:
Service:
By SCOTT CHERRY
Newspaper View
Print
Email
Comment
RSS
Bookmark
If you would like to bookmark this article you will need to Login to your tulsaworld.com account
close
 |
|
