Sorn Thai in Mclean serves some very delicious Thai food if you overlook the idea that it pulls its punches.
The menu has many intriguing selections that take it beyond standard issue suburban Thai. Case in point is the special of Kaeng Tai Pla as show above. I am a sucker for mackerel and I could not resist fermented fish entrails.
It was a welcome dish and yet….. despite the description and that I clearly communicated we like spicy food, it came out surprisingly tame.
Dishes are listed on the menu as mild, and from one to three peppers. As a special this wasn’t listed, but I’d give it a one.
The dishes we ordered from the regular menu were very delicious and could form the basis of a stellar meal: Haaw Mohk (a fish mousse), and the Banana Blossom Salad which comes with minced chicken. The mousse was exceptional and we loved everything about the banana blossom salad. Although the menu listed it as two peppers, I would list it as mild, no peppers.
From the Obsessions part of the menu, we ordered the purposely sweet and cinnamon-laced Hong Moo, a caramelized pork belly. It come served with a fluffy and crispy hot-to-the table milk bread and a sour sauce. Since the pork belly is so sweet, the idea is to dip the bread in the sour sauce as a balance to the sweetness of the pork. This was fabulous.
This is a lot of pork belly, and could be shared by four people. Halfway through we cut out the middleman and just dumped the rest of the sour sauce over the pork belly. I don’t recommend this as much as alternating bites, but we had no intention of finishing the bowl anyway.
I will go back but I will not rush back.
