Dinner for six at Thai/Chinese Wan Wan this evening, where our initial impression (asshole host) was superceded by our exceedingly cheerful and efficient server. Some of my faves were the mushroom curry
the whole (cut up) branzino with its refreshing salad
the shrimp and scallop fried rice - so fluffy!
and the thai iced tea creme brulee under a roof of spun sugar.
The morning glory was the best version of that dish I can remember having, since it retained a bit of crunch, and the fried tofu was very nice, too, mostly due to the very well-balanced peanut sauce underneath it. Neither of those is at all photogenic, at least not with my elderly iPhone.
Great to see @SteveR, @Saregama and @JenKalb, as always! I still think we should’ve camped at the table to make trouble for Mr. Huffy Hosty-Pants.
Agree on the mushroom curry and seafood fried rice being excellent. The flat noodles with chicken (Guay Tiew Kua Gai) were also excellent, even eaten plain, which made me think we should have gotten the Pad See Ew as well (in lieu of another main).
The whole fish was well done, and my first taste of morning glory was a good introduction, the roasted half duck and baby back ribs were both well flavored and well cooked, but I would have happily taken another order of one of the favorites over any of these.
Ginny & I enjoyed our meal. It’s always great to be with other HO posters and our server, who was great (& was actually a highlight of the overall experience) as well, made the loud and tight seating environment bearable (& even overshadowed the self important FOH “guardian of the door” attitude). For us, there are a lot of restaurants around that we come away from satisfied but not in a rush to return. This is one of them. The food is good, some of it very good. That counts for a lot. But I can think of ways that almost every dish could’ve been better. And I can think of many ways to improve upon the overall experience. All in all, I wouldn’t steer anyone away from Wan Wan, but don’t foresee us returning either.
and Indian Table. I agree with Steve that this place was louder and tighter than I prefer especially for a group of more than 4. I was thinking more about discussing the food but for fine dining prices comfort is also relevant. Some of the dishes were delicious and had interesting and very nice textures - thinking in particular of the fried tofu with its unusual sticky rice flour shell and excellent peanut sauce, not too sweet as well as the rice noodle dish and fried rice Thought the fish was a good concept mixing ease of eating and the fried component (the fish was cooked perfectly) with the fun (for me) of chewing on the skeleton and rhe very nicely balanced thai salad components. The two pork dishes were just too bland - the belly was underseasoned and the accompanying sambal ditto. The desserts did not thrill though they were correct and looked nice. More flavor, please.
Thanks to everyone for the great company, and have a happy Thanksgiving!
