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Friday, March 08, 2002

By Sarah Billingsley, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

My Thai Siamese Cuisine is not only charming; it is one of those noteworthy new restaurants that demonstrates excellent attention to detail, from greeting to garnish to finish.

Roger Kun, owner of My Thai, holds two of his favorite dishes: Ka Pow filet of fish and Som Tum, a papaya salad. (John Heller, Post-Gazette)

The Shadyside restaurant is a satellite of the empire owned by partners Roger Kun and Mike Chen -- an empire that includes China Palace and Sushi Too -- and successful, experienced restaurateurs have a way of knowing how to make customers happy.

At My Thai, Kun, who is originally from Bangkok, practices the restaurant savvy he has gleaned from his other ventures, applying this shrewdness to top-notch Thai cuisine, the food closest to his heart. Kun's menu ranges from simple Bangkok street fare to imperial dishes prepared in Thailand's finest kitchens. His ingredients are flawless and his service is ardently friendly.

Kun knows how to run a restaurant, and with his system in place, he can tend the intangibles that ultimately determine restaurant success: comfort and personality. He circles the dining room, shaking hands, checking on tables, doing his best to make the My Thai experience personal.

The feeling of ease at My Thai begins as you enter the restaurant. Everybody smiles at you. In the golden, glowing dining room the ceiling is hung with swags of fabric. Large picture windows frame South Aiken Street below, where shoppers scurry through driving March sleet. Inside My Thai, it is warm, the hum of conversation is steady and low, and the air is fragrant with curry and coconut.

Kun offers the finger food of Bangkok street vendors as appetizers. Of course spring rolls ($2.50) and chicken satay ($6.25) make their appearance, along with tulip-shaped steamed dumplings with moist pork filling ($4.25).

The Todd Mun (fish cakes, $6.25) are ordinary to the taste and gelatinous in texture, but a salad of cucumber half-moons and toasted peanuts served alongside is delicious. Tao Hu Todd, fried bean curds ($4.95), sizzle with the hot oil that crisps their skin, making the soft inner curd seem all the silkier when you bite into it.

The Bikini Shrimp special -- large shrimp coyly clad in wonton wrappers and deep-fried a copper tone -- is appealingly crunchy. The shrimp nest in irresistible, crispy rice noodles and come with a sweet chili condiment for dipping.

My Thai salads make a light entree or starter course, especially for those who say that heat whets the appetite. Yum Pla Meau ($6.95) is a blaringly spicy mix of squid, red onion, lime and chili. Som Tum ($6.50), a mix of julienne papaya, carrot shreds, peanuts, tomatoes and lime, has a gradual heat that creeps on silent feet, starring the sweet starchiness of the papaya. In both salads, crisp wedges of iceberg lettuce find their royal purpose: to chill the tongue afire.

One can never go wrong with Thai soup, especially the Tom Yum Hed ($2.25), redolent with the onion-citrus nuances of lemongrass, bobbing with woodsy straw mushrooms.

My Thai's menu is thick with curries, noodles, fried rice and varied vegetarian entrees. The list of house specialties is more than 20 items long and so tempting, choosing is a challenge. The informed wait staff is eager to make suggestions. Let them. The waitress suggested the best entrees I tried.

Crispy Whole Fish in Chili Sauce was a revelation: Gleaming sections of tender bass flesh, crackling with flavorful skin, fell away under gentle fork pressure. The tangy tomato flavor of the sauce, punctuated by shreds of surprisingly crispy, lemony basil, was worth the work of avoiding tiny bones. The fish is market price, and on a recent night a choice of sea bass or flounder, steamed or deep-fried, cost $19.95.

Paradise Shrimp ($12.95) was a graphic beauty, like so many of My Thai's dishes, adorned with bright, vegetable garnishes. On a white oval platter, elegant pink shrimp curled on terracotta peanut sauce, nestled in a ring of green-green steamed broccoli. The peanut sauce was perfect: thick, gingery and nutty.

In Gang Ped Yang ($12.95), my meaty favorite, tingly hot red curry tempers the pungency of boneless breast of duck, and coconut milk makes sweet studs of fresh pineapple, pepper and tomato taste like caramel.

Seafood, so important to the cuisine of coastal Thailand, is My Thai's specialty. Emerald Seafood ($14.95) is a deceptively cool-looking coconut stew the color of jade, jungle hot and herbal with green curry, swimming with tender scallops, tubes of squid and shrimp. The shrimp are butterflied, with fluted edges to hold the sauce, a nice touch.

Sizzling Seafood Delight, the only My Thai selection to disappoint, was dramatically salty, and lost its sizzle before it got to our table. Shrimp, scallops, squid and mussels suffered too liberal a splash of uniquely Thai mushroom-infused soy sauce.

The lost sizzle of the Delight reveals one of My Thai's rare flaws. In its beautifully clean, open kitchen, where a team of synchronized chefs whittle garnish and mince with speed, sometimes the food waits out too long, and arrives at the table lukewarm.

Entree portions are ample, but save room for a light Thai dessert, balm to the palate after the complex flavors of dinner. Hot sticky rice, bathed with coconut sauce, is served with ripe mango. Thai custard is milky, with a mysterious note of black tea. Tiny banana fritters, bundled in spring roll wrappers and sprinkled with sesame seeds, are earthy and molten inside.

My Thai and the venerable Thai Place are both well positioned for a Thai restaurant turf war. They are mere blocks apart on Walnut Street. But good Thai cuisine, subtle and classic as French, bears many interpretations, and, like all good food, there's always room for more.

My Thai Siamese Cuisine
5401 Walnut St., Shadyside
Third Floor
412-688-0729

Hours: Mon.-Thurs., 11:30 a.m.-10 p.m.; Fri.-Sat.,11:30 a.m.-11 p.m.; Sun. noon-9 p.m.

The basics: Appetizers $2-$10.95; Entrees $7.94-$15.95. Fully stocked bar; wine list ($22-$38); wine by the glass ($4); domestic and imported beers ($2.50-$4.50). Restaurant seats 103; wheelchair accessible; high chair and booster seats available; smoking and non-smoking sections; all major credit cards accepted. Takeout and free delivery (minimum $15 order) available.

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