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Just had a great meal at our favorite hidden gem in Easton – Touch of Thai. Two meal-worthy appetizers, two big entrées and a kickass dessert for maybe $40 (though the byob policy negated the drink tab). And the place was practically empty! I mean it’s great to be able to get a table with no wait but the place really deserves more bizness. Check out my earlier reviews if you’re interested.
My folks drove up Saturday to hang out and we decided to go out for an early dinner. They’d never had Thai food and I wanted to try Touch of Thai again to make sure it was worth my strong reco. We were the first ones there, but the dining room was half-filled by the time we left – a better crowd than they had the Friday evening when we first stopped in.
My folks had a bunch of questions about Thai food, but the menu had brief explanations of the dishes to make things easier. While we pondered the menu, we got to work on a couple bottles of wine. A white from Franklin Hill Vineyards flavored with kiwi and strawberry and a Mondavi Riesling. We have to try Franklin Hill’s more traditional offerings cuz they’re specialty fruit blends are too sweet. The Riesling was very good.
We started off with some vegetable spring rolls, fried crispy with a sweet chili dipping sauce, and the chicken skewers we enjoyed on our previous visit. My folks were liking everything so far. For the main course, my dad had a sweet and sour pork dish, my wife a curry, my mom the pad thai, and i had what was basically the pad thai with glass noodles. It was a huge plate of food, but i hadn’t eaten since breakfast and i wolfed it down. In fact, i don’t think anyone had leftovers – which is unusual for my mom and my wife.
Amazingly we still had room for a little dessert – but little is not what we received. We figured we’d share the triple ice cream dish, though my pops went rogue and ordered the sticky rice and custard. Daring. The scoops of mango, ginger, and toasted coconut ice cream were ginormous, and the flavors and texture were top notch. I’m wondering if they get a local place like Purple Cow to mix them up special. The coconut was packed with toasted coconut and was the clear favorite.
My dad was a bit stunned by the custard – it was a large slab with an odd yellow color. He had an eye on our ice cream so i decided to help him out and let him in on our frozen awesomeness. The custard wasn’t half-bad – kinda like a coconut custard but a bit more textural. Half the portion plus a scoop of ice cream or dollop of whipped cream would improve the dish.
As we were finishing up, PA state rep. Robert Freeman arrived with a small group. He’s a lifelong Easton guy so he would know all the best spots – and i have to agree with him on Touch of Thai.
Picked up a few of these wine bottle totes a few years ago on Amazon to give as xmas gifts. A nice way to add value to a $10 bottle and skip the cheapo gift bag. The neoprene pouch holds a bottle snugly and cushions it from any accidental collisions. I also dig the integrated handle. It was the product BUILT® was founded upon, but they’ve really expanded their product line. Check ’em out.
We got out of work about an hour late on Friday and knew it would be tough to get a table right away at Sette Luna (our default option). My wife brought up Touch of Thai on 2nd Street which I’d pitched to her after our last visit to Phenom. Perfect. No crowd, good reviews, and a new place to blog about.
We found a parking spot on Spring Garden and walked past the revamped Colonial pizza shop. We haven’t been in there since we lived downtown and it looks like they’ve remodeled the whole place, including the lower level. The place was hoppin’ and even had outside seating. Definitely a place to re-try.
A quick right onto 2nd Street and we were at Touch of Thai – set back from the street a bit so you could miss it if you drive by too quickly. Just as I’d suspected, the restaurant is in what used to be a 1st floor apartment. We’ve eaten in places like that several times and it’s always kinda strange – low ceilings, creaky floors, small windows, tight floor plan. Touch of Thai was no different, but we were expecting it and were too hungry to care. We were clearly in for some unpretentious, no-frills dining.
Luckily, i’d remembered at the last second that the place was byob and i’d grabbed a rosé we’d picked up at Newport Vineyards on a trip to Rhode Island last summer. There were maybe a dozen tables, most empty, so we were seated immediately (yes!) with a pair of glasses to get a head start on the rosé.
The menu was much easier to absorb than Phenom’s phonebook, but wasn’t lacking in variety. I went in expecting to try the Pad Thai based on a recommendation. I ended up going with the Lad Nah Talay, a variety of seafood with Thai cabbage and broad noodles in a tapioca gravy, and my wife went for a green curry dish. We started with chicken satay skewers with a peanut sauce and bean sprouts. Tender and tasty.
The entrées were just as expected – simple, hearty and flavorful. Both of our dishes were on the soupier side so i’ll probably go with a stir-fry next time.
The dessert menu had exactly what we’d wanted at Phenom, mango, ginger and coconut ice cream, but we opted for the mango and sticky rice on a whim. Sliced mango, a creamy patty of sweet sticky rice sprinkled with sesame seeds, and a scoop of mango ice cream smothered with whipped cream. It was a new dish for us and we really enjoyed it. We were half finished before we even remembered to take a pic.
It turned out the rosé had been a great choice – a nice sweetness to complement the Thai spices. We even finished the entire bottle, not something we normally would do, though the alcohol content was relatively low. Overall it was a super mellow evening thanks to the great food and comforting atmosphere (and the wine). Plus the bill was under $40 bucks before tip. Hard to beat that. A little bigger crowd to bring the energy level up a bit would have been nice. Maybe it was a slow night. Regardless of that nitpicking, another good experience will tell us if Touch of Thai deserves to be one of our go-to spots.
The fork city 