When we read in a newspaper's review that the owner of Dang's Thai Kitchen used to own Cha Ba Thai that alone was enough for us to put Dang's on our radar for a visit. (Love Cha Ba, but that's another review.)
Since we have no great places to eat Thai food in our home town (and we have a Typhoon so I may get beat up for saying there are no great places) we ended up eating at Dang's on two nights during a recent Lake Oswego visit. We almost never eat at the same place two times in a row. (I would say we never do, but we did here, so there you go.) Winning decision as everything we ordered at Dang's ranged from good to really good.
FOOD HIGHLIGHTS: We are fans of miang kum (sp?), the appetizer that is fresh spinach leaves served with tamarind "jam", finely diced ginger, peanuts, lime, onions and chiles to fold up in the spinach leaf and pop in your mouth in one perfect bite of sweet, hot, salty, sour Thai perfectness. Not found on all Thai food menus, Dang's not only serves it but gets it absolutely right. This was the best miang kum we have ever eaten, and we've tried it in many places.
They also had khao soi (sp?), a Burmese influenced noodle dish made with egg noodles and not rice noodles as is more typical in Thai cooking. Dang's khao soi was second only to the khao soi at Lotus of Siam in Las Vegas, in our opinion. (Lotus of Siam, in our view, once was best Thai food in the U.S.)
SERVICE: We know there have been concerns raised in reviews in some places about service quality, but on both nights of our visit the service was very good. And on both nights the restaurant had a decent occupancy (not full but up there) and the take out orders seemed to fly out the door. Even with those demands on the kitchen, the pacing of our meal worked.
As for the language barriers mentioned as a factor in some places, the server who waited on us the second night clearly did not speak English as a first language, but they spoke English a whole lot better than we speak their language (which is not at all) and we were guests in "their house", so it didn't seem a big issue. Patience and courtesy flow both ways in a service setting, seems to us.
VALUE: As with most Thai restaurants (except perhaps Typhoon) the prices here are very reasonable. I can't recall the tab as I post this review, but we drank only tea on both nights and without a bar bill to factor in, it was pretty inexpensive eating for such good food.
AMBIANCE: We liked the atmosphere here too, which is a lot more polished than many Thai restaurants. As we sat by the window and watched the cars whizzing by in the darkness and pouring rain, we thought how lucky we were to be warm and dry and eating good food at Dang's Thai Kitchen.
UNEXPECTED: Ample parking in the restaurant's private lot is another plus, especially on a rainy night. read more