Called up Nid Ting the other night to order take-away. I asked the lady on the other line if they…read morehad a website so that I could look at their menu online, before placing the final order. She informed me that, unfortunately, they don't have a website, but that instead she knew the menu inside out and would be more more than happy to help me make a decision: I loved the idea of having a "human" or "interactive" menu and so I agreed on the deal.
I was ordering dinner for a group of four, one of the woman being pregnant. This pregnant woman put in a request for beef and so I told the lady on the other line that, amongst others, I definitely needed some beef dishes...don't ever screw with a pregnant woman ;-)
This is where it became interesting; I remember having eaten some lemon-grass beef dish at another Thai restaurant and so I asked her if they had something like this on the menu. In her lovely Thai accent she then went on to explain up me that while this is a possible combination, but that I'm fact in traditional Thai cuisine beef is not paired with lemon grass. If I wanted to have a nice beef dish, she'd recommend stir-fried beef with Thai basil. Or, the marinated beef salad. On the other hand, if I wanted the lemon grass, she'd suggest the Tom Yum soup.
Needless to say, with such a lovely and informative interactive menu, I followed all of her suggestions. On top of that, I also ordered a red duck curry, a Pad Thai (with prawns and not beef, obviously) as well as a mixed starter and some egg fried rice and white rice.
I thanked her and 15 minutes later I showed up at the restaurant to pick up my order. It was a Friday evening and every table was filled. (With it being so busy, I even more appreciated that they has taken so much time for me on the phone earlier.) The food was almost ready - thank goodness, or else the pregnant lady might have changed her desire and maybe demanded lamb instead of beef ;-)
Lastly, I should mention that the food was great...and even the pregnant friend was happy as a puppy!
Note: it's take-away only, no delivery.