A happy marriage of Thai, Vietnamese dishes
Lady Siam
882a Massachusetts Ave., Arlington
781-583-7187
Open Monday through Saturday, 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m.;
Sunday, noon to 10 p.m.
Major credit cards accepted
Accessible to the handicapped
Maybe when you were a teenager you liked drinking what you called a frappe, a milkshake, or even a cabinet. These days, teenagers at Arlington High School are exploring a different beverage option: boba.
Lady Siam opened on Massachusetts Ave. in Arlington last May, a stone's throw from the high school. It serves Thai and Vietnamese food and Boba, or bubble tea, which originated in Taiwan in the 1980s. Pearls of cooked tapioca balls the size of small peas are served with a wide straw in a mixture of black tea, honey, and condensed milk.
Bubble tea quickly caught on all over Asia and traveled via expatriate Chinatowns to countries including Australia, Canada, and America. En route, it morphed into black or green tea with fruit-flavored shots of exotic flavors like papaya and mango as well as tapioca pearls or coconut jelly at the bottom. Later, tealess fruit "smoothie" versions became popular, and now these Boba variations are available in a suburb near you.
At Lady Siam, you can select from flavors including honeydew, dark plum, coconut, avocado, and lychee, and your Boba will be whipped up on the spot from a mixture of ice, fruit syrup, and milk ($3.50). The texture is closer to sorbet than a slushie, but not exactly either one, and it's fun to suck up the chewy tapioca balls through the colorful straw and munch on them: They provide more texture than flavor. Warning: Don't wait until your beverage is gone to try to suck up the tapioca balls: it won't work without the vacuum created by the liquid.
The "bubble" in bubble tea comes not, as you might expect, from the bubble-shaped tapioca pearls, but from the original preparation method of shaking the ingredients together, making a bubbly foam on top.
Beverages are definitely an attraction at Lady Siam, which serves freshly squeezed lemonade ($2.50), something called "royal milk tea" ($3.50), which is more like an exotic blast of cold chocolate and traditional sweetened Thai iced tea and coffee served with condensed milk ($2.50), both also available as Boba with tapioca pearls ($3.50).
Boba drinks are really too hefty to have with a meal, but fortunately Lady Siam's strong suit is side dishes, more than 20 appetizers that make for great nibbles. All those we tried came with traditional sauces tweaked by chef/partner Pichai Suppanisanuwong into perfect harmony with items like "goi cuon" summer rolls or beef or chicken satay skewers (all $4.95).
Asian restaurants can be a muddle of ethnic cuisines, but chef Suppanisanuwong comes by his marriage of Thai and Vietnamese food honestly, through the marriage of his Thai mother and his Vietnamese father in Thailand, where he grew up eating both cuisines. With the closing of Viet Cafe in Arlington, Lady Siam is now the only restaurant in town serving Vietnamese food.
Staples such as pho noodle dishes, "bun" vermicelli bowls with shredded lettuce, bean sprouts and mint ($7; seafood $8); and Vietnamese-style rice plates ($8); are welcome additions for local fans of this ethnic fare.
The curries, yellow, red, and Massaman, with their distinctive spices, are all cooked Thai-style, with traditional coconut milk melding the ingredients.
The bargain Blue Plate special is rectangular "Lunch Boxes" ($7) with Bento-style compartments which come with miso soup, a sweet potato-based curry puff, a Thai roll, and a choice of Pad Thai or plain or fried rice to accompany an array of stir-fries and curries.
Most popular is the well-known Pad Thai ($7-$8), and we sampled a respectable version here, although the portion size was modest compared with the generous size of some of the other dishes. Larb Gai ($8), a tasty minced chicken dish with scallions, red onions, herbs, and vegetables, is also very popular. I'm partial to the tom yum talay ($4), a coconut milk variation on the traditional Thai sweet and sour soup.
The stock base for all the soups is made fresh every day. The atmosphere is luncheonette low-key, the service fast and friendly, and free parking in the back is one more reason to relax.
CATHIE DESJARDINS 