My first exposure to Thai food came quite late in life, in fact it was only a few years ago. There was a Thai restaurant across the street from where I worked in graduate school called Mai Thai. I first had their Pad Thai, followed by the Pad Wun Sen, and Mussuman curry – leading me to becoming an acolyte of Thai cuisine. My almost bi-weekly excursions to Mai Thai became a high point in my graduate career, and I was excited to discover that there was a Thai restaurant near where I worked in Chinatown, called Montien. I was even more excited by the fact that Montien is the first Thai restaurant that I had been to that doesn’t have the word Thai or something referencing Thailand in its name (such restaurants include 3 Mai Thais (or My Thai), 2 Pad Thai, a Planet Thai, a Bangkok Cuisine, and a Bangkok House), showing that Montien is the first Thai restaurant to be secure enough to not insist that it is a Thai restaurant to draw business.  I am ignoring the fact that it’s officially called Montien Thai Restaurant, as the Thai Restaurant part is subtitular.

I was with Kenny and Sam one night, and we decided to get some food in Chinatown before heading out to meet Vernon to play trivia. I hadn’t been to Montien in over three months, and thought this would be a good opportunity to get some Thai food. I have frequented Montien for lunch previously, if only to satiate my enjoyment of lunchtime Thai excursions. Unfortunately, compared to the rest of Chinatown, Montien is far too expensive to frequent on a weekly (or bi-weekly) basis. You can get a 9 or 10-dollar lunch special, which is filling, but quite scandalous considering you can get equal quality meals elsewhere for 6 or 7 dollars. While Montien is slightly expensive for a lunch time meal, it is VERY expensive for dinner. The atmosphere is quite nice, so you might consider taking a date there for a pre-theatre meal (or post-theatre), but 13-15 dollars a plate is quite steep for Chinatown.

I decided to get the Mussuman curry which can come with brown rice (at extra cost over white) under the notion that I wanted to eat something healthy before downing the offal from Razzy’s during trivia (it’s not real offal, just metaphorical). The Mussuman curry is a good blend of sweet and spicy with the chilies and peanut sauce pleasantly melding together. I would say that the quality of the food at Montien offsets the expensiveness of their dishes. In fact, I would argue that Montien is probably the best Thai restaurant in Boston, and comparable to Planet Thai (the best Thai restaurant in Lexington, KY). There are a wide variety of vegetarian options as many of the sauces are interchangeable between being a meat dish or tofu. Their tofu is the fried firm type that I always rave about, and makes every meal amazing.

When discussing the price of food at Montien, one must consider that most Chinatown restaurants attempt to recreate the bleakness of a Southeast Asian road stand. However, Montien attempts to recreate the atmosphere of a five star hotel in a Green Zone. So, I would argue that the cost of the food is acceptable, and since there is a wide range of vegetarian food available at Montien, I will give it four cheese sandwiches. It would get more if it made a better attempt to delineate what is vegetarian and what is not on the menu (as many sauces have fish stock as their base, and it is unclear if Montien uses fish stock as their base or not).

Montien Thai Restaurant
63 Stuart Street
Boston, MA 02116-4723 
(617) 338-5600